Portrait of Ida, the Artist's Wife

Vilhelm Hammershøi and his wife lived in various European cities with irregular intervals.

The settlement in London For example, they lived in London from the end of October 1897 to the end of May 1898. Unlike Rome and Paris, London was not a capital of the arts at the time, and this naturally occasioned some surprise and speculation as to what made a Danish artist want to go there.

James Abbott McNeil Whistler One of the reasons was, undoubtedly, the US-born painter James Abbott McNeill Whistler (1834-1903). In London Hammershøi took a step that was quite out of character. He wrote to Whistler and tried to meet him in person, but did not succeed. The main reason for this direct appro...