Literature
Ancient and Middle Ages
Little of the pre-Christian literature has been preserved. On some rune stones there are poems on the verses we know from Iceland. The oldest literature belongs to the landscape laws, which were recorded from the 13th century. Literary impulses from the south were conveyed by the church. In the 13th century, officers began writing, ie. hymns for the service. The first author with individual features was Petrus de Dacia, who wrote in Latin about his spiritual love for Kristina of Stommeln. At the beginning of the 1300’s, the Hovish poetry reached Sweden with the three verse novels called the Euphemia Papers. A little later there were rhyming chronicles, of which the Erik chronicle is the foremost. The great personality of the Middle Ages was Saint Birgitta. Her “heavenly revelations” often speak of frighteningly concrete visions and attack political and church opponents. She is one of the few Swedish writers of international importance. The 15th century was filled with war. From the political poetry, Bishop Tomas so-called Freedom Visa has retained its place in literature. Political message also has the allegories in the poem poem “Schacktavelslek”, while “The joke about abbots” with satire against monks and priests mainly want to entertain.
- Countryaah: Population and demographics of Sweden, including population pyramid, density map, projection, data, and distribution.
The medieval feudal society is the backdrop to the rich general Nordic poetry of poetry, which must have been largely created during the Middle Ages. Many songs have lived in popular tradition in the 20th century and inspired new poetry. The ballads – or folk songs, as they have long been called – alternate between epic, dramatic and lyrical attitude and have simple form, usually with chant, and stereotypical language.
Reformation and humanism
Of concern to the reformers, with Olaus Petri as the most literary, was the knowledge of the Bible and the new doctrine. Parts of the Bible had been translated during the Middle Ages, and now the work of the New Testament (1526) and the whole Bible (1541) was completed. With small changes, this so-called Gustav Vasa’s Bible came to exist until 1917. Olaus Petri’s lasting efforts include his harsh but essentially humane “Judge’s rules” and his currently objective historical writing in “A Swensk Cröneka”. However, the view of history has long been determined by the Gothicism in Johannes Magnus in Latin written “Historia de omnibus gothorum sveonumque regibus” (‘History of all the kings of the Goths and Swans’, 1554). John and his brother Olaus Magnus, both fugitives, wanted to spread their brilliance across their Nordic homeland.
Renaissance and Baroque
It was not until the 17th century that the Renaissance literature made its entry into Sweden. A foreground figure was Lars Wivallius, whose songs with his love for freedom and Swedish nature have gained a place in national literature. A conscious push to create a Swedish poem during imitation of antiquity and an enrichment of the language was made in the middle of the 1640’s by Georg Stiernhielm, “the father of Swedish painting.” The Hexameter poem “Hercules” (1658) is the first complete work of Swedish literature. In his track went a number of poets, among them Samuel Columbus with the first Swedish lyrical poetry collection “Odæ Sveticæ” (1674). Inspired by Gothicism as well as Stiernhielm, but subtler in emotional analysis was the poet who, under the pseudonym Skogekär Bergbo, probably published the sonnet collection “Wenerid” in the 1650’s. From this time there are also two important prose works:
The Baroque became increasingly clear from the 1670’s. In wedding poems, hymns and tombs, Lucidor expressed burlesque lust and death anxiety. Lessons and pious confidence characterized Haquin Spegel’s hymns and his creation epic “God’s Work and Hwila” (1685). The rich hymn poetry was crowned with the 1695 psalm book with Jesper Swedberg as the driving force. The Baroque culminated towards the end of the century with Gunno Dahlstierna’s “Kunga-Skald” (1698) as the foremost work. More subdued in his baroque are the versatile Johan Runius, the formally strict Sophia Elisabet Brenner and the elegant Jacob Frese. The most great prose of the period was written by Olof Rudbeck, d. in “Atland or Manhem” (Latin parallel title Atlantica, 1–4, 1679–1702), where he propelled the idea that Sweden is Plato’s sunken Atlantis.
Classicism, enlightenment and pre-romance
Literature’s reign of freedom and the rise of a literary bourgeoisie gave the literature a new direction. Olof Dalin turned to the citizens of Then Swedish Argus magazine (1732–34). The short allegorical “The story of the horse” (1740) conveyed his view of the kingdom’s government. In his lyrics, Dalin was primarily a complacent court poet. Hedvig Charlotta Nordenflycht wrote more personal lyrics. Her poems mark a breakthrough of emotion earlier than in foreign poetry, while at the same time she was feminist conscious and intellectually searching. Gustaf Philip Creutz wrote in the short epic “Atis and Camilla” (1761) sensitive about the pleasure and qualms of love, while Gustaf Fredrik Gyllenborg had a stoic ideal. The novel became more important; an early representative was Jacob Mörk with a couple of historical novels.
Of the many scientists of the free time, Carl von Linné has a place in the history of literature. His look for everything in nature, clearly not least in the travelogues, has been perceived by the afterlife as genuine Swedish. His view of humanity, however, became darker, as evidenced by the remarkable “Nemesis Divina” first published in 1923. Emanuel Swedenborg presented, mainly in Latin, a whole world declaration, which had significance for the poetry from romance and far into modernism.
One place for himself was Carl Michael Bellman, who in “Fredman’s Epistles” (1790) created a unique alloy of text and music, which preserves its full life force to this day. The literature received under Gustav III, which in 1786 founded the Swedish Academy, a strong support. The information requirements for reason and clarity were expertly run by Johan Henric Kellgren. In the 1780’s he went into fierce polemic against the oppositional Thomas Thorild, who represented the romance with inspiration from Rousseau and Ossian’s songs. Bengt Lidner was also prominent in his expressive emotional poetry. The body of the Enlightenment was the Stockholm Post, where Kellgren collaborated as well as Anna Maria Lenngren, who in well-toured satires and idols showed a sharp look for concrete reality. In later poems, Kellgren expressed a pre-romantic view of nature but adhered to the classic form. Pre-romance reoccupied the national. Gothicism returned with, among other things, Thorild, and the young Frans Michael Franzén sought in “Song over Count Gustaf Philip Creutz” (1797) to determine the genuinely Nordic.
Romance
Around 1810, the breakthrough of romance took place through a group in Stockholm and another around the young PDA Atterbom in Uppsala, who in the 1820’s, when the romance became questioned, published the poem’s most thought-provoking poem, “The Island of Lycksalighet” (1-2, 1824- 27). For the afterworld, however, the early death of Erik Johan Stagnelius has emerged as the foremost lyricist of romance. The third big name is the Swedish-influenced, enigmatic Carl Jonas Love Almqvist, who with “The Queen’s Jewelery” (1834) created one of the direction’s most suggestive works. Alongside the romantic coteries were Erik Gustaf Geijer and Esaias Tegnér, both Gothically inspired. Tegnér’s rhetorical poetry had long-lasting influence, but his quick, metaphorical letters have stood out best. The spiritual poetry was also influenced by the romance. In 1819, that psalm book came out,
Realism and liberalism
During the 1830’s, a new frontal change occurred. Liberalism introduced social debate and demanded, among other things, in a renewed daily press (Aftonbladet, 1830), political and social reforms. Geijer, a former conservative, resigned in 1838, and Almqvist oriented himself to realism. Almqvist’s reorientation gave a rich harvest in considerations of the issues of the time (“The Importance of Swedish Poverty”, 1838), public life depictions and “It Goes On” (1839), a novel that questions marriage. Realistic novels were also written by female writers, among them Fredrika Bremer, who in “Hertha” (1856) gave the female emancipation its symbol, and Emilie Flygare-Carlén. A number of authors were preoccupied with a realism that came to be associated with radical religious and political ideas. Like no other, Viktor Rydberg defended freedom of thought and social responsibility and criticized Christian dogmatism in the novel “The Last Athenian” (1859), pessimism in the poem “Prometheus and Ahasverus” (in “Poems” 1882) and materialism in the novel “The Arms” (1891). A more unreflected individualism paired with a sense of social responsibility characterizes Carl Snoilsky’s formal poetry.
The modern breakthrough: 80’s and 90’s
Georg Brande’s claim to literature that raised problems during debate invaded Sweden in 1880, at the same time that the Norwegians Bjørnson and Ibsen and gradually naturalism reached the country. The central figure of the eighties became August Strindberg, who already portrayed a young revolutionary in the play “Master Olof” (1872) and who in the novel “The Red Room” (1879) with its critical panorama of contemporary times created a paradigm for literature. For the next 40 years, Strindberg produced himself in different genres and from different ideological starting points. The women’s issue was run by female writers such as AC Leffler, but Victoria Benedictsson modified in “Mrs. Marianne” (1887) the radical ideas. Towards the end of the decade, social criticism was supplemented by analysis of the irrational in man, e.g. in Ola Hansson’s short stories in “Sensitive amorosa” (1887).
By then, new signals had already been hoisted. In “The Renaissance” (1889), Verner von Heidenstam struck a battle for life and beauty. With the poem collection “Pilgrimage and Hiking Year” (1888) he had shown what he intended. He was soon supported by Oscar Levertin, the period’s leading critic. Joy of life also marked Selma Lagerlöf’s novel “Gösta Berlings saga” (1891), but responsibility became an increasingly strong theme. Home-built and dying rural culture inspired the 1890’s. Selma Lagerlöf portrayed in novels and Gustaf Fröding in poems of warm-country tradition, Erik Axel Karlfeldt’s lyric had roots in Dalarna’s peasant culture and Heidenstam returned in “Poems” (1895) to Tiveden. Heidenstam became central figure in a growing nationalism with lyricism and the short story collection “The Carolines” (1-2, 1897-98). However, none of the 90’s remained in provincialism.
From turn of the century to incipient modernism
Pessimistic human view but stylistic brilliance characterized Hjalmar Söderberg’s prose art in, among other things. the novel “The Serious Game” (1912) and the novels in “History” (1898). The foremost lyricist of the period, Vilhelm Ekelund, went into poetry collections from 1900 to 1906 from symbolism and impressionism to classicist strict lyric and then devoted himself to an intrinsic prose. Hjalmar Bergman was also influenced by symbolism, but his extensive novel production portrayed with experimental storytelling techniques people whose psyche is distorted by life anxiety.
The dozen or so prose was otherwise characterized by realism with elements of satire and is about the meeting between old and new society. Hjalmar Bergman’s premises are Bergslagen, Ludvig Nordströms Norrland’s coastal cities, Elin Wägners Småland in “Åsa-Hanna” (1918), Sigfrid Siwertz Stockholm and its surroundings. The terms of the profession were described by Elin Wägner in “Norrtullsligan” (1908) and the workers by Martin Koch in “Workers” (1912), Gustav Hedenvind-Eriksson and Maria Sandel.
The First World War gave new direction to several writers. Martin Koch wrote the socially most shocking novel of the 1910’s, “God’s Beautiful World” (1916), in expressionist colored novels Hedenvind-Eriksson expressed the anguish of the time, and Elin Wägner wrote in novels in the 1920’s and 30’s a utopian matriarchy. The one who mainly gave voice to the existential anxiety, however, was the young Pär Lagerkvist, who as early as 1913 pleaded for a literature inspired by Cubism in “Word art and visual art” and gave an example of this in the poem collection “Anxiety” (1916) and in expressionist drama.
Civil idylls, academics and autodidacts
Striking in the early 1920’s is the attraction to the idyll. With his Peace Poetry, Birger Sjöberg became perhaps the most popular poet of the decade. In the 1920’s, Lagerkvist also expressed a reconciliation with life in a love story. But the idyll was deceptive. The short story collection “Evil Fairy Tales” (1924) forbade the revelation of human evil in the works Lagerkvist created in the shadow of Nazi victory train, “The executioner” (1933) and “The Dwarf” (1944). In the epoch-forming collection of poems “Crises and Wreaths” (1926), Sjöberg showed an abyss of anxiety beneath the idyllic surface.
Old cultural values, including the Christians, were highlighted in virtuoso traditional form by a series of lyricists, many with academic education. Hjalmar Gullberg with “Spiritual Exercises” (1932) and other poetry collections, and Nils Ferlin with “Barfotabarn” (1933) became the most loved poets of the 1930’s, while Johannes Edfelt’s lyricism was increasingly characterized by strict form and dark outlook on life.
During the 1920’s and 1930’s, writers appeared with worker and peasant origins, who received poor training and were called autodidacts. They could portray unique experiences. Vilhelm Moberg drew on the individualist peasant’s struggle against the new era, Ivar Lo-Johansson and Jan Fridegård the gloomy life of the staters and Moa Martinson’s factory workers’ chances. The early European-formed, artist-conscious Eyvind Johnson went his own way with novels about the modern society and its problems of ideas. The aforementioned and many others published autobiographical novels in the mid-1930’s, which received a large readership.
Most notable among the many female prose artists was Agnes von Krusenstjerna with portrayals of high-status girls’ mental development. Her sexual portrayals in the Pahl series attracted debate and contributed to the reaction to openness in the mid-1930’s. Some of the autodidacts with Artur Lundkvist and Harry Martinson at the forefront, with impulses in futurism, expressionism and surrealism, launched a modernist lyric; In 1929 came the collection “Five young”. Lyricists with academic education also joined modernism, e.g. Karin Boye, who was influenced by Clarté’s socialism and Freudianism. However, for the most radical advance, Gunnar Ekelöf responded with the collection of poems “late on earth” (1932). Towards the middle of the 1930’s, a modernist retreat took place, partly under the impression of the spread of Nazism. Ekelöfs lyric became more traditional and Harry Martinson abandoned the lyric for prose books for a time. inspired “Linnean” books about Swedish nature.
