Chapter 2. Einar Nerman – From the picturebook page to the avant-garde stage

Elina Druker | Stockholm University

This chapter analyzes recurring motifs and techniques in the Swedish artist Einar Nerman’s picturebooks Crow’s Dream (1911) and Knight Finn Komfusenfej (1923). By comparing Nerman’s books for children with his caricatures, dance and theatre productions during the 1910s and 1920s, an interaction between different media, but also between mass culture and the avant-garde, is demonstrated. The article shows that Nerman’s innovative picturebooks are influenced by international commercial graphic design and that his books for children also function as a starting point for new ideas that are transmitted to other areas of art like modern dance performances or stage design.

Published online: 29 July 2015
https://doi.org/10.1075/clcc.5.03dru

References

Primary Sources

Andersen, Hans Christian

1912 Per Svinaherde: Saga. Illus. Einar Nerman. Stockholm: Norstedt.

Nerman, Einar

1911 Kråkdrömmen. Stockholm: Ljus.

1920 Den lustiga a-b-c-boken: Ritad. Stockholm: A.-B. Ernst Frick & C:o.

1923 Riddaren Finn Komfusenfej: bilderbok. Stockholm: Svensk läraretidning.

Secondary Sources

Arthur, Marc

2012 Relâche! and Les Ballets Suédois. Performa. 14 August 2012 <http://performa-arts.org/magazine/entry/relache-and-the-ballets-suedois1 (1 July 2014).

Baer, Nancy Van Norman & Ahlstrand, Jan Torsten

1995 Paris Modern. The Swedish Ballet 1920-1925. San Francisco CA: Fine Arts Museum.

Banes, Sally

1994 Writing Dancing in the Age of Postmodernism. Hanover NH: University Press of New England.

Benjamin, Walter

1963 Das Kunstwerk im Zeitalter seiner technischen Reproduzierbarkeit: Drei Studien zur Kunstsoziologie. Frankfurt: Suhrkamp (first published 1936).

Berg, Andreas

2013 Den dansande illustratören. In Svensk illustration - en visuell historia 1900-2000, Andreas Berg (ed.), 67-85. Stockholm: Arena.

Bergstrand, Ulla

1993 En bilderbokshistoria: svenska bilderböcker 1900-1930. Stockholm: Bonniers juniorförl.

Bourdieu, Pierre

1992 The Rules of Art: Genesis and Structure of the Literary Field. Translated by Susan Emanuel. Stanford CA: Stanford University Press.

De Groote, Pascale

2002 Les Ballets Suédois. Ghent: University of Ghent, Academia Press.

Della Porta, Giambattista

1583 De humana physiognomonia. Naples: Giuseppe Cacchi.

Druker, Elina

2008 Modernismens bilder: den moderna bilderboken i Norden. Stockholm: Makadam Förlag.

Greenberg, Clement

1939 Avant-Garde and Kitsch. In Partisan Review 6: 34-49.

Hallberg, Kristin

1996 Den svenska bilderboken och modernismens folkhem. Stockholm: Stockholm University.

Horkheimer, Max & Adorno, Theodor W.

1947 Dialektik der Aufklärung. Amsterdam: Querido (first published 1944).

Jaffe, Aaron

2005 Modernism and the Culture of Celebrity. New York NY: Cambridge University Press.

Näslund, Erik

2009 Rolf de Maré: Art Collector, Ballet Director, Museum Creator. Alton: Dance Books.

Nerman, Einar

1929 Bland vackra barn och fula gubbar: Einar Nerman, 1st-3rd ed. Stockholm: Bonnier.

1996 Einar Nerman: divor & divaner. Porträtt och karikatyrer av kända artister och konstnärer. Stockholm: Dansmuseet.

Newton, Leslie

2012 Picturing smartness: Cartoons in the New Yorker, Vanity Fair, and Esquire in the Age of Cultural Celebrities. The Journal of Modern Periodical Studies 3(1): 64-92.

Thomson, John & Grandville, J(ean)-J(acques)

1876. The Public and Private Life of Animals. Edinburgh: Ballantyne, Hanson and Co.

Widenheim, Cecilia & Rudberg, Eva

(eds) 2000 Utopi & verklighet: Svensk modernism 1900–1960. Stockholm: Moderna museet.