Old Norse mythology was sometimes used in political rhetoric. Loki, a god who was perceived as the very personification of evil, could therefore be identified with political enemies. This painting by the Danish artist Constantin Hansen is a study for a larger composition that portrays how Loki is thrown out of a banquet. The Loki figure was probably identified with the German states that Denmark had fought in the Schleswig-Holstein war a few years earlier.

Ægir’s Feast was commissioned by National Liberal politician Orla Lehmann in 1852. It caused Constantin Hansen problems. The artist lacked experience of ancient Norse subjects, and the result was classicism in Nordic disguise. Ægir, ruler of the sea, invites the gods to a feast, which is disrupted by the evil Loki in red. He flees when Thor arrives seeking revenge with his hammer. For contemporaries, Loki came to symbolise the German threat to Scandinavian unity. This is one of the artist’s studies for Loki.