The victory of modernism
With World War II, the existential issues came to the center. The new generation of lyricists wanted to combine modern content with chaotic form. The dark outlook on life that violated 1930’s primitivism became the subject of heated debate, as did the modernist form. After 1946, one can speak of the victory of modernism. Erik Lindegren’s “man without a road”, 40 “broken” sonnets with a surrealistic image flow, came out as early as 1942 but at a commercial publisher only in 1946. The second lyricist – and foremost debater – of the 1940’s was Karl Vennberg, who with “Halmfackla” (1944) introduced the ironic, initially influenced by lyric that would fill a series of poetry collections over decades. Werner Aspenström grew from “Snow Legend” (1949) on verse and prose symbolic poems, ironic considerations and nature miniatures.
To the 1940’s, Maria Wine and Ruth Hillarp count in lyric about poor female experience and Elsa Grave with distinctive grotesque poems. Older lyricists such as Bertil Malmberg and Hjalmar Gullberg took the impression of modernism and published some of their most important poetry collections during the 1950’s. Harry Martinson was heading in the opposite direction. But his poetry about environmental degradation and the dangers of technology, which was crowned with the science-fiction bag “Aniara” (1956), has received new news. Ekelöfs lyric was renewed with the critically trying “Färjesång” (1941) and the Eastern inspired Diwant trilogy from the late 1960’s.
The 1950’s are marked by great interest in lyricism, where the gains from modernism were exploited by poets such as Lars Forssell, Tomas Tranströmer and Bo Setterlind. Traditional consciousness and formal elegance distinguished Lundaskolan with Göran Printz-Påhlson, Ingemar Leckius, Majken Johansson and Anna Rydstedt – the three latter became Christian confessors.
The 1940’s prose was represented by Lars Ahlin, who claimed an anti-naturalistic aesthetic and in his novels embodied an evangelical radical democracy, by Sivar Arnér, who, with provocative acumen, clarified essential ideas, and by Lars Gyllensten, also his idea poet, who inspired Kierkegaard. different attitudes to life issues. Gösta Oswald stood with labyrinthine, allusive prose works for the most extreme modernism. With his novels about anxiety and guilt, Stig Dagerman became something of a generation of poets, “The Serpent” (1945) and “The Island of the Damned” (1946).
During the 1950’s, Artur Lundkvist increasingly turned to the prose and wrote a lyrical short prose. Eyvind Johnson wrote his greatest works, among them historical novels “About Our Own Time” such as “The Time of His Grace” (1960). Among the 50’s writers who in various ways renewed the prose include Per Olof Sundman, who wrote about the Nordic wilderness on a scarce, behavioral prose. Catholic Birgitta Trotzig portrayed human vulnerability in dark, symbolic novels. In Sven Fagerberg’s “Höknatt” (1957), Jung’s psychology and Zen Buddhism combine in an experimental form, taught by Joyce and Eliot. Lars Gustafsson depicted modern life attitudes in varied experimental authorship (novels, poems).
In the midst of all the experimentation, the realistic novel, represented both by older writers such as Vilhelm Moberg with the “Emigranteposet”, the great fresco of emigration to America, survived, and Ivar Lo-Johansson with new suites of autobiographical works and novelist, and by younger sculptors of rural areas. Sara Lidman with “Tjärdalen” (1953) and big city as Per Anders Fogelström with “Summer with Monika” (1951).
Community engagement and documentary
In the mid-1960’s, a power surge occurred. The demand for community engagement was met with the same force as in the 1880’s. Many poets abandoned the lyrics, e.g. Göran Palm and Folke Isaksson, and many even the fiction novel for the documentary novel or “report book”, the most representative genre of the period. Göran Sonnevi stuck to the lyrics but wrote in original, staccato-like form about the difficult but necessary in taking a position.
Even before 1965, a “new”, realistic lyric had been launched; now it survived, i.a. in Sonja Åkesson’s pictures of women’s everyday lives. Sundance’s “Engineer Andrés Aviation” (1967) and PO Enquist’s “The Legionnaires” (1968) are among the documentary novels of the period. The report book was introduced by Jan Myrdal, the period’s leading folk tribune, with “Report from the Chinese Village” (1963).
Several prose writers wrote about the conditions in the world, including Per Wästberg, Sara Lidman and Sven Lindqvist. Grotesque illustrations of Swedish society and mentality gave PC Jersild in “The Pig Hunt” (1968) and “Babel’s House” (1978). In the 1970’s, domestic issues came back to the fore, mainly women’s issues. The woman’s conditions and female consciousness were portrayed by Gun-Britt Sundström in “For Lydia” (1973) and Inger Alfvén in “Daughter to a daughter” (1977).
The return of literature
The epic novel came back in the 1970’s in the form of suites depicting a funnel in the break between old and new. The beginning happened with Sven Delblanc’s four novels about the heathen villagers (1970–76) in a rural Södermanland during the 1930’s. About the late 19th century Södermanland is the suite by Kerstin Ekman that begins with “The Witch Rings” (1974).
Sara Lidman returned to Västerbotten with a suite initiated with “Your servant hears” (1977). The Västerbotten of the 19th century is also the venue for Torgny Lindgren’s “Ormens Road on the Hill of Mountains” (1982) and PO Enquist’s “Musicians’ Outing” (1978). Social and psychological problems were raised by Per Gunnar Evander, Lars Andersson and Göran Tunström.
Towards the end of the 1980’s, the private, semi-documentary novel gained a strong position. Delblanc’s suite about his family, opened with “Samuel’s Book” (1981). A postmodernist, hot cool prose has been written by Stig Larsson. Lars Norén and Bruno K. Öijer represent a metaphorical, almost surreal lyric and Katarina Frostenson a hermetically closed, while Kristina Lugn continues the everyday realism of the novelty and Tobias Berggren follows a more classy path. Female consciousness and emotional life have gained lyrical interpreters in eg. Eva Ström and Ann Jäderlund.
Before and after the turn of the millennium
In recent decades, prose art has evolved in different directions. The idea novel has received important additions with Lars Gustafsson’s multi-faceted authorship, for example “The History of the Dog” (1993). Also Agneta Pleijel’s “Fungi” (1993), PO Enquist’s “Levi’s Journey” (2001) and Carl-Johan Vallgren’s “The History of Wonderful Love” (2003) belong to this category, as does Peter Nilson’s natural science novel.
The documentary element that has always been prominent in Enquist’s writing is also found in many others. Carina Burman (“My Blessed Brother Jean Hendrich”, 1993), Ernst Brunner (“Moist Your Ash”, 2002) and Stewe Claeson (“The Round Glow”, 2002) have made a living in Swedish literary history, while Sigrid Combüchen (“Byron”, 1988) and Carola Hansson (“Andrej”, 1994) were inspired by the international history of literature. Carina Rydberg brought the documentary to the forefront with her widely debated autobiographical novel “The Highest Caste” (1997).
The psychological novel was further developed by Inger Alfvén, who already in the 1970’s became familiar with the gender role novel “Daughter to a Daughter” (1977), and Inger Edelfeldt, who is also a prominent author of youth books.
Klas Östergren and Björn Ranelid have created widely-read novels about strange existences. A commitment to the weak also characterizes several of Ola Larsmo’s works, which “Heaven and earth may burn” (1993). Göran Hägg’s satirical novels also often have a socially critical cap. A criticism of the Swedish people’s home gave Majgull Axelsson in his popular novel “April witch” (1997) and in the field of lyricism Göran Greider has given situation reports from today’s Sweden based on the ideology of the labor movement.
Elise Johansson won many hearts with her trilogy about the working girl Nancy and her upbringing and development during the 1930’s and 1940’s (started with “The Glass Birds”, 1996). Kjell Johansson and Ylva Eggehorn have richly depicted childhood environments from the middle of the last century. A few decades later, Jonas Gardell’s novels play out with the same theme, such as “The Coming of a Comedian” (1992), as well as Mikael Niemi’s “Popular Music from Vittula” (2000). Niklas Rådström, in a romance suite, started with “The Moon Doesn’t Know” (1989), also stayed at childhood and focused the relationship with the father. About a father relationship is also about the quirky Peter Kihlgård’s “Instructions to a father” (1996).
Mare Kandre was, with her richly dense imagery, a distinctive voice in Swedish prose literature, from her debut in 1984 to her untimely death in 2005. The multifaceted puberty depiction “Bübins young” (1987) is considered a masterpiece. Deeply original are also Lotta Lotas’s experimental and sometimes hallucinatory novels about man’s desire to explore the unknown. A religious and erotic theme permeates Christine Falkenland’s authorship.
The crime novel has experienced a strong upswing in recent years and many talented writers have appeared in the genre such as Henning Mankell, Håkan Nesser, Åke Edwardson, Inger Frimansson, Åsa Larsson and Aino Trosell. A posthumous breakthrough was achieved by Stieg Larsson, whose detective novels became a great success even internationally.
A fresh addition to our literature from the last few years is Jonas Hassen Khemiri’s novels with his broken Swedish and his humorous and ironic tone in the novels “An eye red” (2003) and “Montecore” (2006).
In the lyrics, Bodil Malmsten has partly continued the simple everyday realistic line from Kristina Lugn, while Eva Ström and Eva Runefelt built on the tradition of modernism. Ström is happy to combine medical experiences with a female imagery, while Runefelt’s lyrics are characterized by sensuality. Katarina Frostenson has consolidated her position as a modernist poet and has also worked with cross-border forms (“The Beaches”, 1989), while Ann Jäderlund’s sometimes hard-to-reach lyric has developed towards greater openness. A distinctive lyrical suite from the area of Bohuslän (started with “Olunn”, 1989) was Gunnar D. Hansson’s breakthrough as a poet. A personal address also characterizes Birgitta Lillper’s lyric. A new form of estrad poetry is the competition form poetry slam, where among other things. Bob Hansson and Daniel Boyacioglu broke through.
Children’s Literature
The history of Swedish children’s literature begins, apart from religious and educational writings, in the 1750’s with the fables of Olof von Dalin and CG Tessin’s letter to the future Gustav III. The collection of fairy tales and folk verses in the 1830’s and 1940’s was of great importance, which left traces in children’s editions, in picture book verses and in modern fairy tales such as Astrid Lindgren. Influential also became Zacharias Topelius and the women who created the Swedish children’s book’s first high period around the turn of the 1900, for example. Elsa Beskow, Laura Fitinghoff, Anna Maria Roos and Anna Wahlenberg.
The wartime import of fantasy and nonsense contributed to the great breakthrough in 1945 with Astrid Lindgren’s “Pippi Longstocking”, and authors such as Lennart Hellsing, Tove Jansson, Hans Peterson and Martha Sandwall-Bergström. The following decades led to innovative efforts by Maria Gripe, Harry Kullman, Gunnel Linde, Barbro Lindgren, Inger and Lasse Sandberg.
During the period 1970–85, for example, Gunnel Beckman, Inger Brattström and Sven Wernström for a problematic depiction of youth, while Gunilla Bergström, Ulf Nilsson, Viveca Lärn and Siv Widerberg wrote and still write for younger children. A century after the first flowering, the area is characterized by both literary narrators for youth (Inger Edelfeldt, Peter Pohl, Mats Wahl) and internationally recognized picture book creators such as Lena Anderson, Eva Eriksson, Anna Höglund, Olof Landström, Mati Lepp, Ulf Löfgren, Sven Nordqvist and Anna-Clara Tidholm.
Drama and theater
Reformation and Baroque
The newly established Lutheran Church was prepared in the 16th century to take the performing arts in the service of theological pedagogy. The oldest Swedish drama, “Tobie Comedia”, is probably written by Olaus Petri as a school drama for his disciples in Stockholm’s big school. At Uppsala University, Johannes Messenius used the theater as an instrument to make students familiar with Sweden’s fairytale history. At Queen Kristina’s culturally ambitious court, the nobility performed allegorically mythological ballets at the castle Three Kronor.
International comedian companies from the 1630’s visited Stockholm and other places in Sweden fairly regularly with a repertoire that could entertain a socially layered audience. The student theater in Uppsala received a temporary boost in the 1660’s under the leadership of Urban Hiärne. In 1682, the theater troupe Dän Swänska Theatren was started in the university’s exercise house. In 1686, the troupe moved to the theater of the Lion Ball at the castle Three Kronor. The group focused on developing a Swedish literary language, which is why it wrote the dramas itself, even though the ancient myth and dramaturgy were derived from well-known classic models. The experiment attracted such attention that Parliament for the first time began to discuss the need for a domestic performing arts.
Free time and Gustavian era
During the free time, the hat party believed that the performing arts were the most appropriate art to assert the Swedish language’s intrinsic value. The foreign theater companies were therefore banned, and in 1737 the Swedish Comedy started a regular theater operation at the Bollhuset in Stockholm. Although much of the repertoire consisted of Swedish adaptations of foreign dramas, it also contained Swedish originals such as Carl Gyllenborg’s character comedy “Swedish jumping hawk” and Olof von Dalin’s ancient Nordic tragedy “Brynhilda”. The troupe was allowed to leave in 1754 to a French actress called by Lovisa Ulrika. On his accession to the throne in 1771, Gustav IIIdismiss the squad, including as an indication that cultural policy should be given a more national focus. He invested in opera art through whose rich décor and imposing music he could reach a wider audience with his message. Early on he also wanted to strike a battle for Swedish speech drama with the aim of developing the language through a smooth dialogue and a rhetorical-expressive word choice. He established the Royal Swedish Dramatic Theater in 1788, giving Sweden a national stage, which would take care of domestic drama and performing arts.
