"With needle and thread on Grönsöö"
A wonderful display of textiles taken from dresser drawers, cabinets and chests has been laid out for this year's exhibition: tablecloths for large and small tables, serviettes and handkerchiefs, evening bags, purses and small decorative cloths. Embroideries are to be found in the decoration of different upholstery fabrics and cushions. In total there are probably thousands of works and a large part of the collection was made at the castle. For convenience, much of the material has been left out; however this selection of textiles gives a good overall picture. The focus is on embroidered works, but many lace objects and sewing accessories are included.
Embroidery has been labelled as a meaningless way to pass the time, or a waste of women's energy. Similarly, the expression “embroider the story” can have negative connotations. It can also mean to enrich, to give nuances and to be exact and personal in one's art of expression. It's the same with real embroidery too. It can be seen as a handicraft that enriches with a personal touch and perhaps completes an interior.
Summers on Grönsöö during the 1900's were filled with ladies doing needlework. Occasionally the needlework would certainly have functioned as a meditative pause, sunk deep in concentration. At other times it was an oasis for chatter and gossip. We can perhaps see these sewing women as yesterday's Facebook group, where all sorts of subjects could be dealt with.
One thing that all needlework seems to have in common is that it is seldom mentioned in texts describing country manors. In the major series "Slott och Herresäten" (Castles and Country Manors) written during the 1960's, or the recently published "Kungliga slott" (Royal Palaces) series, such things are almost never mentioned and this seems on the whole to be the case in interior design literature as a whole. Cushions, footstools, and embroidered decorative cloths lack descriptions and words placing them in their context. They are objects that exist, but which have never been important enough to be given their own line of text, other than in those needlework books describing their production and material.
"Gunnar Brusewitz" -An incredibly productive artist’s life
Gunnar Brusewitz (1924-2004) called himself a depicter. During the 1940s and 1950s, he worked primarily as a newspaper artist at Stockholms-Tidningen (Stockholm's Newspaper). His interest in animals, birds and man's role in the landscape was awakened early, during his school years, and it is probably as a nature artist that Gunnar Brusewitz is most well known.
In a little over half a century, Gunnar Brusewitz published around 60 books. He wrote texts adapted to his own illustrations and vice versa - an enviable collaboration with himself!
In addition, he produced over 200 book illustrations, more than 800 book covers, posters, ex-libris bookplates, postage stamps and endless articles for cultural periodicals, books, catalogues, etc. For twenty-five years he also designed the diplomas for the Nobel Prize in literature. He was willingly controlled by "the impatient pen"; the title of the second part of his memoirs.
Brusewitz also worked at Sveriges Radio-TV (Swedish Radio and Television), where, among many other projects, he made more than thirty nature films with the recently deceased filmmaker Boris Engström. He also collaborated on the classic programmes from Korsnäsgården.
Gunnar Brusewitz and Carl Gustaf von Ehrenheim on Grönsöö - both appointed as honorary citizens of Uppland, met through Count Lennart Bernadotte, a mutual friend. During these meetings the idea was born for a summer exhibition on Grönsöö, but there was not enough time for everything and so the exhibition never took place. We are therefore now happy and proud to be able to offer an exhibition in collaboration with the Brusewitz family, mirroring aspects of a long, multi-faceted and unbelievably productive artist's life..
