My Dog

My Dog

1887

Oil on panel

Mått 34,00 x 32,00 cm Ram 42,00 x 40,00 cm

F 4

Bequest of Pontus and Göthilda Fürstenberg, 1902

In the small painting of his dog, Karl Georg Arsenius' qualities as an animal painter emerge. He has not only depicted the dog as it looks but has captured the animal's pitiful gaze and posture in an apt way. The female dog, of the French Bulldog breed, sits in the grass facing left and its body is seen in profile. The dog turns its head up towards the viewer, at once anxious and inviting. In front of the dog stands a shallow, orange-coloured bowl of water. The grass is greener closest to the viewer and in the background transitions into a rockier terrain covered with twigs. The dog is seen from above and the picture space is heavily cropped so that the ground fills the picture surface. The painting is fluid and sketchy with rhythmic brushstrokes and a bright, sparkling colour. In this respect, the painting has features of impressionism. Kristoffer Arvidsson

Georg Nordensvan, Svensk konst och svenska konstnärer i nittonde århundradet. II. Från Karl XV till sekelslutet, Ny, grundligt omarbetad upplaga, Albert Bonniers Förlag, Stockholm (1925) 1928, p. 289