The wider audience in the capital and the countryside during these decades had the opportunity to be satisfied by Harlequin fares and comedies by Ludvig Holberg, primarily through Petter Stenborg’s actor group, formed when the Swedish Comedy ceased. This man succeeded in engaging Swedish comedy writers such as Olof Kexél and CI Hallman to write original pieces with a broad popular foundation. With a more serious repertoire, son Carl Stenborg was able to win a larger Stockholm audience at the Munkbroteatern in Stockholm. Eventually, however, competition from the newly established royal speech scene became too fierce, and in 1799 Stenborg sold his privileges to Gustav IV Adolf. This created a royal monopoly, which lasted until 1842.
Realism, naturalism and symbolism
The conditions for Swedish performing arts improved during the 1840’s by the construction of several new theater venues. This resulted in a lively theater business of artistically ambitious traveling theater companies. The royal theater monopoly in Stockholm was broken as Anders Lindeberg started the New Theater, and in the latter half of the 19th century additional new scenes were added in the capital. In addition, the conditions for the illusion-creating effects of the stage art were radically improved as it gradually changed from wax candles to oil lamps and in the middle of the century to gas lights, which in turn were replaced by electric light. The theater decoration developed an increasingly rich splendor of ethnographic and historical detail realism. During the 19th century, a new professional role emerged, the modern director.
By August Blanche’s popular and time-conscious drama and FA Dahlgrens in national romantic folk tradition anchored the song “Wermländingarne” (1846) gained a certain domestic character in Stockholm. Otherwise, the theaters repertoire was mastered by the French pièce bien faite. The genre contributed to the spread of stargazing.
A radical reversal happened with the slogan of the Nordic breakthrough to put the issues under debate. It received its response on stage at the end of the 19th century, when the directors began to interpret Zolas, Ibsen’s and Bjørnson’s open socially critical dramas. AC Leffler also listened to these appeals, which in their plays highlighted various women’s issues in connection with contemporary emancipation movements.
Strindberg, who during the 1870’s renewed the cherished Swedish history drama of the century with “Master Olof” (1872), in his naturalistic dramas from the end of the 1880’s came to dissect with deep-bore passion the frustration between the sexes, trapped in the tight rules of contemporary society. In doing so, he made his first internationally significant contribution as a playwright. The second, which occurred at the turn of the century and the years that followed, is characterized by a drama that dealt with overall religious-existential conflicts embodied in a new symbolic dramaturgical form. With his wandering dramas, dream games and chamber games, Strindberg set his contemporary performing arts to new challenges with demands for a simplified playing style and a stylized playground.
1900’s and 2000’s
International theater theoretical ideas gained a pervasive importance for Swedish performing arts during the first half of the 20th century. The modern directing art in Sweden was introduced around 1920 by Per Lindberg and Knut Ström at the Lorensberg Theater in Gothenburg. Olof Molander followed up these efforts on the Dramaten during the interwar period. The legacy was managed and developed independently by Alf Sjöberg, who for fifty years as a director at Dramaten gave Swedish theater a distinctive character.
Through a series of cultural policy measures, at the middle of the century the expanded Swedish theater life’s municipal and state-financed theater scenes became increasingly important, while the private theaters played a more limited role. The often debated idea of folk theater, which aimed to give the performing arts a broader popular anchorage, was realized to some extent in 1933, when the Riksteatern with its broad tour activities was introduced.
An important role in the postwar theater life played the experimental cellar theaters of the 1950’s, where different aesthetic orientations were tested. During the late 1960’s, the free groups became very important, including the National Theater in Gothenburg and the Free Proteatern. In connection with a radicalized cultural debate, they created a politically conscious theater of agitation. Institutional theaters could, however, respond to these new style endeavors. through Alf Sjöberg’s innovative artistic grasp in the sets of Almqvist’s works during the 1950’s. At the Gothenburg City Theater, the ensemble improvised during the rehearsals during the rehearsals to present contemporary socially critical projects such as “The Fleet”, “The Sandbox” and “The Home” with Kent Andersson and Bengt Bratt as literary figures.
As the professional performing arts manager and defender, Ingmar Bergman has played a dominant role. The puppet leader Michael Meschke has made a significant contribution to puppet theater for both children and adults.
During the 20th century, many prose writers dealt with contemporary conflicts in dramatic form, including Vilhelm Moberg, B.-E. Höijer and PO Enquist. A more experimental drama was tried by Hjalmar Bergman in his symbolic puppet play and by Pär Lagerkvist in his early expressionist drama. The same can be said about Stig Dagerman’s partially strindberg-influenced plays. Lars Forssell is related to the dramaturgy of literary cabaret or avant-garde and in recent years Lars Norén has in his production given the dialogue lyrical luminosity while exposing the underlying demons of everyday life.
During the last decades of the 20th century, theater life was broadened through a number of county and regional theaters. More free and often politically radical groups were also added, including the Theater Galeasen in Stockholm. Among the directors of the time are Lennart Hjulström and Peter Oskarson, who both united a scenic modernism linked to the folk theater traditions. At the same time, the Swedish children’s and youth theater, through its artistically high wealth and with theater leaders such as Suzanne Osten at Young Klara and Eva Bergman at Backa Theater, has reached world renown.
Dramatists include Niklas Rådström and Magnus Dahlström, who are both interested in the problem of evil. Lars Norén has also continued to take an interest in such issues, later also as a director. Among other things, he was responsible for the highly controversial project “7: 3” (1999) with Nazi interns on stage.
In the 2000’s, the gender distribution of playwrights among dramatists, directors and theater leaders has begun to change seriously, as has ethnic homogeneity.
Revue
For the Swedish revyns story see the revue.
Film
Cinematography, the new invention that made it possible to project “live images”, was introduced in Sweden in 1896 by Danish, French and German presenters. The first time projected film was shown to paying audiences was at the industrial and craft exhibition in Malmö on June 28, 1896. The public breakthrough came at the Stockholm exhibition 1897, when the first minute-long Swedish film recordings were also recorded and shown.
Over the next few years, interest in the country was spread by the traveling viewers, and a few years into the 20th century a gradually denser network of permanent cinemas began to emerge (compare cinema).
In 1909, Charles Magnusson at AB Svenska Biografteatern (Swedish Bio) in Kristianstad initiated a continuous production of Swedish feature films. In 1911 he moved the business to Stockholm and a newly built film studio at Lidingö. There, during the 1910’s, the directors Victor Sjöström and Mauritz Stiller developed an increasingly competent filmmaking, which during a period around the end of the First World War reached world reputation – “the golden age of the Swedish silent film”. Not least was their admiration for the artistic, dramatic and character-forming character of the magnificent Nordic nature artistically utilized. The Swedes’ most famous work was also based on a literary material unusually qualified for the international film industry, for example. Stiller’s “Mr. Arnes’s money” (1919) and Sjöströms “Körkarlen” (1921) after Selma Lagerlöf’s novels.
During the first world war, Svenska Bio got some competition from Hasselbladfilm in Gothenburg, where the director and production manager Georg af Klercker 1915-17 developed outstanding productivity.
In 1919, all major companies in the Swedish film industry merged into the monopoly-like AB Swedish Film Industry (SF) under the leadership of Charles Magnusson. The recordings were moved in 1920 to a modern and lavish giant facility in Solna, Råsunda Filmstad. However, the heyday was short. Both Sjöström and Stiller and the latter’s star finds Greta Garbo moved to Hollywood in the early 1920’s, while the Swedish film after the war lost its economically favored position on the world market. A period of financial, artistic and quantitative decline followed.
Economically, the rescue came with the audio film, which during the 1930’s gave Swedish film an exceptionally large audience in the home market. In addition to SF, Europa Film established itself as a large production company with simple listening games as a specialty. Popular actors such as Fridolf Rhudin, Edvard Persson, Adolf Jahr, Thor Modéen, Åke Söderblom, Dagmar Ebbesen and Sickan Carlsson made big profits for the film companies, but artistically, the Swedish 1930’s film got a near legendary bad reputation for vulgarity and general turmoil (compare p.). The most productive and reputable director of the period was Gustaf Molander. launched the new international big star Ingrid Bergman in some refined melodramas, eg. “Intermezzo” (1936) and “A Woman’s Face” (1938).
The Second World War led to a sharp increase in production of Swedish entertainment films, but also a cultural tightening and a renewed interest in national, social, ethical and religious motive choices in the spirit of preparedness. A large part of the formal and substantive renewal came through Alf Sjöberg, who among other things. with the valley painting paraphrase “The Heaven Play” (1942) and the outrageous school depiction “Hets” (1944) suggested new ways of using the medium. By his side, Hasse Ekman established himself as a brilliant film narrator with a lot of wit and great seriousness. The dominant film personality of the war, however, was folk comedian Edvard Persson, who for a few years exercised a public attraction unparalleled in Swedish film history.
After the war, economic trends became uncertain for the Swedish popular film, which paradoxically seems to have favored the artistic ambitions. Four leading film companies – SF, Europa Film, Sandrews and Nordisk Tonefilm – gave relatively great artistic freedom of movement to a number of serious working but very different filmmakers such as Arne Sucksdorff, Nils Poppe, Hampe Faustman and Arne Mattsson over the next ten years. Hasse Ekman made his best films, including “Girl and Hyacinths” (1950). Alf Sjöberg made Swedish film world famous again with “Miss Julie” (1951).
Ingmar Bergman stood for the most brilliant career, culminating with award and global attention for the comedy “Summer Night’s Smile” at the festival in Cannes 1956. A quarter of a century ahead, until the farewell film “Fanny and Alexander” (1982), he maintained his position as a of the world’s most admired filmmakers. During the 1950’s, for example, “The Seventh Seal” and “The Smultron Place” (both 1957) to the most influential articles in film art, during the 1960’s for example “The Silence” (1963) and “Persona” (1966) and during the 1970’s for example. “Whispers and Cries” (1973).
For the Swedish film industry as a whole, a dramatic and difficult-to-handle decline began towards the end of the 1950’s, with prominent television as a major cause. To the extent that the audience at the cinemas decreased, the production companies’ artistic will decreased. Now came the time of the liberated sexual depictions. The Swedish nudity had proved recordable already with “She Danced One Summer” (1951) and in the 1960’s came to embody the image of Swedish film abroad with sensationally successful successes such as “Angels, there are…” (1961), ” Dear John “(1964),” I’m Curious – Yellow “(1967) and” The Language of Love “(1969). Olle Hellbom’s film formations of Astrid Lindgren’s children’s books were also among the publicly available films during the 1960’s.
What saved the survival of the artistically aspirated film over the next few years was the so-called film reform, which was carried out in 1963 following a film agreement between the state and the film industry. The reform included that large funds were added to the quality film production via a support system administered by the newly established Swedish Film Institute. The institute’s dynamic and controversial director Harry Schein gave the film a central place in the Swedish cultural debate. In this new film climate, several young determined directors could make their debut. Vilgot Sjöman, Bo Widerberg, Mai Zetterling, Jan Troell, Kjell Grede and Roy Andersson. Several of them engaged in politicized filmmaking in harmony with the general societal atmosphere of the time.
During the 1970’s and 1980’s, the decline in cinema continued at the same time as the film’s life-giving effects gradually diminished. Lust games, comedy and father’s were still publicly available genres and were successfully cultivated by humor collectives such as Swedish Words (eg “Picasso’s Adventure”, 1978), The Madness / After Shave (eg “Leif”, 1987) and the circle of films about the Jönsson League (since 1981) or by directors such as Lasse Åberg with, above all, the “Sällskapsresan” 1-5, 1980–2011), the first part of which beat all time Swedish public records with 2.1 million. Lasse Hallström qualified with the emotionless child portrayal “My life as a dog” (1985) for a continued and successful directorial career in Hollywood. The focus on children’s films in the aftermath of the early Astrid Lindgren films continued and gave Swedish film policy strong goodwill abroad.
An encouraging feature of the time was also that female directors made their first claim on a broad front, for example. Marianne Ahrne, Marie-Louise Ekman and Suzanne Osten. At the beginning of the 1980’s, three of the most magnificent works in the history of Swedish film were added. Ingmar Bergman took a grand break from film art with his magnum opus, “Fanny and Alexander” in 1982. In 1985, the ex-Russian film artist Andrej Tarkovsky directed his last film – “The Victim” – in Swedish production and with international funding. At the same time with Bergman, Jan Troell recorded “Ingenieur Andrées aviation”, a freezing, cruel chamber play in the polar desert about a misguided Swedish heroism. It was the most spectacular exponent of the period’s flamboyant interest in historical biographies on film (such as Gunnar Hellström’s “Raskenstam”, about the reputable solo artist,
Otherwise, the stage was characterized by increasing economic and creative instability and by revolutionary changes. Harry Schein was forced to resign as director of the Film Institute in 1978. The 1980’s video boom and the media revolution that culminated with the introduction of advertising television hit the film industry very hard. Several of the film companies came to bankruptcy. SF was bought by the Bonnier companies in 1983, whereupon Europa Film was in turn incorporated in SF in 1984. Thus, only one competitor remained, ie. Sandrew. In the early 2000’s, this classic film company also found it too good to close down the recording business and divest its cinema chain. In order to prevent an imminent total concentration of power in SF, the chain was bought by a newly formed ownership group, Astoria Cinemas, which, however, after a short time in 2007, was forced to give up and finally let SF take over these cinemas as well. The Swedish cinema industry was thus returned to a monopoly situation similar to that which occurred when SF was formed through the merger in 1919.
