Nils Forsberg 1842-1934

Born in Riseberga, a small village in the Swedish province of Scania, Nils Forsberg grew up in a farming family and initially worked as an agricultural laborer. As a teenager, he completed an apprenticeship as a house painter in Gothenburg, which providentially guided him toward a more artistic path. In 1867, supported by a state scholarship awarded for a sculpture of Minerva made during his apprenticeship, Forsberg moved to Paris and joined Léon Bonnat’s studio at the École des Beaux-Arts. There, in addition to solid drawing skills, he quickly absorbed a painterly touch rich in material, inherited from the Spanish masters.

In 1870, Forsberg was trapped in Paris during the siege of the city and chose to serve as a stretcher-bearer. This close experience with a particularly bloody episode would leave a lasting mark on his work, which, like his master’s, took on a dramatic and baroque quality. In 1896, critic Richard Muther referred to him as the “Swedish Bonnat.”

Forsberg exhibited regularly at the Salon from 1872 onward and achieved recognition in 1888, winning a first-class medal for La Fin d’un héros (cat. no. 1014), a historical painting inspired by the Franco-Prussian War, now held at the Nationalmuseum in Stockholm. The following year, the same work earned a silver medal at the Exposition Universelle, reaffirming critical and official recognition of Forsberg as a history painter.

A close friend of Akseli Gallen-Kallela, Forsberg expressed his Scandinavian patriotism and caused a sensation at the 1897 Salon with a large-scale composition, Gustave-Adolphe, roi de Suède, exhortant son armée devant l'ennemi, commandé par Wallenstein, à Lutzen, le 6 novembre 1632 (cat. no. 659). This emblematic work was exhibited again at the 1900 Exposition Universelle in the Swedish section (cat. no. 30) and was later acquired by the Gothenburg Museum.

Having become one of the most prominent artistic figures in Sweden, Forsberg returned permanently to Helsingborg in 1904. There, he actively participated in reforming academic art education while continuing a career as a portraitist and decorator.

[1] Reference: Muther, R., The History of Modern Painting, London, Henry and Company, 1896, p. 355