The Skagen Painters was a whole artists' colony! There are so many of them! Some of the most famous are PS Krøyer, Marie Krøyer, Anna Ancher, Michael Ancher, Holger Drachmann, Lauritz Tuxen, and the list goes on! Many painters came and went from the colony, even international ones. There are Swedes, Englishmen, Norwegians, etc. featured among their ranks. Lemme find a bunch of my favourite pieces :)
Vibeke Krøyer i Skagen Plantage (Vibeke Krøyer in Skagen Plantation) by P.S. Krøyer (1909).
This is one of my favourite paintings of all the ones that came out of the colony. It's so vibrant and cozy. I have a poster of it in a (fake) golden filigree frame on my wall :)
Solbeskinnet pergola fra Ravello (Sunlit pergola from Ravello) by Marie Krøyer (1890).
This one has such peace and calm to it, it's also one of my all time favourites.
Kunstnerfest (Party of Artists) by Viggo Johansen (1903).
I have to make it so clear that the pictures do NOT do Johansen's work justice at all. I visited the Skagen Museum while they had a special temporary exhibition of a bunch of Viggo Johansen pieces and my stars, the dimension. These paintings are the kind that must be viewed in person to really be admired for their brilliance. It's sort of visible in the image above but pay attention to the glasses and silverware on the table. That's Johansen's specialty. He painted reflective surfaces like no one else. I can look at a random Skagen painting and immediately clock whether it's a Viggo Johansen on the reflections alone. They're just that extraordinary. Truly the most underrated of all the Skagen Painters.
Glade jul (Joyful Christmas) by Viggo Johansen (1891).
This is one of his most famous pieces and the image doesn't just not do it justice, it does it an outright injustice. But I still wanted you to see it. Oh and "Glade jul" is the first line of the Danish translation of Silent Night (which is the English version of the original German "Stille Nacht, Heilige Nacht").
Nature morte med krabbe (Still Life of Crab) by Viggo Johansen (1887).
Getting all the Viggo Johansen out of the way now. I could not for the life of me find a picture of a quality that was not an insult to the painting, but luckily I own a print of this one so I just took my own. (I own an absurd amount of the prints they sell in the museum, they love to see me coming and my wallet silently cries.)
Den druknede (The Drowned) by Michael Ancher (1896).
Because of Skagen's location, surrounded by the sea on three sides, the local population and industries were largely maritime. The Skagen Painters famously painted a lot of water, beaches, boats, fishermen, etc. because of these surroundings. Most of the most famous Skagen Paintings are beach focused or happen on the beach as most things did there. This is a more tragic example of this common theme.
Fiskere trækker vod på Skagen Nordstrand (Fishermen Pull a Net on the Northern Beach of Skagen) by P.S. Krøyer (1883).
Excellent example of what I wrote above. Also another excellent example of Krøyer's impeccable understanding of light.
Holger Drachmann by P.S. Krøyer (1895).
The beat thing about the Skagen Painters is how obvious it was that they spent a lot of time together and were good friends. They painted one another, painted one another painting, made paintings for one another, of one another's children, etc. It's all lovely to see how much friendship there was between them. This one I also had to photograph myself so apologies for the shoddy resolution (and awful overexposure on my computer for some reason, stars, I hope it's just my screen).
Kunstnerens hustru i morgentoilette (The Artist's Wife Preparing For the Day) by P.S. Krøyer (1893).
The male painters also famously painted their wives a lot. P.S. Krøyer and Michael Ancher especially. They also painted one another's wives a fair amount because the two spent a lot of time together. The Krøyers and the Anchers were some of the most prolific painters to come out of the colony and probably spent more time there than anyone else (Helga Ancher, Daughter of Anna and Michael Ancher, even grew up to become a Skagen Painter herself).
Marie Krøyer i haven i Skagen (Marie Krøyer in the garden in Skagen) by P.S. Krøyer (1892).
This one is just really cosy. Kind of has Monet vibes.
Hip, hip, hurra! (Hip Hip Hooray!) by P.S. Krøyer (1888).
This is one of P.S. Krøyer's most famous paintings and features several of the Skagen Painters, including his wife (sitting left), Anna Ancher (sitting right in white), Helga Ancher (child next to Anna), himself (in the back, dark suit, glasses, beard) and I'm sure Michael Ancher too (I forget how he looks so idk which one of them he is). Would not surprise me if there are more I simply don't recognise.
Fisker Kræn Wollensen bøder garn, interiør (Fisherman Kræn Wollesen repairs yarn, interior) by Anna Ancher (1886).
Anna Ancher really had a way with light as well. She seemed to favour painting flowers but I genuinely think her skills with light, people, and interiors were where she shone.
Ved frokosten (At Lunch) by P.S. Krøyer (1893).
The Skagen Painters painted mostly real people, they rarely invented people beyond for backgrounds. This is an example. This painting features PS. Krøyer (right), Marie Krøyer (middle), and real author Otto Benzon (left), despite the fact that you can barely even see Benzon's face. The commitment was real.
Overplantør C.F. Dahlerup med jagthund (Plantation Leader C.F. Dahlerup With Hunting Dog) by P.S. Krøyer (1898).
I just really like the light in this one. Very cosy. Should also be pointed out that in the bottom right, we can see how many of the Skagen Painters signed and dated their pieces by scraping their initials and the date into the paint with palette knives rather than writing, painting, or signing the back. There are examples of full lines of text like "Gift for [person] from [person] scraped into some paintings. I find this a fascinating way of viewing the signature as part of the art rather than a detail to be hidden away on the back.