Similar structural changes took place on several levels towards the end of the 20th century, with continued instability as a result. Sweden’s integration into the European community also had an impact on the film industry. Stockholm lost its age-old and obvious position as a production center as the growing recording industry in West Swedish Trollhättan was able to take advantage of regional EU policy. The audience’s consumption patterns for the motion picture media were also radically changed over a couple of decades. Long into the 2000’s, both the rental and purchase markets for video films steadily increased, while the number of cinema visits decreased. In 2005, the frequency of visits to Swedish cinemas reached its lowest level since the First World War (14.6 million).
In parallel with this development, on the other hand, cheap digital technologies have changed the conditions for both production and projection and distribution of film. The possibility of recording films with publicly acceptable qualities is no longer only reserved for money-intensive film companies. This was one of the reasons why during these film production, even during these uncertain times of structural change, it was kept at a fairly even level (too large in many people’s view). Nowadays it was mainly linked to small and medium-sized production companies and maintained by a state support system, administered by the Swedish Film Institute.
A few individual projects had sufficient potential to succeed in the biomarket without grants. The popular “genre production” that has taken off with the pleasure game wave in the 1970’s and 1980’s spread to new areas. Violent crime films about the police commissioners Wallander and Beck (based on Henning Mankell’s and the author couple Sjöwall-Wahlöö’s characters) were produced in long series and received great demand at home and abroad. Swedish horror films also proved internationally viable, e.g. Tomas Alfredson’s “Let the Right Come In” (2008) after John Ajvide Lindqvist’s vampire novel. The most expensive recording project in Swedish film history was devoted to a couple of grand action film animations by Jan Guillou’s epic romance suite about the crusader sire Arn (2007–08).
The director and screenwriter Richard Hobert profiled himself with his film suite about the Seven Deadly Sins (eg “Spring for Life”, 1997). Britten Colin Nutley demonstrated in several successful films, e.g. the audience success “Änglagård” (1992), a well-developed sense of genuine Swedish motifs. A number of immigrants from more distant continents than Nutley revitalized the repertoire with multicultural experiences that proved dramatically – and comically – grateful. The biggest successes were Josef Fares (born in Lebanon) with eg. “Jalla! Jalla! ” (2000). Cultural clashes in everyday Swedish environments of everyday origin were also decidedly accurate and poignant in a series of films that Maria Bloms praised “Masjävlar” (2004) and Johan Klings “Darling” (2007). Björn Runge became the 2003 critic’s favorite by “If I turn around”, a drama about betrayal in many dimensions.
A couple of directors of the older generation went on to create original and personalized film artworks that were rewarded with awards and tributes around the world. One was Jan Troell with “Hamsun” (1996), “Maria Larsson’s Eternal Moment” (2008) and “Judgment on the Dead Man” (2012). The other was Roy Andersson with “Songs from the Second Floor” (2000), “You Live” (2007) and “A Pigeon sat on a branch and pondered on existence” (2014), which was awarded with the Gold Lion at the Venice Festival.
Of the 1990’s new film talents, Lukas Moodysson proved to be uniquely promising. In 1998 he stood for a formidable audience and critic success with the youth and small town portrayal “Fucking Åmål”. He showed the breadth of his artistic record with the outrageous trafficking tragedy “Lilja 4-ever” (2002) and eventually with the lavish international relationship drama “Mammut” (2009).
The dominants of the 2000’s and 2010’s on the humor side have been the duo Måns Herngren and Hannes Holm, Måns Herngren’s brother Felix and Ulf Malmros. After a series of successes with TV productions such as the series “S * M * A * S * H” (1990), Måns Herngren and Hannes Holm broke through to the cinema with “Eva and Adam” (1997) and continued with “The Class Party” (2002)) and “Every other week” (2006) before going different paths. On his own, Herngren the film “Everything flows” (2008), while Hannes Holm reaped success with critically acclaimed “Heaven is innocent blue” (2010) and the audience success “A man named Ove” (2015), the third largest audience magnet in Swedish film history.
For Felix Herngren, the film’s success in cinema was delayed until 2013 with “The Hundred Year Old who stepped out of the window and disappeared” (sequel 2016). Ulf Malmros, on the other hand, has had a more varied career with, among other things, “Smal Sussie” (2002), “The King’s Servant” (2006), “The Wedding Photographer” (2009) and “My so-called Dad” (2014).
One of the brothers who made their mark in the decades was Daniel and Tomas Alfredson. Daniel Alfredson had a long career in television behind him when he made his breakthrough in 1997 with film with “Tic Tac”, followed by, among other things. “The Wolf” (2008) and the two internationally successful Millennium films “The Girl Who Played With the Fire” and “The Air Castle That Exploded” (both 2009). Tomas Alfredson went from Killinggänget to the international success with the horror movie “Let the Right Come In” (2008), which paved the way for his English-language debut “Tinker, Tailor, Soldier, Spy” (2012). It was Hollywood’s career for Daniel Espinosa, who, after his debut in 2004 with “Babylon’s Illness”, was well-known far outside the country for the gangster movie “Fast Cash” (2010). After moving across the Atlantic, he made the spy thriller “Safe House” (2012) and the science fiction movie “Life” (2017). Other notable directors during the period are Jesper Gansland (“Farewell Falkenberg”, 2006; “Apan”, 2009), Fredrik Edfeldt (“The Girl”, 2009; “Faro”, 2013), Pernilla August (“The Swine Alongs”, 2009; “The The Serious Game ”, 2016), Lisa Aschan (“ The Monkeys ”, 2011), Lisa Langseth (“ To the Beautiful ”, 2010,“ Hotel ”, 2013), Anna Odell (“ The Reunion ”, 2013) and Gabriella Pichler (“Eating Sleep Dying”, 2012).
With the 2017 film reform, they broke completely with Harry Scheen’s 53-year-old film contract model and made the funding state-wide. Cinema VAT increased from 6 to 25 percent. At the same time, the cinema-based cinema fee of 10 percent was abolished. The industry gained influence through three councils, which had to spread power over the distribution of state film support, which in the first year amounted to SEK 545 million.
International stars
After the superstars Greta Garbo and Ingrid Bergman, another large number of Swedish actors have made international careers. Signe Hasso, Märta Torén, Viveca Lindfors and Mai Zetterling made great success in Hollywood during the 1940’s and 50’s, while Zarah Leander and Kristina Söderbaum were compromised as reputable stars in Nazi films. From the 1960’s, several of Ingmar Bergman’s actors became extensively involved in foreign films as well, for example. Bibi Andersson, Harriet Andersson, Ingrid Thulin and Lena Olin. Ulla Jacobsson also opened an international career, especially in German film 1955-75.
During the new millennium, Stellan Skarsgård, Peter Stormare, Malin Åkerman, Alexander Skarsgård, Noomi Rapace, Alicia Vikander and Rebecca Ferguson made a career in Hollywood.
On the director’s side, Lasse Hallström has made a large number of costly and reputable films in the USA. Also Mikael Håfström (Swedish directorial debut 2003 with “Evil” after Jan Guillou’s novel) and Lukas Moodysson have embarked on promising international careers. The filmmaker and music video director Jonas Åkerlund has achieved great fame, not least as mega star Madonna’s director.
documentary film
Alongside the feature film, the Swedish documentary has its own story. During the silent film years immediately after the First World War, the ethnographic “reality movie” also had a heyday, resulting in a long line of prestigious film expeditions to exotic countries, led by, among other things. Prince Wilhelm. In the 1930’s, journalism was especially favored by the transition to audio films and gained great popularity not least thanks to the pregnant and easy-to-hear speaker voices.
During the Second World War, nationally edited short film documentaries were given an important role in emergency preparedness. As short films, Arne Sucksdorff created a series of masterpieces during the 1940’s and 1950’s, mainly nature films but also poetic miniatures of a different kind, such as the Oscar-winning “People in town” (1946). With the internationally acclaimed “The Great Adventure” (1953) he took the step to the feature film format. In 1950 came another Oscar-winning Swedish documentary, Thor Heyerdahl’s and Olle Nordemar’s travel adventure “Kon-Tiki”.
Towards the end of the 1950’s, the documentary lost its attraction at the cinemas but got a new forum on TV, where Jan Lindblad became a world name with his elaborate animal films from exotic countries. Alongside the Swedish Film Institute, FilmCentrum, an organization of free filmmakers formed in 1968, helped to maintain production and distribution in the long term even outside television. A familiar socially critical documentary tradition emerged, represented by, among other things, Stefan Jarl (eg “A Decent Life”, 1979, “The Revenge of Nature”, 1983) and Maj Wechselmann (eg “The Viggen 37 – The History of a Military Plan”, 1973, “U-boat! certainty ”, 1985).
Since the end of the 1980’s, the Swedish documentary film inside and outside TV has been one of the most vital elements of the media repertoire. Among the most remarkable efforts of the 1990’s in the genre are Elisabeth Wennberg’s trilogy about world shamanism (eg “Schaman”, 1994) and Mikael Kristersson’s bird depiction “Falkens eye” (1998). Kristersson returned in 2008 with yet another exquisitely attractive feature film in feature films, entitled “Light Years”. In 2008, it also meant a breakthrough for the documentary film as a feature on the cinema repertoire, where for almost 50 years it has been difficult to assert itself publicly. For example, record-breaking success Nahid Persson Sarvestani’s “The Queen and I” about the filmmaker’s meeting with Farah Diba, the detronized Iranian Shah’s widow.
Animated movie
At the same time with Sjöström and Stiller, the Swedish film director Victor Bergdahl had great success at home and abroad with a series of technically advanced small silent films about “Captain Grogg”. Only during the 1980’s did Swedish film-makers again gain a corresponding international position through Stig Lasseby’s “Pelle Svanslös” (1981) and Per Åhlin’s “Journey to Melonia” (1989), a paraphrase on Shakespeare’s “The Storm”. Younger Swedish animators mainly work with children’s films on the TV market. Most notable abroad is Magnus Carlsson, for example with the series about “Lisa” and “Robin” – not always as child-allowed as they sound. In the 2000’s, in particular, Johannes Nyholm has had great festival success, among other things. with “The Little Doll Boy” (2008). Compare animated movie (History).
Regional Film Policy
The need for a regional structure for film culture was put forward by the Swedish Film Institute (SFI) in the late 1980’s. This resulted in the film becoming increasingly an integral part of the regions’ cultural policy in the 1990’s, mainly through the establishment of regional resource centers for film and video, aimed at production, distribution and film-cultural work for children and youth (t. eg school cinema). From 1997, SFI administers state aid to these regional resource centers. Such are now found in all 21 counties. The most established are Film in the West (Västra Götaland), Filmpool Nord (Norrbotten County), Filmpool Jämtland and Film in Dalarna. In addition, some resource centers, including Film in the West and Filmpool Nord, have been able to strengthen their operations with the support of EU structural funds. Film in the West (founded in 1992) based in Trollhättan has developed into a significant film production center and since the end of the 1990’s has co-produced about half of the annual Swedish feature film production, including. Josef Fares ”Jalla! Jalla! ” (2000) and Lukas Moodysson’s “Fucking Åmål” (1998) and “Together” (2000). They also cooperate with abroad and co-produced e.g. Lars von Trier’s “Dancer in the Dark” (2000, winner of the Guldpalmen in Cannes), which was recorded in Trollhättan and its surroundings. Film in the West, which has two film studios, also offers training for film workers and young filmmakers in the region. ”(2000) and Lukas Moodysson’s“ Fucking Åmål ”(1998) and“ Together ”(2000). They also cooperate with abroad and co-produced e.g. Lars von Trier’s “Dancer in the Dark” (2000, winner of the Guldpalmen in Cannes), which was recorded in Trollhättan and its surroundings. Film in the West, which has two film studios, also offers training for film workers and young filmmakers in the region. ”(2000) and Lukas Moodysson’s“ Fucking Åmål ”(1998) and“ Together ”(2000). They also cooperate with abroad and co-produced e.g. Lars von Trier’s “Dancer in the Dark” (2000, winner of the Guldpalmen in Cannes), which was recorded in Trollhättan and its surroundings. Film in the West, which has two film studios, also offers training for film workers and young filmmakers in the region.
Photography
For the history of Swedish photography see photography (The artistic expression and Bruksfotograf).
Art
For Sweden’s oldest art, see rock carvings, picture stones and runic inscriptions.
THE MIDDLE AGES
The connection to the Roman Catholic Church made murals as well as sculpture in stone and wood into significant art forms in Sweden. Influences came from many directions, mainly from the south, but also from England and Russia. Initially, most of the new art was created by foreign artists. In the stone sculpture, where Lund’s cathedral (in Danish Skåne) played a significant role as a mediator of foreign style impulses, a number of domestic masters appeared early. An important category of Romanesque art objects consists of pictorial baptisms of stone. Many are on Gotland or have been manufactured there. Another significant group of Romanesque sculptures is made of wood and mainly comprises the arched crucifix and the representations of the Virgin Mary with the child. The Romanesque mural was concentrated on the church’s main partition, the Triumphal Arch.
