In 1902 Carl Larsson was awarded a commission for a painting for the assembly hall of the Latinläroverket school in Göteborg. His intention was to produce a picture based on the story of St. George and the Dragon, but the idea met with tepid enthusiasm and it was abandoned. Larsson thus chose to paint a festive panorama which focused on the Swedish children whose tradition it was to decorate their school before the summer holidays with birch leaves, bouquets of flowers, brooms and rushes. Contrasting with the backdrop of this youthful parade, he also depicted the lives of adults: a woman mourning, a beggar and a guardsman to illustrate the passage of time. He called the painting "Ute blaser sommarvind" ("Outdoors Blow the Summer Winds"), an extract from Samuel Hedborn's lullaby.

Larsson worked on the painting for a year during which time he made careful observation of the people in his village of Sundborn in Dalecarlia. Many of these studies are in the Nationalmuseum, Stockholm and The Antheneum in Helsinki. Our picture dates from 1902 and depicts the young girl who forms the rear of the procession. Marianne Nilson, curator of the Carl Larsson-garden, has confirmed that the girl is Ida Erikson and that she appears in the background in one portrait of a vicar in the museum's collection.

As a young artist, Larsson had worked in Paris and exhibited at the Salon. However, from the late 1880's, he was influenced by the Nationalistic spirit, which was sweeping Sweden and he turned away from the elegance of the French style, which had characterized his earlier painting. Larsson's work idealized the life, work and traditions of the Swedish peasant, true to the spirit of his compatriot artists and poets.

In "Ett Hem i Dalarna" ("A Home in Dalecarlia") he wrote:

"Therefore, O Swede, save yourself time; become simple
and dignified; be clumsy rather than elegant; wear leather,
fur and wool; make yourself furnishings to suit your
stout body and slap on all the strong colors, yes, all right,
the gaudy ones we need to counter the deep green of our pine
forest and our cold white snow..."

This sketch is identical to the final figure in the full composition in every regard--even to the detail of the shape of the shadow cast on the ground. His fascination with strength, activity, sunlight and the clear color of Swedish folk art are all evident in our study for the young girl in the painting. Furthermore, the use of bold outline in the study is suggestive of peasant woodcuts. When "Ute blaser sommarvind" was finished in 1903, Larsson was regarded as being at the pinnacle of his career.

We are grateful to Marianne Nilson for her assistance in preparing this catalogue entry.