In discussions about tapestries, a common theme emerges – the separation between the artist conceiving the design and the skilled craftsperson executing it. However, Norwegian textile pioneer Frida Hansen (1855-1931) defied this dichotomy, embodying both the artist behind the design and the hands-on weaver.
A major force behind the Norwegian textile renaissance, as a child Hansen actually wanted to become a painter and also took lessons from Norwegian landscape painter Kitty Kielland. Originally from a wealthy family from Stavanger, she gave up her own artistic aspirations when she married.
A twist of fate – her husband's trading company going bankrupt in 1888 – reignited her creative pursuits and soon she started an embroidery business from her home, developing an interest in tapestries.
After learning how to weave in Sogn, Hansen acquired a warp-weighted loom and founded Atelier for haandvævede norske Tæpper (Studio for Handwoven Norwegian Tapestries) and a dyeing workshop. She also ran a workshop that made textiles from her patterns, where she used to teach other women as well, so that they could become financially independent.
Hansen's interest in the condition of women pervades a large-scale piece entitled "Løvetand" (Dandelion, 1893), commissioned by the Norwegian Association for Women's Rights for the Chicago World's Fair (May-October 1893). The tapestry featured a woman in the centre surrounded by other women bearing dandelions in bud, bloom and seed.
In 1897 Hansen established the limited company Norsk Aaklæde – og Billedtæppe-Væveri (Norwegian Coverlet and Tapestry Weaving Mill) together with Randi Blehr and patented the "transparency technique" consisting in an alternation between dense and translucent areas in a tapestry. This decorative technique was best applied to tapestries representing flowers and plants and it is best exemplified in her piece "Sommernattsdrøm", representing a forest of trees, with birds hiding among their branches.
Hansen's designs, characterized by bright colours often verging towards the pink or salmon and Art Nouveau-inspired symbols (she had studied abroad in the mid-1890s and brought back to Norway a passion for this art movement that was at the time prevailing in Europe), became very popular.
Hansen made her major breakthrough during the Paris Exposition of 1900, where she received a gold medal for the tapestry "Melkeveien" (Milky Way, 1898), a fantasy rendition of the Milky Way with young women dressed in white gowns carrying a starry veil.
Yet, despite being acclaimed abroad, in her own country Hansen wasn't extremely famous as her tapestries didn't reflect the taste for national themes that was favoured at the time, but appealed more to international tastes and styles (that's why her works were mainly purchased by most of the major museums in Europe but were not recognised by Norwegian museums until much later).
Yet Norway is now making amends: the National Museum in Oslo has indeed just announced four university scholarships to fund further researches on Frida Hansen.
Funded by the Fredriksen Family Art Company (FFAC), they will be assigned from January 2024 to allow new studies on Hansen that may tackle not just art and textiles, but also other disciplines including philosophy and gender studies. The first scholarship has been assigned to art historian Adine Ødegård Lexow who completed her master' degree on the transparent tapestries of Frida Hansen at the University of Oslo in 2022.
Lexow has already studied Hansen's works in the light of contemporary art and gender theory, but she would like to explore the artist's intense fascination with flowers and gardens through the ecocritical theory and ecofeminism perspectives.
Influenced by William Morris, Hansen shared indeed with the English artist and textile designer a feeling of respect towards nature. This theme actually holds the potential to prompt new research about Hansen not only in Norway but beyond, extending its inspiration to artists, but also fashion designers and creative minds in our times.