During the Gothic and Late Middle Ages many churches were provided with vault paintings instead. As a rule, this did not happen until the 15th century. Wooden churches were also painted internally, both in the roofs and on the walls. The Gothic stone sculpture got a rich development on Gotland, where many churches were now rebuilt and provided with new portals. High standing Gothic stone sculpture can also be found in the cathedrals in Linköping and Uppsala, where foreign stone masters were active. Gothic wood sculpture is also significant.
During Gothic, the most important art impulses came from both France-England and northern Germany. The influence of the Gothic homeland France was particularly strong in the archdiocese, where several sculptures from the beginning of the 13th century appear to have been made by French artists. During the 15th century, sculptures and painted altar cabinets from northern Germany, primarily Lübeck, became important elements in the Swedish church room. One of the most remarkable art objects of the Swedish medieval period, the Lübeck artist Bernt Notke’s sculptural group “Sankt Göran and the dragon” in Stockholm’s Great Church, joins the North German altar cabinet art.
After the Reformation
After 1527, the position of visual arts in Sweden changed radically. It would take half a century before the churches even began to order new sculpture adornments even on a modest scale, and instead it became the king and the nobility that accounted for most art acquisitions – even for the church environment. It now became a rule within the ruling circles, which existed until the beginning of the 18th century, that called-in trained and time-conscious champions from the continent were called in if necessary. Gustav Vasa called in some artists, Jacob Binck from Cologne and Willem Boy from the Dutch Mecheln, and Erik XIVhired some painters from Antwerp, including Steven van der Meulen and Domenicus ver Wilt. While Boy and Ver Wilt worked here for an extended period of time, the others appear to have only stopped while performing their duties. Boy was not only a painter but also a sculptor and architect. There are a few Swedish names; This probably includes Urban Painter, which is considered to have made the “Vädersolstavlan” in Stockholm’s main church (1535). Among the significant sculptural works from the Reformation period are a number of tomb monuments. Gustav Vasas in Uppsala Cathedral by Boy and several different places in the then Danish Skåne. During the 1600’s, it grew in ia. Gothenburg and Jönköping painters who were responsible for ceiling paintings in both churches and manor houses.
A significant Swedish sculpture was started in 1661 by Erik Dahlbergh, who drew from Swedish castles, cityscapes, etc., which were published in copper engraving as “Suecia antiqua et hodierna” (first published in 1716). Among the great powers of portrait painting called Johan Baptista van Uther, Jacob Heinrich Elbfas and Hendrick Munnichhoven. Sébastien Bourdon came in 1652 and stayed for a year. In 1651, the northern German David Klöcker, adlad Ehrenstrahl, was summoned, who came to stay as a court painter in a high Baroque spirit and form a school in Stockholm. At the same time with him Martin Mijten’s d.ä. from The Hague as a portrait painter in Stockholm. Ehrenstrahl was succeeded by his sister David von Krafft from Hamburg, who made several famous portraits of Karl XII. During the free time, several students responded to von Krafft, among others. Lorenz Pasch i.e. for portrait needs. He spent a few years in England, where Ehrenstrahl’s student Michael Dahl came to work for good. In conjunction with the construction of Stockholm’s castle, many, especially, French artists were summoned. sculptors Bernard Foucquet and Pierre Hubert L’Archevêque.
In the middle of the 18th century, the popular living room painting began to flourish and developed rich and distinctive decorative storytelling styles in Dalarna, Halland, Småland and Hälsingland. One of Rokokon’s foremost painters in S. was Carl Gustaf Pilo. In Paris, pastel painter Gustaf Lundberg and the younger Alexander Roslin studied, both reputed portrait painters. They also worked longer times in Paris as did the miniature painter Peter Adolf Hall, who became a big name in his field, as well as Niclas Lafrensen dy who won success with his morals. In Paris, both portrait painters Lorens Pasch dy and Per Krafft d.a. The latter also developed a bourgeois genre painting, as did Pehr Hilleström, who also took an interest in the life of the Swedish rural population. Our principal pre-Romantic landscape painter Elias Martin studied in London and represented an English type of colorism. English romance also characterizes Carl Fredric von Breda’s art and is a feature of Per Krafft dy’s portrait painting despite being trained at David in Paris. The first significant sculptor in Sweden was Johan Tobias Sergel, who completed his education first in Paris and then in Rome. He started in the Rococo style but then became a leading Swedish representative for the new antiquity.
1800’s
Originally a craft painter, Pehr Hörberg developed around 1800 a personal, color painting of religious images. Pupils for Sergel were Johan Niclas Byström and Bengt Erland Fogelberg, both of whom were educated in Rome. Fogelberg came to do some of our most famous royal statues. Classicism also applies in painting, such as in Gustaf Wilhelm Palm’s landscape. But often classic and romantic features are mixed, as with landscape painter Carl Johan Fahlcrantz and to some extent also with idyllic Edvard Bergh. The latter also linked to the folk painting, which became an appreciated genre during the romance and early represented by Per Wickenberg, as well as towards the middle of the 19th century by a long line of painters. Of these, Bengt Nordenberg and Kilian Zoll studied in Düsseldorf, sometimes also in Paris, such as Ferdinand Fagerlin and August Jernberg, as well as Marcus Larson, who became known for his powerful dramatic landscapes and marines, and Johan Fredrik Höckert, who became a leading history painter. Within that genre Georg von Rosen developed a more archaic style.
Paris became even more dominant through realism and outdoor painting for a number of the leading artists of the 1870’s, both for landscape painters such as Alfred Wahlberg and history painters such as Gustaf Cederström and Nils Forsberg. The next generation was entirely French-oriented. These included a number of significant landscape painters, such as Carl Skånberg, Hugo Salmson, August Hagborg, Per Ekström and Carl Fredrik Hill, a truly prominent colorist as well as the versatile Ernst Josephson, both early isolated by mental illness. They developed widely distinct, yet distinctive and significant depictions during their illness. The same generation and circle also included the sculptors Per Hasselberg and Christian Eriksson and Nils Kreuger.
The 1900’s and 2000’s
The great majority of Swedish artists had joined forces in 1885 in an opposition movement (Opponents) against the Academy of Fine Arts’ education and management of art life and the following year formed the Association of Artists, which would play a central role in Swedish art for a few decades. In the 1890’s, they were connected to them, partly as pupils at the association’s school, landscape painters like Ivan Aguéli – with strong roots in pre-modernism – Stockholm painter Eugène Jansson and the youth influenced by Art Nouveau Gustaf Fjæstad and figure painters such as the symbolist Olof Sager-Nelson, the realist Carl Wilhelmson, who took up neo-impressionistic features, and – somewhat later – Ivar Arosenius with his fairytale miniature art. Also close to symbolism was the young Carl Milles, whose sculptural art matured during the 1910’s with features of ancient archaic and realistic sculptural tradition. Karl Isakson became the foremost among many representatives of the Cézanne tradition in Sweden. From the next generation from the School of the Artists’ Association, many broke up and went to Paris to study for Matisse. With a joint exhibition in Stockholm in 1909, they made the first real manifestation of modern art in Sweden. The gathering figure here was Isaac Grünewald, whose wife Sigrid Hjertén was a leading colorist in the circle; This also included Leander Engström and Einar Jolin, as well as Gösta Sandels and Birger Simonsson, who had special significance for the painting in Gothenburg. There also appeared, among other things. Carl Kylberg with an increasingly free coloristic painting. As a teacher at Valand School of Art, Simonsson and his successor Tor Bjurström gained decisive influence in the direction of free colorism in the spirit of Matisse and Bonnard. The distinctive and significant Gothenburg colorism developed in the young Gothenburg painters during the 1920’s-30’s. It was represented by Ragnar Sandberg, Inge Schiöler, Ivan Ivarson and Åke Göransson. More centered on Stockholm was the development with strong elements of naivism that was represented by, among other things, Nils Dardel and Hilding Linnqvist. Naivism was associated with the sculptor Bror Hjorth with a emphasized material primitivism and during the 1920’s raised strong features of curiosity among, among others. Otte Sköld and Arvid Fougstedt, while this direction gradually among others. Sven Erixson became a feature of colorful expressionism. This included Albin Amelin, Evert Lundquist and Vera Nilsson in a generation of significant colorists. During the 1920’s, radical post-cubist tendencies played a major role, at Gösta Adrian-Nilsson associated with expressionism, at Otto G. Carlsund consistently purist, with Christian Berg in his sculptures with features of organic abstraction. Surrealism made its entrance into Swedish art with the sculptor Eric Grate and returned with him after a more classical development in the 1930’s, while during this decade surrealism was mainly represented by the Halmstad group, with among other things. Erik Olson, Sven Jonson and Stellan Mörner.
A new generation focusing on geometric abstraction and constructivism, the so-called concreteists, emerged in 1947: Lennart Rodhe, Olle Bonniér, Karl Axel Pehrson, Lage Lindell and others. Next to them was sculptor Arne Jones. Somewhat later, Olle Bärtling appeared with strictly non-figurative compositions. At the same time, in Malmö, imaginism developed as an expressive and poetic variant of surrealism, with Max Walter Svanberg, CO Hultén and Anders Österlin. Endre Nemes, who also had surrealistic connections, also introduced strong impulses from the Picasso circle’s modernism when, around 1950, he led Valand’s art school in Gothenburg. The painting direction continued with abstract tendencies among others. Rune Jansson and Ulf Trotzig, while the new expressiveness is associated with the emphasized depiction of the former debuts, the sculptor Bror Marklund and the painter Staffan Hallström, and the younger Torsten Renqvist, later especially the sculptor. This trend continued as a main stream through several decades with painters such as Erland Cullberg and Lena Cronqvist and a monumental artist such as Roj Friberg.
In the 1960’s, a richly varied Swedish neodadaism emerged with elements of pop art with, among other things, Carl Fredrik Reuterswärd, Öyvind Fahlström, Erik Dietman and Per Olof Ultvedt. Olle Kåks represents a further development from this tendency in a painterly direction. The role and possibilities of the image in relation to language and the world of mind began to be explored with neorealistic appropriations by Ola Billgren, focusing not least on the structures of nature by Jan Håfström and others. During the 1970’s, many artists came to engage in socially and politically engaged representations, sometimes neorealistically as with Peter Tillberg, Dick Bengtsson, Gerhard Nordström and John-e Franzén, often with satirical and grotesque means such as Lena Svedberg and Lars Hillersberg and Petter Zennström, who then became representative of the new wave of painting risk, predominantly non-figurative expressionism that characterized the 1980’s, when, among other things, Max Book and Rolf Hansson appeared.
In the older generation, around 1980 tend to associate traditional image objects with some certain but apparently inaccessible meaning content, as different as in Torsten Andersson’s painterly character-like objects and the late Elis Eriksson’s associated cardboard objects translated by writing. Within the sculpture, at the same time, a strong focus on the raw stone material’s own rhetoric applies, among other things. at Takashi Naraha and Pål Svensson. The legacy of constructivism and minimalism is clearly evident in Stina Ekman and Fredrik Wretman, but the latter tends to neutralize the expression in ordinary everyday forms rather than using completely neutral forms. Truls Melin’s sculptures appear to be strictly constructive objects, but have associations both to the world of play and to technology. The latter applies even more to Ulf Rollof, whose sculptures may seem poetically suggestive, while often containing and displaying advanced technical solutions. Already in the 1970’s, Ulrik Samuelsson had often designed magnificent installations that form rooms with different objects and shapes, sometimes as permanent elements in the public environment. The installation as a form of expression can then be found in widely different artists. The large driftwood sculpture “Nimis”, which Lars Vilks built up outside the frame of art life with driftwood by the sea, has that character and at the same time is perhaps our only significant example of the category The installation as a form of expression can then be found in widely different artists. The large driftwood sculpture “Nimis”, which Lars Vilks built up outside the frame of art life with driftwood by the sea, has that character and at the same time is perhaps our only significant example of the category The installation as a form of expression can then be found in widely different artists. The large driftwood sculpture “Nimis”, which Lars Vilks built up outside the frame of art life with driftwood by the sea, has that character and at the same time is perhaps our only significant example of the categoryland art; however, it also became an event, an artistic provocation, whose response is returned to the work as part of its expression. In his special way, Dan Wolgers has created provocative events in everyday life, just as Charlotte Gyllenhammar has done with more poetic means.
By the 1990’s, a long line of younger artists definitely broke the boundaries between photography and visual art in the traditional sense, with suggestive interpretations of older photographs, such as Maria Miesenberger’s, and as pure photographs whose motives were first physically built up for the purpose, for example.. Ingrid Orfali and Annika von Hausswolff, or as a collage of often specially made motifs, sometimes alternating with direct painting, as with Maya Eizin Öijer. At the same time, video art and film have had an explosive development as expressive art beyond the areas of the feature film within the visual arts. Important efforts have been made there by Ann-Sofi Sidén and Felix Gmelin. In one and the same work, several combined projectors are often used, as well as many installations containing several moving video elements.
Most of the artists mentioned in connection with photo and video art have also created standalone objects and gradually become more and more applicable with painting or sculpture of a more traditional kind. At the same time, the new realism lives on undisturbed in the early 2000’s with new representatives, among others. in Lars Lerin’s and Peter Fries’s lyrical, fine art landscape landscapes. But even with the new freedom to choose and compile materials, many artists still use the painting as a traditional picture scene, such as Karin Mamma Andersson with a rich painting in often large and magnificently narrative paintings or Linn Fernström in conceptually complex images.