Ane Brøndum i den røde stue (Ane Brøndum in the Red Room) by Anna Ancher (1910).
Yet another example of Anna Ancher's wonderful way of painting light. This is also a painting of her mother, fun fact.
Roser (Roses) by P.S. Krøyer (1893).
Yet another very famous one by P.S. Krøyer. And yet again, Marie Krøyer is featured in the background.
Uh, I don't wanna tempt fate by posting nudity on here, so here's a link to the painting.
Vent på os! (Wait for us!) by P.S. Krøyer (1892).
This one is just really sweet and also quite famous because of that. For anyone aghast that someone would paint this, let alone someone in the late 1800's, then welcome to a part of the world where a naked child is not a sexual thing and it's completely normal for children to bathe naked on public beaches because people aren't weirdos about it and know that the human body is not inherently a sexual thing, especially not the body of a child. Frankly kinda disgusting that that has to be prefaced.
Sommeraften ved Skagens Strand (Summer's Night on the Beach of Skagen) by P.S. Krøyer (1899).
This is a less famous painting of his but embodies the classic Skagen Painting vibe to a T. Had to take my own picture of this one too so sorry about the glare on the side.
Skagen, hvor Skagerrak og Kattegat mødes ved Grenen (Skagen, Where Skagerrak and Kattegat Meet at Grenen) by Holger Drachmann (1906).
Skagen lore time! Skagen's main claim to fame as a tourist destination (unrelated to the Skagen Painters) is that it sits at the tippy top of Vendsyssel (a big island that looks like it's part of the Jylland peninsula but actually is separated from it by the Limfjord) where the two seas Skagerrak and Kattegat meet. You can see this in action at "Grenen" which translates to "The Branch" which gained its name from the fact that the meeting seas shape this area into a point. The exact place the seas meet changes every day but when you find it, you can see how the waves meet and cross into these really fascinating grids that seem almost fake. In wilder weather, you can witness the waves properly collide. Absolutely recommend going to see it if you're ever in Denmark and like this kind of stuff. And for anyone visiting from a country that wasn't invaded by the Germans in the 40's, you can also witness some of our many still standing WWII bunkers. They can be found in many places but the coast, particularly the West Coast, is where you'll find the majority of the ones which are still standing. You can enter them too, provided you're willing to climb a little and get some sand in your pockets. They're not museums, they're just standing where the Germans left them.
Båden sættes i søen. Skagen (The Boat is Put in the Water. Skagen) by Oscar Björck (1884).
An example of a non-Danish painter. Björck was a Swede and painted many wonderful paintings like this one. He's not very wellknown by most which I think is a shame.
En strandpromenade (A Walk on the Beach) by P.S. Krøyer (1896).
Now we're getting into some of the most famous Skagen Paintings of all, the ones that almost define the style. The ones every single Dane has seen at least once. All of them by P.S. Krøyer. Mans was good and painted a lot and he has the fame to show for it.
Sankt Hansblus på Skagen strand (Summer Solstice Fire on the Beach of Skagen) by P.S. Krøyer (1906).
This painting is HUGE. No, bigger. No, even bigger than that. This hangs in the Skagens Museum and has been there since 1958 and covers almost an entire wall. It also took him 14 years to paint due to other tasks and illness etc. It's one of his last and the last of his large people dominated pieces and features his entire family as well as several other painters and people from the town of Skagen. Truly a beautiful culmination of the entire culture surrounding the colony, painted on the longest day of the year. Oh, funny lore tidbit: This painting was damaged by, fittingly, a fire in 1948(?). It has since been restored.
Sommeraften på Skagen Sønderstand (Summer's Night on the Southern Beach of Skagen) by P.S. Krøyer (1893).
If I had to guess, this is probably the second most famous Skagen Painting. It features Anna Ancher (left) and Marie Krøyer (right). Michael Ancher actually painted the two in this exact same scene (zoomed in on them) as well. I don't know whether it was referenced from this piece or if he and P.S. Krøyer painted them at the same time.
Sommeraften ved Skagen (Summer's Evening in Skagen) by P.S. Krøyer (1892).
This is THE Skagen Painting. There is no painting more famous. It defines the category. Featuring Marie Krøyer and their dog which is quite fitting for a definitive piece. Every Dane has seen this painting so many times that we're almost sick of it. And yet I still have it on my wall, framed in a (fake) golden filigree frame because I gotta. It's a beautiful piece.
Those were the paintings I had rn (mostly based on the prints I own which means a lot of P.S. Krøyer because his prints are most available) but I definitely missed a lot. If you want access to a very complete database of both Marie and P.S. Krøyer's paintings, there are webites for that specifically! They're entirely in Danish but if you navigate to "Galleri" and then "Oliemalerier", you'll get a page that lets you sort by year at the top and then otherwise just scroll through. You can also search for specific titles in the search bar.
Marie Krøyer
Peder Severin Krøyer
No other painters have websites like these as far as I'm aware (and Den Hirschsprungske Samling won't show me their collection on the website despite being one of the most extensive Skagen Painting collections outside of Skagen), but those two sites have a lot to start with. I know Wikipedia also has fairly good collections of several artists so just looking up their Wiki page should net some results. I recommend looking them up in Danish though (search "[name] wiki dansk" and click the link that starts with da.wikipedia) since, afaik, they tend to have more extensive collections. Here's a list of all the Skagen Painters I know that you can look into:
I hope this is enough to keep you fed for at least a little while :)
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