A Touch of the Modernist Mystical in Bror Nordfeldt's Prints

Bror Julius Olsson Nordfeldt, better known as B.J.O. Nordfeldt, was a Swedish immigrant, who embraced the American Modernist artistic tradition. He was known for his still lives, landscapes, portraits and religious scenes, and made prints that exude a mystical quality often found in 19th c. Japanese relief printing.

The artist was born in Tullstrop, Skåne, Sweden in 1878, and his family immigrated to Chicago, Illinois in 1891. There, he worked as a typesetter at a Swedish-language newspaper until enrolling in the Art Institute of Chicago and moving into the 57th Street Artists’ Colony.

Nordfeldt was recruited to work on a mural commissioned by the McCormick Harvester Company with local artist Albert Herter. In 1900, Nordfeldt went to the Paris Exposition, then briefly enrolled in the Académie Julien with Jean Paul Laurens. He went to England where he studied wood-block printing at Oxford and displayed work at the Royal Academy of London. He returned to Chicago in 1903 where he opened a studio and made prints and paintings. He had two shows in Chicago in 1907.

The outbreak of World War I sent Nordfeldt to California, where he painted boat camouflage, and Europe, where he served in combat units. Military service temporarily took him away from his art just as he had won a silver medal award at the 1915 Panama-Pacific Exposition.

After the war, Nordfeldt travelled from Europe to Massachusetts and New Mexico, mostly painting commissioned portraits. He moved to Santa Fe in 1917 and lived there until 1937. He was deeply involved in documenting Pueblo Indian tribes, but also was concerned to preserve their culture. He helped found the Indian Artists Fund, which attempted to foster and preserve the arts of the Pueblo.

While in New Mexico, Nordfeldt’s style changed to a brighter palette indicative of the colors found in the southwest. He painted Indian figures and ceremonies, as well as untraditional portraits and still lives which were more Modernist than his contemporaries.

In 1937 Nordfeldt moved to Lambertville, NJ where he lived for the rest of his life. He was interested in conveying the symbolic or emotional core of his subject, through flattened forms and distorted space. His late work mainly consisted of religious scenes in this same style. Nordfeldt died of a heart attack in 1955 while returning from a trip to Mexico.

Nordfeldt is known to have developed the white-line method of printmaking, which allowed for a more spontaneous way to apply color in relief printing. It was used by many printmakers working in the Provincetown area, most notably Blanche Lazelle. Some of Nordfeldt’s these Provincetown images are brightly colored, showing scenes of fishermen, but the prints that intrigue me moreso are his images of nature, and the sea. Here, Nordfeldt pays homage to the great work of the 19th century Japanese printmakers with their simplified images, cropped compositions and flattened areas of color. Here there is a similar interest in Nature and the peace one finds when engaging with it.

Nordfeldt’s lack of detail opens up these images and lets us fill in the gaps of what else may be a part of the scene he doesn’t portray. His light found in a wooded area is dark and eerie, like some of the work of Edvard Munch. As for his peaceful scenes of the sea and boats in their harbor, noticeably interrupted by a stream of fireworks, we visualize his affinity with the printed works of James Abbott McNeil Whistler. His ghostly dim, near-dark, and mist-filled evening air speaks to us in much the same way as do Whistler’s atmospheric prints.

Nordfeldt’s work resonates with those who have lived by the sea, or in the country. he understands the light that flickers and hides amongst dense brush, and he knows the glow seen at dusk as it is bounded by the low-hanging branch of a tree. The simplicity of some of his compositions are truly Japanese as he captures a single branch of a tree for us to savor its beauty. These are elegant works by an artist who loved his adopted country. Let us revisit his works and appreciate the peace we can find in our own environments.

The Most Expensive Prints in the World...Really?

Well , my fellow inksters, some scouting around for examples of the top selling original prints at auction generated some varying reports, but I think I have grasped recent information to impart. You will pardon me for not knowing the very latest information, because I don't usually hang at the local art auction house. Being an artist myself, I'm likely to spend my cash on supplies than another work of art, and besides, it seems these auction things take place quite a lot so the information is always changing. :)

My quest to find the most expensive print in the world, lead me first to Pablo Picasso’s “Le Repas Frugal”, (pictured above) which was a bit of a surprise. I mean, really, this one is nice and all, but I guess I supposed that something by Rembrandt or Durer would claim the top prize. Still, there is something in this piece by Picasso that grabs the viewer. The primordial couple sitting very intimately at a table, looking out at the world, as if they hadn’t a care. The fact this piece comes early in Picasso’s oeuvre, lends some intrigue for the period the work is associated with – namely the carnival and Rose period. The couple’s faces are drawn and their gaze seems detached from the world around them. Their bodies are elongated as one would expect to see if El Greco was alive and working in the 20thc., but they aren’t representing celestial beings, just the average Parisian starving artist.