Cartoons
For the history of the cartoon series in Sweden see cartoon series (Sweden).
Crafts
Even when the Renaissance was in full bloom on the continent, the medieval forms remained in the Swedish crafts. The furniture stock of the older Vasatids was very limited and, by type and style, a depositor of the North German, during the latter part of the period with Dutch elements. In return, there was a rich and artistically advanced inlay art, preserved in wall panels and cabinets. Not least, the textile splendor was highly developed. Benches and coffins were covered by the clothes, and to the guest banquet were hung large cloth ceilings under the roof, a custom that seems to have been unknown outside the Nordic countries. Woven wallpapers were in use early and were also manufactured in Sweden, we know; among other things, the Vasahovet brought a suite of wallpaper to their movements between the castles.
The Great Power and Gustavian times
During the time of the great power, the desire for luxury grew, and chairs and tables with sculpted and gilded decorations were largely imported from France as well as silver pieces from Germany; both categories became subject to imitation. Alongside this Carolinian high baroque there was an English-influenced, more bourgeois flow, which extended into the late Baroque. With its tighter design language, it also gave room for national features; among other things, alrot became one of Swedish furniture carpenters favored veneer.
The golden age of Swedish handicraft was in the second half of the 18th century. The attraction to the simple and unadorned who got their start during the Late Baroque was further reinforced, primarily by JE Rehn, who, as a designer at the Manufacturing Office, provided the art industry with designs and models. The starting point was the French fashion styles, rococo and then neoclassicalism. In their sworn version they received a touch of moderate elegance, which we have come to regard as genuine Swedish. Rokokon soon spread across the country, and the interiors were enriched with small furniture and interior details such as gilded console tables, mirrors and mirror lamps, painted floor clocks, etc. However, the fashion furniture in front of others was the curvy, veneered office. Despite its French origins, it acquired an unmistakably Swedish character and was produced in a significant amount of furniture carpenters such as Nils Dahlin, Christian Linning and Lorentz Nordin. Above all, the high-end home was the poorer, but even the bourgeoisie had become a clientele during the free period. The firm retained its popularity during the Gustavian period, then in straight form. The oblique patterns that have been the most common decor of the rococo bureau were replaced by antiquarian inlays of urns, festoons, lyre and storage wreaths. The incomparable champion of the genre was Georg Haupt, who excelled in more demanding compositions with amorins or trompe l’œil type.
Part of what is considered specifically Swedish is the tile stove. It got its final design in the 1760’s and played a more important role with us than in any other country, both practical and aesthetic. Similarly, the tea table with faience tray and wooden shelves is to a large extent a Swedish phenomenon, despite French origin and manufacture in, among other things. Denmark. Great Swedes in their severe splendor were the porphyries that were produced in Älvdalen and which became known in other countries through state gifts.
1800’s
Virtually every style in Sweden has developed in two directions, one string and pompous, the other more low-key and pleasantly bourgeois. When the French emirate of the turn of the century reached our country in 1800, it was adopted by the court and the castle saddle, while in other environments it was linked to the British-influenced Bedouin Stavian style with mahogany and smooth brass moldings as the main means of expression. Particularly noticeable were the British impulses in Western Sweden, where the French style will never really have an attachment. Here, instead, the classic Swedishism created by CW Carlberg and the British-trained furniture carpenters in Lindome dominated. In southern Sweden, too, they looked west, towards Denmark and the Biedermeier with its neat, comfortable furniture.
The historical styles in the middle and second parts of the 19th century led to an internationalization and thus equalization of the craft. Only with the Art Nouveau style did national noises begin to re-assert itself.
1900’s
Pioneers of the new, artistically-crafted arts and crafts were primarily Alf Wallander and Gunnar G: son Wennerberg. The Swedish Art Nouveau style was in spring bloom at the Stockholm Exhibition in 1897, but was already in bloom at the Baltic Exhibition in 1914. With the Swedish Slöjdföreningen as a driving force and with Gregor Paulsson’s slogan “Beautiful everyday goods” as a goal, a renewal of the art industry grew in the latter half of the 1910’s. An important milestone was the Home Exhibition 1917 with its social aesthetic program. A number of artists were now linked to the industry, including Simon Gate, Edward Hald and Wilhelm Kåge, and Carl Malmsten, Elsa Gullberg and Märta Måås-Fjetterström started their groundbreaking operations.
During the 1920’s, the craftsmanship came to play a prominent role in Stockholm’s new monumental buildings, with forms that in line with the ideals of the time were characterized by a sheer classicism (see twenty classicism). At the end of the decade, there was a movement in the continent in the architecture and the art industry that radically broke with the historical styles and took the appropriateness and new technology as the starting point for production. Functionalism gained its first and largest manifestation in Sweden with the Stockholm Exhibition in 1930. During the 1930’s, the range of standard industrial art products of good quality was broadened. Josef Frank introduced his exclusive furniture and crayons and Bruno Mathsson started his career as our internationally best-known furniture designer. Within the silversmith, Erik Fleming and Wiwen Nilsson consolidated their leading positions.
During World War II, individual craftsmanship flourished. In the ceramics, the experimentalist Stig Lindberg became more prominent, and in the textile arts, among others, appeared. Barbro Nilsson with picture fabrics and rugs and Lisbet and Gocken Jobs with flowery fabric prints. After the war, idyll and homeland romance were to give way to an abstract cleanliness in forms and patterns. The home’s linen supply got colors and new designs through Astrid Sampe, who also introduced new materials. Viola Gråsten also emerged as an important artist. An important silver designer was Sigurd Persson, who also made an important contribution as an industrial designer, and in ceramics Karin Björquist became increasingly leading.
Around 1960, there was a shift in interest from the hitherto dominant art industry to, on the one hand, industrial design, on the other, individual crafts. Leading industrial designers had an engineering education instead of art schools behind them, while the arts and crafts conquered a new freedom that increasingly became a focus on free art. Pioneers in ceramics were Anders Liljefors and Hertha Hillfon, and as significant creators in the textile arts, Kaisa Melanton, Sten Kauppi and artists such as Lennart Rodhe and Siri Derkert appeared at the Friends of Handicraft under Edna Martin’s direction. Silver forging and jewelery also had a shining period in the 1960’s. In glass art, the renewal at the glassworks took place through designers such as Gunnar Cyrén, Erik Höglund and Bertil Vallien until its studio glassestablished itself in Sweden. In the 1980’s and 1990’s, however, glassworks have re-asserted themselves through prominent designers.
The blonde and factual object culture that has characterized Swedish craftsmanship since the middle of the 20th century has in recent decades been replaced by an international design language that seeks strong expressions rather than expediency and beauty. One example is the young art of furniture, represented by Jonas Bohlin and Mats Theselius, who, in contrast to IKEA’s construction kits and the rational units of the computer world, mainly seek sculptural expressions and material effects with their furniture.
See also glass art, jewelery art, ceramics, furniture and room decor.
Architecture
The article only deals with the overall architecture of Sweden. For more detailed descriptions, see the architecture section in the respective landscape article.
THE MIDDLE AGES
Sweden’s medieval profane architecture was mainly made of wood. Of stone were built mainly defense towers and castles as well as merchant houses in Visby and Stockholm (Old Town). A main monument is the Visby ring wall, erected during the latter half of the 13th century.
Some of the church architecture was also built of wood, especially in the early Middle Ages. During the 1100’s, however, the art of stone building got its breakthrough, with the cathedrals and monasteries as the main monument. Early centers for the church stone building were Lund, Sigtuna and Gamla Uppsala, as well as Husaby and Alvastra. In Gotland, stone church building was started in Visby, and in Skåne the church in Dalby and a precursor to Lund’s cathedral were already built during the latter half of the century. Many Romanesque churches were built as defense churches and subsequently designed, for example. several round churches. As a rule, however, a Romanesque parish church was built with a rectangular longhouse, a square choir and often even a semi-circular abyss in the east. The west towers were unusual, and where they appeared they often had an empor (a gallery of barns), which opened onto the church room. This had an open roof chair or flat wooden ceiling. Some churches were built with towers over the choir, so-called east towers, and on Öland many churches were equipped with towers in both east and west.
During the Gothic period, the brick had its breakthrough as a building material. The main monument became the new town churches and monasteries of the 13th and 13th centuries, the latter usually belonging to the Franciscan or Dominican Order. The cathedrals in Strängnäs and Västerås as well as Uppsala cathedral were also built in brick, but in the new cathedrals in Linköping and Skara as well as in Vadstena monastery the building material became limestone. The same applies to the church architecture of Gotland, which during the Gothic period had a rich flowering, both in Visby and in the countryside.
During the 16th century, medieval architectural art lived on in both the wooden architecture and the large city churches and the Vasa kings’ palaces – in the palace, however, with increasing elements of the Renaissance and new fortification forms, such as in Vadstena and Kalmar. With Johan III appeared a builder with great ambitions, but of his castle construction only fragments or ruins remain, as in Borgholm. The architecture of the later Vasa era was formidable. brick facades with decorative window coverings and other carvings, steep ceilings and high spiers.
After the fire in 1625 in the Old Town in Stockholm, Sweden’s first grid plan was built, covering the block at Nygatorna. On a larger scale, it gained successors throughout the country over the coming decades, from Luleå and Piteå to Gothenburg and Karlskrona, and Sweden’s architecture has been under strong influence from Stockholm ever since. Only in Skåne and – to a certain extent – in Gothenburg, a building culture independent of the capital has been developed.
With Nicodemus Tessin i.e. and Jean de la Vallée became an architect in the middle of the 17th century, a professional designation also in Sweden. Under de la Vallée’s leadership was completed around 1674 the Knights House in Stockholm, built with pilasters and manor roofs that came to be imitated for a long time to come in the noble country castles and manor houses. Similarly, Catherine Church in Stockholm, also de la Vallée, became the model for a large number of wooden cross churches in Sweden and Finland.
A new Roman building ideal was launched during the second half of the 17th century by Tessin d. and dy with Kalmar Cathedral and Tessin Palace in Stockholm. Initially perceived as strict and foreign, this ideal soon emerged as Swedish through the rebuilding of Stockholm Castle which, after the fire in 1697, turned into total new construction. The castle building was completed following the death of Tessin Dy by Carl Hårleman who also, from French starting points, formulated the more mundane version of the 18th century Swedish building art, which spread throughout the country through town halls, mansions and utility facilities. In the aftermath of the castle construction, for example, now both stone houses and nobler wooden buildings are rather yellowish than red.
Sweden’s leading architect after Hårlemans death in 1753 became CF Adelcrantz, who among other things. designed China Castle and Gustav III ‘s opera in Stockholm. From the 1780’s the ideal became stricter and more antique inspired. Gripsholm Castle Theater by Erik Palmstedt, Botanicum in Uppsala by LJ Desprez and the high school in Härnösand by Olof Tempelman. A simultaneous increase in the architectural quality and weakening of the regional building traditions was the result of the establishment at the end of the 18th century by the Office of the Superintendent as the investigating authority.
The construction of the early 19th century mainly concerned the countryside and the military sector, with works such as the Göta Canal and Karlsborg Fortress. The military was also Karl Johanidan’s leading architect Fredrik Blom, who besides several barracks i.a. erected the Imperial Palace Rosendal and the classically shaped Skeppsholm Church. A restrained classicism also characterized CF Sundvall’s university library in Uppsala. Against classicism, against the superintendent’s office and against the Academy of Arts, which since the 1780’s was responsible for Sweden’s architectural education, CG Brunius, who wanted to rediscover the medieval architecture.
During the second half of the century, construction increased. New building types were introduced and the design language was renewed. The National Museum, designed by the German architect FA Stüler, not only became the largest new building since the castle; Through its Italian Renaissance facades and its colorful interiors, it also differed from the older classicism. A rich form also characterized the works of contemporary Swedish architect Fredrik Wilhelm Scholander, among others. synagogue in Stockholm. Among his many students is HT Holmgren, with among others. the University of Uppsala, as well as Helgo Zettervall, who became the foremost representative of the eclectic riches of the 19th century with works such as the City Hall in Malmö and the All Saints Church in Lund. The Malmares in Stockholm and Sundsvall’s stone city were the major urban building projects at the same time.
In the late 1800’s, the search for a national form became increasingly important. Early attempts were made by IG Clason with the Bünsowska House and the Nordic Museum in Stockholm. The importance of the young architects’ polemic distance from four of today’s major projects was also of great importance for the future: Zettervall’s restoration of Uppsala Cathedral, Fredrik Lilljekvist’s restoration of Gripsholm, Axel Anderberg’s opera house in Stockholm and Aron Johansson’s Riksdag- and riksbank house at Hel.
The first decades of the 20th century constituted the most eventful history of Swedish architectural history to date. At the same time as Ferdinand Boberg in his works was close to the international Art Nouveau style, the Swedish national romance took shape in buildings by Carl Westman, Ragnar Östberg, Torben Grut and LI Wahlman. At one time, there were modern forms and motifs from older Swedish building traditions, as well as respect for old craftsmanship and interest in modern technology. But before the great work – Stockholm City Hall by Ragnar Östberg – was completed in 1923, Carl Bergsten, with Liljevalch’s art gallery in Stockholm and Gunnar Asplund, with Villa Snellman in Djursholm, had already approached modernism with a new, elegant and scarce classicism. In various variants, this classicism became the style of the 1920’s (see the twenty classicism)), with Sigurd Lewerentz, Ivar Tengbom and Gunnar Asplund as the leading architect names.
