Jenny Nyström
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Jenny Eugenia Nyström (born June 13 or June 15, 1854 in Kalmar, Sweden; died January 17, 1946 in Stockholm) was a painter and illustrator of children’s books, but is mainly known as the person who created the Swedes’ image of the “jultomte” on numerous Christmas cards and magazine covers, thus linking the Swedish version of Santa Claus to the gnomes of Scandinavian folklore.
Childhood, education and family life
Her father was a school teacher and piano teacher, and also the cantor of the Kalmar Castle Church. When Jenny Nyström was eight years old, the family moved to Gothenburg, where her father had found a better paying teaching job.In 1865 she started in the Gothenburg art school Göteborgs Musei-, Rit- och Målarskola, today known as Konsthögskolan Valand, and in 1873 she was admitted to the Royal Swedish Academy of Arts in Stockholm, where she studied for eight years. Thanks to a scholarship, this was followed by studies in Paris 1882-1886, at Académie Colarossi and Académie Julian. While in Paris, she discovered the booming postcard market, and tried to persuade the Swedish publishing house Bonnier to start producing postcards, but they declined. She, however, eventually became Sweden’s most productive postcard artist.
In 1887, at the age of 33, she married the medical student Daniel Stoopendaal, brother of fellow artists Ferdinand Stoopendaal. Wilhelm Johan Stoopendaal, Georg Stoopendaal and Ebba Stoopendaal. Due to tuberculosis Daniel was never able to finish his studies and take up his intended profession. It was instead up to Jenny to support herself, her husband and their son thorough her artistry, while Daniel handled her business affairs. He died in 1927.
In 1933 her son, Curt Nyström Stoopendahl, followed in her footsteps and also became a popular postcard and poster artist, staying very close to his mother’s artistic style. Even his signature, “Curt Nyström”, looked like his mother’s. Likewise, her brother-in-law, Georg Stoopendaal (1866-1953), already in the beginning of the 19th century found postcards to be a good source of income, contrary to his more serious paintings, and his Christmas cards are also clearly inspired by Jenny Nyström's.
Production
In 1874 she was asked to illustrate the Christmas story Lille Viggs äfventyr på julafton (Little Vigg’s Adventure on Christmas Eve) by Viktor Rydberg, where she and the author associated the Nordic gnome to Christmas for the first time. However, she made the “tomte” much to ugly for Rydberg’s liking, so when she in 1881 was asked to illustrate his Christmas poem Tomten, which tells the story about a gnome walking around the farm on Christmas night, ensuring everything is fine, Rydberg asked her to make the “tomte” more kindly looking, whereupon she used her father as the model.Influenced from Denmark, where the tradition of the farm gnome bringing the Christmas presents had begun in the 1840’s, as a local variant of Father Christmas, the Swedes and Norwegians started adopting the same tradition in the late 1880’s, gradually pushing out the old Yule Goat as the bringer of presents – and the creator of that image was Jenny Nyström, on hundreds of Christmas cards. According to some, the Swedish introduction of the "tomte" as the bringer of presents can be dated to a picture by Jenny Nyström, called "Christmas Eve" and published in the weekly magazine "Ny Illustrerad Tidning" on December 20, 1884. It shows a winter evening scene with three "tomtar" and a sled full of presents. Jenny Nyström is also credited with making the Christmas tree popular in Sweden through frequent display in her Christmas cards.
She was a very productive illustrator, leaving behind some 3,000 postcards and 2,500 book and magazine illustrations, posters, advertisements, company brochures and paintings. Although she is mainly known for her illustrations and postcards, especially her Christmas cards, she also painted landscapes and portraits in oil or watercolor.
Her Christmas illustrations are still enormously popular in Sweden and the other Nordic countries. They can be found on dinner plates, trays, ginger snap tin boxes, wrapping paper, and, of course, as Christmas cards.
After her death at 91 years of age in 1946, the Kalmar County Museum inherited the many of her works, as well as the copyright to all her production. The museum has a permanent exhibition about Jenny Nyström and her art, which covers “serious” paintings from Sweden and France, as well an abundance of her book and magazine illustrations and postcards.
Jenny Nyström is interred in the Norra begravningsplatsen in Stockholm.
See also
External links
- [Jenny Nyström on the Kalmar County Museum website]
- [American site offering original Jenny Nyström postcards]
- [Swedish site offering original Jenny Nyström postcards]
- [American site offering original Curt Nyström postcards]
- [Swedish site offering original Curt Nyström postcards]
- [Swedish site offering original Carl Stoopendaal postcards]
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