Additional texteDescription: According to myth, the violin music of the Water Sprites tempts people into the water, where they drown. In Ernst Josephson’s painting the Water Sprite is playing in the moonlight. His music is accompanied by the sound of the waterfall behind him. The water cascades and splashes. River weed and other plants wrap around his head. Grasses wave between his legs and caress his stomach, while flowering water plants tickle his back. His body is young, strong and slender, almost androgynous. We have an idea of but cannot see his sex. The Water Sprite has his eyes closed and his mouth half-open. He appears to be intensely enjoying the music and the nature around him.
The vivid expression of sensuousness and sensuality shocked the audience of the time. In the 1890s, Nationalmuseum turned down one version, Strömkarlen, which was bought by Prince Eugen and now resides at Prince Eugen’s Waldemarsudde. Another version of The Water Sprite is in the collection of the Gothenburg Museum of Art. Nationalmuseum’s painting dates from 1882–1883 and was purchased with the support of the Friends of Nationalmuseum in 1915.
Exhibition text: A murky, mysterious scene, with an imaginary figure in the middle. This could not have been more wrong, in an era when artists were doing their utmost to paint realistically. Despite derogatory comments from his colleagues, Ernst Josephson worked on his water sprites for years. The reason why he had become obsessed with it was his experience of nature during a trip to the Norwegian mountains, where the landscape made a deep impression on him. His work on The Water Sprite was most probably his way of retaining the memory of this experience.
Exhibition text: As water cascades down the moonlit waterfall, the Water Sprite plays a melancholy tune on his fiddle. He was at once a frightening and a mesmerising figure, who lured people into the depths with his music. The artists of National Romanticism were fascinated by traditional peasant folklore. Josephson listened to folk songs and wrote his own poems. To him, the Water Sprite was an alter ego – the misunderstood bohemian trying to go his own way.As water cascades down the moonlit waterfall, the Water Sprite plays a melancholy tune on his fiddle. He was at once a frightening and a mesmerising figure, who lured people into the depths with his music. The artists of National Romanticism were fascinated by traditional peasant folklore. Josephson listened to folk songs and wrote his own poems. To him, the Water Sprite was an alter ego – the misunderstood bohemian trying to go his own way.