Then, after more investigation, I discovered there are subcategories to the original print auction records, and low and behold, some other surprising names and pieces popped up. I will give a listing and a sampling of them at the end of this article. More predictably, Rembrandt’s Three Crosses,” a 1653 etching, One impression,( about 80 are known to exist), sold privately a few years ago for $1.5 million. (It's estimable value in 1967 was a mere $20k. Yikes!) Albrecht Durer figures into the same subcategory with his famous "Adam and Eve" print.

Still, moving closer to our own time period, some of the most recent art auction sales for original prints on paper are garnishing staggering sums at auction. Pablo Picasso's “La Femme Qui Pleure I” (pictured here)now claims to the top price paid for a work of art on paper in the print category. A nice little piece, considering the subject is of a wailing woman:)

One Norwegian artist's print has recently risen to the upper levels of the charts and stolen our collective hearts. It's a quiet little color print by the tortured soul Edvard Munch. His "Young Woman on the Beach", done in 1891-92, just sold for a whopping $3.2 million.

Picasso's rival, Henri Matisse, rates the number Two spot for the Impressionist/Modern category with his “Océanie, La Mer”(below). It grandly reflects his latter Joy collage work, without the usual bold colors.

Two artists from the Contemporary category who have done well, one expectantly so, is Andy Warhol. His iconic Marilyn Monroe portrait is on the top-selling list, but it's his Chairman 'Mao" 10 portraits series that has garnished over $2 million in recent sales. They seemed a sort of quirky subject, given Mao wasn't the Iconic American figure like Marilyn was, but in the 1970s, when US President Nixon went to visit the famed leader of the eastern world, it was big news and a significant step toward what became global enterprise.

For a living artist, Jasper Johns has realized a hefty price for one of his prints, "Untitled" from 1983, where this painterly impression brought in $1.5 million in 2012.It's not exactly a favorite of mine, but it easily speaks to John's paintings.

All this fuss about some dried ink on paper, but admit it, they Are treasures in the art world, and they reflect a growing art-savvy collector base. We printmakers can take encouragement from this news, as we all know we’re not giving up the 'ink in our veins idea' that original prints are worth as much as any old bit of oil paint on canvas, or a collage, or even a .... photograph.

Truly, the real thing here to pay attention to is not how Much $ these lovely pieces of paper are Worth. The real importance to any of them is the artist who decided to make an image friom his/her imaginaiton or observations. The real importance is the result we get from seeing these images and the messages they convey to our collective souls. No one auction record could ever mean anything compared to that.

Look over these stats, and chew on those numbers. Just imagine how much paper, plates and ink we could buy with that, eh?

OLD MASTERS
1. Rembrandt van Rijn, “Christ crucified between the two thieves: The Three Crosses” (circa 1660) $990,000 at Doyle New York, May 23, 1990.
2. Rembrandt van Rijn, “Christ Presented to the People: Oblong Plate” (1655)
$956,100 at Christie’s London, December 10, 1991.
3. Rembrandt van Rijn, “Christ Crucified Between the Two Thieves: The Three Crosses” (1653–61) $924,200 at Christie’s London December 5, 2006.
4. Albrecht Durer, “Adam and Eve” (1504) $655,900 at Christie’s London, July 7, 2011.
5. Albrecht Durer, “Map of the Northern Sky and Map of the Southern Sky” (circa 1515)
$577,800

IMPRESSIONIST/MODERN
1. Pablo Picasso, “La Femme Qui Pleure I” (1937) $5,122,500 at Christie’s New York, November 1, 2011.
2. Henri Matisse, “Océanie, La Mer” (1946–47) $4,774,500 at Christie’s London, June 21, 2011.
3. Pablo Picasso, “Le Repas Frugal” (1904) $3,052,400 at Christie’s London, June 20, 2012.
4. Edvard Munch, “Vampire II” (1895–1902)$2,182,800 at Grev Wedels Plass Auksjoner, Oslo, November 27, 2007.
5. Pablo Picasso, “La Minotauromachie” (1935) $1,980,400

CONTEMPORARY
1. Andy Warhol, “Mao” (set of 10 from 1972) $2,544,800 at Sotheby’s London, May 22, 2012.
2. Andy Warhol, “Mao” (set of 10 from 1972) $1,684,900 at Christie’s London, October 16, 2007.
3. Andy Warhol, “Marilyn Monroe” (set of 10 from 1967) $1,551,800 at Christie’s London, June 20, 2007.
4. Jasper Johns, “Untitled” (1983) $1,482,500 at Christie’s, New York, May 9, 2012.
5. Andy Warhol, “Mao” (set of 10 from 1972) $938,500.