The Stockholm Exhibition 1930 had several international counterparts, but became unique in that it initiated such a long and continuous development of the ideals of modernism, especially in housing construction. The somewhat idyllic folk modernism of the 1940’s and 50’s, mainly realized by the Backström & Reinius office, attracted international attention, as did some individual projects, including Asplund’s crematorium at Skogskyrkogården, Vällingby center of Backström & Reinius and, around 1960, the five, Haymarket. Next to the rationalism of the 1960’s stood the new churches of Lewerentz and Peter Celsing.
The so-called million program is in quantitative terms the most remarkable achievement in Swedish building history, but also received criticism for schematic architectural design. When rationalist modernism began to be questioned in the late 1970’s, it had dominated longer than any other architectural direction since neoclassicism. In the hectic building boom of the 1980’s, traditional and modernist motifs appeared side by side, but both with a richness that had not characterized Swedish architecture since the national romance. In Ralph Erskine’s modernist version, this formality became the signature of the 1980’s.
LANDSCAPE-GARDENING
Sweden’s earliest garden art can be found in the 12th century monastic gardens. During the vase period, small, fenced-in pleasure gardens were built at the royal palaces, designed by architects from abroad. Large gardens were built by Karl IX, very much the most important in housekeeping in Nyköping.
When André Mollet, invited to Sweden by Queen Kristina, published her book on the Baroque Park (1651), Sweden took the lead in the development of style. High class Baroque parks, including The Drottningholm Park, was designed in the style of André Le Nôtre by Nicodemus Tessin dy and others. Greenhouse cultivation had already been tried during the Vasatiden, but was improved in Olof Rudbeck d’s famous botanical garden in Uppsala (Linné garden). Around the middle of the 18th century, the English landscape style was introduced in Sweden by Fredrik Magnus Piper, who got many followers. The garden taste of the 19th century was characterized by floral arrangements and style blending according to German and French models.
At the end of the century, the emphasis of style development was shifted from castles and mansions to public facilities such as parks and boulevard systems. In Malmö, Erik Bülow-Hübe designed the Pildammsparken geometric plane according to a German model. A natural romantic style with Swedish features and elements of functionalism was represented in the 1940’s by a.k.a. Ulla Bodorff and Erik Glemme. In landscape planning for roads, power plants and other facilities, Sven A. Hermelin was a forerunner. Later, the more form-oriented Danish style tradition has had a strong influence. Per Friberg and Sven Ingvar Andersson.
Music
The oldest signs of musical cultivation in Sweden consist of archaeological finds of sound tools such as flutes and rassal instruments from the Stone Age and bronze slings, which are also depicted on rock carvings. From the Bronze Age also come the object (rather a gong) known as the Balkåkrat drum. With Sweden’s Christianity came the Gregorian song, preserved in handwritten worship books of various kinds. The liturgy of the Birgitta cult is associated with e.g. Nicolaus Hermannis (Nils Hermansson’s) story “Rosa rorans bonitatem”. Polyphonic music was grown in Sweden to a greater extent only during the 16th century, mainly at the court and possibly in the school environments. In 1586, the art of printing notes was introduced. In connection with the Reformation, the Protestant coral of German origin was knotted in the country. Only with the 1697 coral book was this tradition codified.
During the Middle Ages, for the musicians who were proficient in continental role models, the games mourned, mentioned in team texts and depicted in sacred art. The medieval ballads have been part of the Hovish culture from the beginning. The oldest ballad fragment can be a pair of verse and note lines in a run-down manuscript by the Skånelagen from the 1300’s. Text and, from the 19th century on, melodies are usually found in guidebooks and records; the release of these took off in the 19th century.
During Gustav Vasa’s time you can find an organized Swedish court music; The Hov Chapel dates back to 1526. A number of different music groups (instrumentalists and singers) were paid at the court state. Art music was developed within the court and high section through the import of musicians and musicals. Gustav II Adolf reorganized the court music in 1620, when a court chapel with German musicians was formed. Among the forces in force belonged the court chapel master Düben. The music was part of the superpower’s representative culture. A culmination was reached at Queen Kristin’s court, where French and Italian musicians were hired. In the increasingly important cities, city musicians, organists and musicians served.
From 1731 a public concert hall in Stockholm emerged with professional musicians and amateurs in collaboration thanks to JH Romans so-called Riddarhus concerts. Public concerts became an important element of the bourgeois music culture. Roman, “the father of Swedish music”, was also keen to use the Swedish language even in larger church musical works.
Italian opera was seriously introduced in the 1750’s during Lovisa Ulrica’s egid. Her son Gustav III founded in 1773 in the patriotic spirit of the Congl. Swedish Opera (see Royal Opera). The Drottningholm Theater had been built as early as 1764–66, while Gustav III ‘s opera house in Stockholm was completed in 1782 and was replaced by the current 1898. The most important composers of the Gustavian opera were all Germans: JG Naumann, JM Kraus, GJ Vogler and JCF Haeffner. A lighter repertoire of song plays was grown in parallel by the bourgeois Stenborg theater. Gustav IIIBell’s initiative also included the founding of the Musical Academy in 1771. Bellman’s unique contribution as a poet also belongs to the Gustavian music culture. The cultural depletion after Gustav III’s murder was partly felt in the music scene. However, the social movement flourished, and here Olof Åhlström’s work as a composer and publisher at the turn of the century should be mentioned.
The romantic literary dawn has hardly any equivalent in music. However, AF Lindblad was prominent as a song composer. The most musical of the poets of the time, EG Geijer and CJL Almqvist, were also composers. The greatest genius in Swedish music during the mid-19th century was Franz Berwald, whose operas, symphonies and chamber music won little understanding in the composer’s lifetime. National romance got an early representative with August Söderman. In Stockholm music, composer and court chaplain Ludvig Norman became a leading figure, schooled in Germany like most during this era. He introduced Wagner to Sweden. The slightly younger Emil Sjögren was instead French-oriented.
During the 1890’s, a whole generation of composers with a national romantic connection emerged. Wilhelm Peterson-Berger gained lasting popularity as the originator of easily accessible songs and piano lyrics, and Hugo Alfvén was a brilliant orchestral composer, known for his rap songs and his choral music. Wilhelm Stenhammar, with his more aristocratic attitude, did not get the same popular impact, despite songs, string quartets and two high-quality piano concerts, but his deeds became of profound importance. As conductor in Gothenburg, Stenhammar propelled the music life to a high level with the current symphonic repertoire. The violinist and conductor Tor Aulin had a similar role in Stockholm. The modern symphony orchestra institutions were organized during the earlier stages of the 20th century in the larger cities. Ture Rangström fulfilled the strong solo singing tradition in Swedish music creation. At the same time, Kurt Atterberg was considered a significant symphonist. Intrusive modernism came to the earliest through Hilding Rosenberg’s 1920’s music. Rosenberg’s enormous productivity and exemplary artistic seriousness became important guiding principles for the next generation of modernists. In the pioneering modernist generation was also noticed the French-oriented symphonist Gösta Nystroem and the expressionist Moses Pergament. The predominantly neoclassical 1930’s generation was represented by a number of composers, such as the novelists Gunnar de Frumerie and Hilding Hallnäs, the folk-inspired Erland von Koch, the popularizer L.-E. Larsson and the savvy Dag Wirén. such as the novelists Gunnar de Frumerie and Hilding Hallnäs, the folk-inspired Erland von Koch, the popularizer L.-E. Larsson and the savvy Dag Wirén. such as the novelists Gunnar de Frumerie and Hilding Hallnäs, the folk-inspired Erland von Koch, the popularizer L.-E. Larsson and the savvy Dag Wirén.
The isolation during and after World War II was mainly broken by the Monday Group, a study group of composers, executors and researchers with K.-B. Flower dahl in the tip. From the 1950’s, the harvest time of modernism prevailed, and composers such as Ingvar Lidholm and S.-E. The streams became more and more prominent. At the same time, a composer talent with a tradition-based attitude appeared: Jan Carlstedt, Hans Eklund, Maurice Karkoff and Bo Linde. The monumental and internationally born symphonist Allan Pettersson appears in this context as an isolated stranger. As symphonics, composers such as Daniel Börtz and Anders Eliasson, born in the 1940’s, have profiled themselves, while S.-D. Sandström has developed a stylistically and genre-wide production. In music drama, names like LJ Werle and Hans Gefors should be mentioned.
Sweden’s rich singing culture, where legendary 19th-century soprano such as Jenny Lind and Christina Nilsson were followed by world singers such as the tenors Jussi Björling and Set Svanholm, got a number of new representatives at the mid-1900’s. Birgit Nilsson and Elisabeth Söderström, Nicolai Gedda and Ingvar Wixell. Conductors such as Sixten Ehrling and Herbert Blomstedt were given important international positions. In the postwar era of music, the international greatness of Eric Ericsons, the Radio Choir and the Chamber Choir was further shaped. Radio’s importance as the foremost body in the launch of contemporary music became evident under Blomdahl’s leadership. Sweden’s Radio Symphony Orchestra with leaders such as Sergiu Celibidache and Stig Westerberg got their first flourish. In Swedish Radio’s fence, the Electronmusikstudio (EMS) was launched in 1968. Bengt Hambræus, L.-G.
Of course, among the mass media, the phonograms have had their upsurge after the Second World War. Disc labels such as BIS, Caprice and Swedish Society Discofil have launched and documented Swedish music and Swedish artists. The musical series Musica Sveciae (1972–94) is a scientifically commented sounding summary of Swedish music history until about 1920.
From the 1960’s, the decentralizing tendencies of music have been culturally rooted. The municipal music schools have broadened the foundations for Swedish music culture, and the expansion of higher music education through new music schools and the establishment of the National Concerts in 1963 has deepened the music life. Through the transformation of the military music corps into Region music in 1971, the civilian music scene received considerable reinforcement. A number of chamber orchestras and other ensembles have been organized in various quarters within the county music foundations that promote regional music life. The musical drama has also reached regional distribution through institutions such as the Music Theater in Värmland, the Norrland Opera, Vadstena Academy and the Ystad Opera. In addition, in 1976 came an “alternative” Stockholm stage such as Folk Opera. New concert halls have been erected around the country in recent decades, including
Folk music
Inspired by JG von Herder and his appreciation of popular poetry, the collection of folk songs in Sweden began in the first year of the 19th century. From the beginning, interest was focused on the medieval ballads. A selection of records was published by AA Afzelius and EG Geijer: “Swedish folk-songs from ancient times” (1-3, 1814-18). The collection “Traditions of Swedish folk dances” (1814–15) marks that, after a while, the pioneer circles also devoted themselves to instrumental songs. However, the first coinage for the word folk music in Swedish is from 1823. The collection of songs and songs took a long time because the music was alleged to carry traces of history. This is largely true, but nothing that matters to those who have sung or played the music in their original contexts. Equally true is that it is constantly influenced by European fashion trends.
The oldest ancestors have the functional music of the shepherds, performed by almost exclusively women (see shepherd music). The lock call, with a dialectal term often called ball, is produced by a special voice technique that makes the sound reach far. Almost as pervasive are the songs on cow or goat horns. Some parts of the content-rich tradition also have a respectable age, e.g. the cradles and ballads, but on the other hand there has always been a strong stream of new poetry. For the distribution of visas, the printing presses have meant a lot. The first known print of this kind came in 1583, the genre peaked with the development of literacy during the second half of the 19th century and died out in the 1910’s.
The playing tradition in Sweden has been dominated by violin playing since the 18th century, although other tune instruments, e.g. key harp, bagpipe and clarinet, also available. With industrialism also came the accordion to Sweden. The main task of the gaming men has been to stand for dance music, but also for music for certain ceremonies. The most popular dance was for long Polish, which is still reflected in the repertoires of the players. Polish as a song type and dance is an example of the influence of high-level music on popular music – the influence has also always gone the other way. In order to preserve the musicians’ music after it lost its original functions, several initiatives were taken that are usually brought together under the name the gamesmanship movement. The country’s first player competition took place in Gesunda outside Mora in 1906. Its successors are the many gamers’ meetings that are now arranged across the country, the largest in Bingsjö, Delsbo and Ransäter. The Gamesmen’s own organizational build started in the 1920’s but took real momentum two decades later. In 1947, Sweden’s gaming men’s national association was formed. During the 1940’s the gaming crew was also created, which has become a popular ensemble form among Swedish gaming men. See alsofolk music and the Music section in the landscape articles.
Popular
The precursors to the 20th century’s popular music in Sweden developed during the 19th century in amusement parks, at popular concerts as well as in cafes and restaurants. At the turn of the century, the labor movement’s national parks were established, which has since been an important forum for Swedish popular music. Old dance music, with the accordion as a central instrument and Carl Jularbo as the dominant stylist, developed at the same time.
