Johan Axel Gustaf ‘Jag Acke’ ACKE
1859–1924, Sweden

Johan Axel Gustav Acke, J.A.G. Biography:

Johan Axel Gustav Acke, usually called J.A.G. Acke, originally Andersson, born April 7, 1859 at the old Bergielund in Stockholm, died September 5, 1924 in Vaxholm, was a Swedish painter, draftsman and sculptor. Acke was the son of botanist and Professor Nils Johan Andersson and artist Anna Tigerhielm, and brother of artist Elias Anckers. His sisters were also artistic. Acke grew up in Bergielund, the precursor to the Bergius Botanic Garden, which was located between today's Vasa Park and Karlbergsvägen, where his father, who was curator at the Museum had his official residence. As a child he accompanied his father on expeditions to Lapland and Gotland and illustrated his father's early work with his flower paintings. Acke was already as a 14-year-old student at the Art Academy's principle school, he continued his studies at the academy until 1882 and then he spent a period at the Edvard Perseus free school of painting. He made trips to Holland and Belgium and to France where he studied etching for FA Milus. Acke disliked the academic studies and joined the rebellious young artists at the Art Academy, but completed his studies there, however. Acke came Aland 1886 and became a member of Önningebykolonin, a Swedish-Finnish artist colony that appeared where roughly between 1886 and 1914 and whose founder was the Finnish painter Victor Westerholm. Acke painted much in Aland and got on with the other artists who perceived him as a bit odd, energetic and humorous person. He spoke jokingly of the Aland archipelago as "Malanda". Mower man is his most famous works from this period. Among the artists was a rebellious mood against the academic painting and the Dusseldorf school and you took the impression of naturalism and later Impressionism. Acke differed from the other artists in that he also painted winter outdoor designs from Åland. Open-Air Painting outdoors in winter was then unusual for practical reasons. 1887 saw Acke his future wife Eva Maria Topelius in Önningeby, but the relationship was only just friendly. When the emotions began to be torn Acke between Eva and Anna Topelius Wengberg, a Swedish artist who also painted in Önningeby, but it was Eva Topelius he married in 1891, with her father, the Finland-Swedish author Zacharias Topelius. In the 1890s, was Acke with the restoration of the medieval frescos in Uppsala Cathedral. He worked for years at a large painting, Snöljus, who represented the winter fishing on the ice in the Åland Islands and had high hopes for the painting that was sent to the Salon in Paris, but was refused, after which the couple Ackes visit to Åland thinned out somewhat. They lived at times in Finland and at times in Sweden during the first years of their marriage and took part in the Finnish art world. They spent much of his father in law, partly for economic reasons. After Zacharias Topelius death in 1898, they came to be increasingly directed towards Sweden and the Swedish art world. 1901 the couple moved Acke to Vaxholm and his residence Villa Columbines. The marriage remained childless, but during a trip in Italy 1900-1901, they met an Italian family whose son Fausto Alessio they adopted the 1903rd He was three years old. In Sweden, the couple to spend time with several of the era's better-known artists such as Carl and Karin Larsson and Richard Lindstrom. Another acquaintance was Verner von Heidenstam as Acke painted a portrait of. 1902-1903 illustrated Acke along with a couple of Finnish artists his father Zacharias Topelius Reading storybooks for children I and II. He took the name Acke 1904 and was also working under the pseudonym I and I Acke. 1912 did Acke a longer trip to Rio de Janeiro, which affected his paintings, particularly his way of depicting light. The trip, however, a drain on Ackes economy. Ackes last major work was the frescoes of the Stockholm City Hall. While working at Sweden's Vision for the National Museum, he died suddenly. Meanwhile, in Önningeby developed Acke an Impressionist outdoor painting style but later, his works have elements of expressionism, symbolism and art nouveau in the works that night dew and sunbeams from 1895 and the Forest Temple from 1901. After 1904 his work has often been linked in the crowd with outdoor vitalism and its depictions of the naked human body, the sea and sun, as in Morning Air 1911th After the trip to Brazil, his painting more impressionistic and sketch in the handling of color and light in Avenidan in Rio de Janeiro from 1912. Acke painted portraits of the Bonnier family, and also designed furniture in Art Nouveau style of the family Bonnier's house. Acke was to some extent also active as a sculptor. In their book Improbable Stories (1919) he tells humorously about their whims and antics.

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Johan Axel Gustaf (JAG) Acke. When National Romanticism and the northern lights faded away around the dawn of the new century 1900, it paved the way for a visionary Symbolism and an early Vitalism in Scandinavian art.
Johan Axel Gustav Acke, or JAG Acke as he called himself was instrumental in introducing the the new movements into Swedish art history.
When fellow artists like Anders Zorn, Bruno Liljefors and Carl Larsson became "Peintre de Salon", Acke focused beyond the horizon towards early Modernism. Well connected with Finland, through his marriage with the daughter of Zacharias Topelius, the legendary Finnish national writer, his youth was divided between Finland and Sweden. Bringing impulses from the East as well as from the West. Finnish artists were early adopting Symbolism from the hillsides of Fiesole outside Firenze.
Physically closely related to writers like Verner von Heidenstam, Gustav Fröding and Oscar Levertin, and mentally to August Strindberg, Acke became a 'painterly voice' of literature around 1890-1900.
Acke developed a deep life-long relationship with the Sea and the archipelago surrounding Stockholm. Here with it's open horizon and skerries he found the elexir for life in the deep blue waves of the Baltic. He was one of the first to adopt the Arts and Crafts movements in Sweden and made some of the most important sets of furniture in Sweden around 1900. Together with Prince Eugen, he decorated the famous Town Hall of Stockholm. He decorated the Thiel Gallery and the Bonnier family's Villa Manilla, on Djurgården, with stucco - lustro walls, introducing fairy and fairy tails into Swedish art history.

Source: http://www.artfinding.com/Biography/Acke-Johann-Axel-Gustaf/411.html http://www.jagackemuseum.se