Portrait of the Painter Oda Krohg, b. Lasson

The laughing, vivacious Oda is depicted en face with hands-on-hips. Oda Engelhart (née Lasson), who at this point in time was Christian Krohg’s bride-to-be, is portrayed in a simplified style, with few details and with vibrant reds and blues as the dominating colours. Our attention is drawn toward the woman’s spirited, joyous face and gaze that meet us head on. She is dressed for the summer with a short-sleeved, low-necked red blouse. It is a cheerful portrait of a strong, self-assured, and independent woman aged 28: her clothes and loosely hanging hair signal a relaxed spontaneity that lets the viewer understand that this was not a commissioned portrait.

The portrait gradually became an emblem for the so-called “bohemian princess” Oda. Edvard Munch played a part in this interpretation of the picture by paraphrasing it in his etching The Kristiania Bohemians II (1895), in which Oda figures in the same posture and with the same attire, but where she is surrounded by “her” men.

Oda Engelhart became a student of Krohg’s in January 1884, at which time she was separated from her first husband Jørgen Engelhart and living alone with their two children. The teacher and student would soon become romantically involved. When Krohg painted the portrait, they had known each other for four years, and it is fair to say it was not a bohemian princess he saw or wanted to portray, but rather a beautiful, charming young woman who had already become the mother of the first child they had together (Nana, b. 1885) and whom he more than anything else wanted to marry. The painting was painted outdoors on a summer’s day in Hvitsten in 1888, only a few months before the couple married.