From the 1920’s, Swedish popular music was characterized by the new media gramophone, radio and audio film. Schlagermelodies by composers such as Jules Sylvain and Lasse Dahlquist were launched and disseminated through revues and films. Within the largely schlag music based on international material, there were also distinctly Swedish forms, e.g. sailor roll. The Swedish song was developed by singers and composers such as Evert Taube, Birger Sjöberg and Ruben Nilson. Jazz was introduced in Sweden around 1920 and spread through dance venues and concerts, gradually also through the media. During the 1930’s and 1940’s, Swedish jazz developed, the publication of jazz records increased, jazz clubs were formed and orchestras such as Thore Ehrlings and Seymour Österwalls were established. The 1950’s has been called “the golden age of Swedish jazz” with names such as Arne Domnérus, Lars Gullin, Bengt Hallberg, Gösta Theselius, Alice Babs and the young Monica Zetterlund. The increasing flow of cultural impressions from abroad from the media was processed in parodies and pasties by Ulf Peder Olrog, Povel Ramel and Owe Thörnqvist. The bait mold was cultivated during the 1950’s by Lars Forssell and Olle Adolphson.
American rock music inspired Swedish successors such as Rock-Ragge, Little Gerhard and Jerry Williams during the latter part of the 1950’s. Top lists were established, and in the early 1960’s the etheric media’s program policy changed in the direction of the new “youth music”. Among the 1960’s English-speaking Swedish pop bands are Hep Stars and Tages. At the same time, in the music of the drummer. Thore Skogman and Siw Malmkvist, and within the jazz Jan Johansson. A new wave of waves also arose around troubadours such as Cornelis Vreeswijk and Fred Åkerström. The popular music of the 1970’s was characterized partly by the so-called music movement, with groups such as the Hoola Bandoola Band, Kebnekaise and the National Theater, and partly by the specifically Swedish dance band music, with names such as Sven-Ingvars and Vikings. Great international success was achieved by the pop group ABBA.
During the 1980’s, Swedish popular music was characterized by a growing stylistic broadening and, to a certain extent, a division between the artists who, with Swedish-speaking texts, aimed at a Swedish audience and those who with English-language texts sought an international market. Popular artists in the national popular music environment during this period were Eva Dahlgren, Tomas Ledin and Ulf Lundell. On the international stage, rock and pop groups like Europe and Roxette achieved success.
From the early 1990’s, the international successes, the “Swedish music export wonder”, were increasingly noticed, and groups and soloists such as Army of Lovers, Ace of Base, Dr. Alban, The Cardigans, The Wannadies, Sahara Hotnights and Robyn confirmed these successes. Music exports also included other categories than artists, such as producers and songwriters Denniz Pop (1963-98) and Max Martin, as well as music video director Jonas Åkerlund. Furthermore, during the same period Swedish folk music was played in “world music” versions of groups such as Groupa, The Hedna, Ale Möller Band and Nordman, and various variants of rap appeared, often as a feature of a specific immigrant youth culture, especially in metropolitan areas, with names such as Latin Kings and Petter.
Swedish artists also made their mark in genres such as heavy metal with its various sub-genres (Bathory, Hammerfall, Entombed), eurotechno (E-type) and electronica (The Knife), and among a growing number of rock troubadours were names such as Stefan Sundström, Lars Winnerbäck, CajsaStina Åkerström and Håkan Hellström. All these trends have continued into the 2000’s alongside the emergence of new pop groups such as BWO and The Ark, and in addition, the rising popularity of televised talent competitions such as “Idol” has enabled artist careers for singers such as Måns Zelmerlöw, Darin and Agnes Carlsson. In recent years, dance band music has also seen a boost.
Dance
Folk dances and song games have since the earliest times of the year parties, mainly Christmas and midsummer. Traditional dances in the countryside have been studied and practiced by folk dance and associations during the 20th century, since 1971 organized by the Cooperation Committee for Folk Dance. In 1981 a vibrant National Association of Folk Music and Dance (RFoD) was started. Watch folk dance.
In the 13th century, polite social dances were introduced at the Swedish court, which according to the Erik Chronicle danced after tournaments and knight ceremonies. Social dance after foreign models spread and became a popular pleasure over time, culminating in the 19th century when bales were given too high and low. In the 20th century, public dance courses were built and dance restaurants opened. (Compare dance, Dance as a social phenomenon.) Dance sports also have many practitioners in Sweden. Since 1977 they belong to the Swedish Sports Federation.
The art dance can be said to have come to Sweden when the court ballet was introduced at Queen Kristina’s Court in 1638. 14 printed ballet texts have been preserved from the Kristinatide. Three of these were given by Georg Stiernhielm Swedish design of considerable literary value. The last Swedish court ballet is considered “Ballet meslé de chants héroïques” (1701, ‘Ballet mixed with heroic songs’), which celebrated the victory at Narva.
Sweden received a professional ballet and student school in 1773, when Gustav III inaugurated the Royal Theater (Opera). The ensemble was mostly foreign with artists such as Antoine Bournonville and Filippo Taglioni. The Gustavian era was a glamorous period even for the ballet. In 1833 Anders Selinder became the opera’s first Swedish ballet master. Selinder introduced romance to the ballet repertoire. His main contribution was three folkloric performances with singing and folk dances for the stage. The dances from “Värmlänningen” (1846) are preserved and constitute the only choreographic heritage Swedish theater has from the mid-1800’s. These scenic folk dances have been of great importance to the folk dance movement.
Around 1860, the ballet entered the cloud mouth for opera art. The recession lasted well into the 20th century, interrupted only by 1913-14 by Michel Fokine’s inspirational guest play. Inspired by Fokine, the Swedish Ballet (Les Ballets Suédois) was formed, which was active in Paris 1920–25. A new era was ruled only after World War II. Peace meant a time of prosperity for dance art. Foreign guest games, usually arranged by Dansfrämjandet (1938–62), testified to the newly awakened interest in both classical ballet and leisure in Europe and the United States. Renewal became necessary even in Sweden. From about 1950, the Opera Ballet was reformed, primarily through the ballet managers and choreographers Antony Tudor (director 1949-50, 1962-64) and Mary Skeaping (director 1953-62). An extensive repertoire was created by ballet classics, works by contemporary choreographers and not least works by the first large generation of Swedish choreographers. Birgit Åkesson, Birgit Cullberg and Ivo Cramér had a creative period and got younger followers.
Within the National Theater, the Cullberg Ballet was formed in 1967 and 1968 the Cramér Ballet, which ceased in 1986. The Cullberg Ballet with choreographers and leaders such as Birgit Cullberg and Mats Ek has become internationally known and sought after. For a long time, the ballets in Malmö and Gothenburg have had ballet managers with a past at the Opera: Carl-Gustaf Kruuse af Verchou (Malmö 1944–61), Conny Borg (Gothenburg 1967–70, Malmö 1972–80), Elsa Marianne von Rosen (Gothenburg 1970 –76, Malmö 1980–87) and Ulf Gadd (Gothenburg 1976–88 and 1996–99). The Opera Ballet also came under Swedish direction: Ivo Cramér 1973–80, Gunilla Roempke 1980–84, Nils-Åke Häggbom 1986–94, Petter Jacobsson 1999–2002 and Madeleine Onne 2002–08.
In Stockholm, the castle theaters in Drottningholm and Ulriksdal (Confidencen) have cherished the repertoire of ballets in historical styles that Mary Skeaping initiated in 1956. She, Cramér and Regina Beck-Friis have choreographed these unique performances. For a couple of years in the 1990’s, major changes took place within the institutions. In Gothenburg, in 1994, the ballet got a new home in the newly built Gothenburg Opera, in 1995 Malmö City Theater’s ballet was converted to Skåne’s dance theater and the same year Norrdans started at Norrland’s Music and Dance Theater in Härnösand. In 1996, Östgötabaletten was dissolved, which since its inception in 1971 has been linked to Östgötateatern.
Interest in a freer, contemporary dance art was aroused in 1906 at Isadora Duncan’s guest play in Stockholm. Anna Behle, a student of Duncan and Jaques-Dalcroze, opened a school in 1907 that trained dancers and teachers on vacation. During the interwar years, Mary Wigman and Kurt Jooss influenced the Swedish dance world outside the ballet. Åkesson, Cullberg and Cramér received their first training from Wigman, Jooss and Sigurd Leeder.
After 1960, contacts were made with choreographers and teachers in the USA. The Ballet Academy (founded in 1957 by Lia Schubert) engaged educators in new dance technology. Soon dancers formed smaller groups and carried out outreach activities. A generation of experimental choreographers emerged, among others. Margaretha Åsberg with the group Pyramids, Eva Lundqvist with Wind Witches, Efva Lilja, Per Jonsson, Alexander Ekman and Finnish-born Virpi Pahkinen. Some created their own scenes. Modern Dance Theater at Skeppsholmen was founded in 1986 by Margaretha Åsberg. In Gothenburg, the dance group Rubicon opened their own stage called Young Atalante the same year. The dance station in Malmö, started in 1996, has grown into a dynamic center for dance throughout the region. By 1972, the free groups had formed their own organization, Danscentrum.
An important instrument for coordinating and spreading dance in the country is the regional dance consultants. In 2009, dance consultancy was conducted in 18 counties and regions. In the Swedish dance committee, the entire professional dance life in Sweden is represented.
Many dance activities are concentrated in Stockholm. At the Opera, 40% of the repertoire consists of ballet programs. In Dansens Hus (founded 1991) there are scenes for guest games by domestic and foreign dance groups, most of them avant-garde. At the Department of Theater Science at Stockholm University, the history and aesthetics of dance can be studied. Dance Academy, founded in 1963 as the Choreographic Institute, is the country’s artistic college for dance and new circus. The Swedish Ballet School is a vocational training for dancers in classical ballet and modern dance. The Ballet Academy accepts both amateurs and professional students. Jazz dance was introduced as a subject at this school and was widely distributed.
In Stockholm is the Dansmuseet, founded in 1950 by Rolf de Maré and Bengt Häger. Exhibitions and lectures are held there continuously. An incentive for the Swedish dance world is the Carina Ari Foundation, which annually awards scholarships and research grants. A rich collection of dance books can be found in the Carina Ari Library.
Folk culture
Sweden’s expansion in the north-south direction provided different ecological conditions for pre-industrial folk culture. Knut-timbered houses naturally belonged in the coniferous forest areas in the central and northern parts, the parish had its highest frequency in the mixed coniferous and deciduous forest area south of it and the cross-timber in the rather tree-poor areas of Skåne and Halland. The spring parties were located in the south to the fixed law and the first of May, while the north bar had to be moved to the midsummer celebration. The most important Swedish cultural boundary, the livestock boundary, is partly ecologically conditioned. Many traits in Northern Swedish traditional culture are associated with the livestock industry, eg. the division of labor between the sexes – the men must devote their time to hunting, fishing and forestry, so that the women, to a greater extent than the south, took care of the animals and agriculture. sowing. In northern Sweden, some old-fashioned cultural elements were preserved that disappeared in the south earlier and / or replaced by new ones, e.g. cube chairs and courtyards. At the same time, there are many examples of the livestock boundary serving as a spread boundary to the south for innovations that emerged in the north. These include feather braiding, threshing trolleys and seed cane (compare sowing, Cultural History).
Other Swedish cultural boundaries are historically-administratively conditioned. Skåne and Halland, which have long been a part of Denmark, belong in many ways to the continental culture, which is evident in details such as the large loaf breads, the dome kitchen, the car egg cooker, the farm form and the chairs with straw seats. These traits are common with mainly Denmark, but often also with areas far south. However, the former national border was not an insurmountable barrier, but several news received from the south has, over time, penetrated north. Some came to conquer all of Sweden (eg several agricultural implements), others halted its spread at a diagonal border from south-east to northwest, roughly from Kalmar to Lake Vänern, so for example. the custom of setting aside a room in the home as a kitchen only. There are also cultural elements that have about this line as their southern border. This includes the attic with a cool passageway. In this case, it is the question of a “cultural meeting boundary”, which lies midway between the two most important distribution centers in Sweden, Mälardalen (with Stockholm) and Skåne.
However, southern Sweden also exhibits an east-west distribution of several cultural elements. Western Sweden is in many respects part of a North Sea context. Since old, however, central Eastern Sweden has been the most important gateway for news in our popular culture due to early urbanization, economic conditions and good internal communications from the port cities. Both from the East (during the Viking Age’s contacts with Eastern Europe, among other things, knot timber, smoke oven and sauna may have been imported from there) and the news came from northeastern Germany first, and then advanced further or shorter way west. Among the innovations that emanated from Germany from the Middle Ages include cross-timber in urban culture and oblique.
The development of traditional folk culture accelerated markedly from the 18th century to almost completely change the living conditions of most Swedes during the 19th century. The most important factors behind this were the shifts, which dissolved the old villages, industrialism with subsequent migration into the urban areas, the spread of the railways and the noticeable economic boom. But cultural innovations in the 19th century and even in our own times often repeat the traditional patterns of dispersion outlined above.
Since the 20th century, Stockholm and its environs within popular culture have been a role model for the entire empire; thus, the Valborg Fair fairs have knocked out older local counterparts (except the West Swedish Easter Fires). The introduction of new traditions from other countries, not least the Anglo-Saxons, is promoted in similar ways, e.g. procession at Halloween (Halloween) and mistletoe as Christmas decoration. An important factor behind the change during the last half-century of e.g. our food and beverage habits are the contact with other traditions offered by mass tourism.
In terms of material culture, the documentation of older Swedish folk life has been provided by, among other things, museums and homesteads, while the oral tradition, folk beliefs and festivals etc. were taken care of by special institutions, public archives, with an original connection to the universities. The Nordic Museum combines both fields of activity. See also the review articles of folk dance, folk costumes, folk art, folk, traditional boats, village, farm, house and articles for the individual provinces folk culture. The documentation of contemporary Swedish life and work is provided by SAMDOK.