Jonas Heiska - Mountain Landscape, Finland, 1922
Normaler Preis 42,342.00 krJonas Heiska (1873–1937) Finland
Mountain Landscape, Finland, 1922
signed J. Heiska and dated lower left
oil on panel
unframed 35 × 48.5 cm (13.8 × 19.1 in)
framed 45.5 × 59 cm (17.9 × 23.2 in)
Essay:
Jonas Heiska was a Finnish painter and graphic artist associated with the Impressionist movement. Heiska is especially known for his sensitive depictions of the Finnish landscape, often capturing the atmosphere of rural scenes with a delicate touch. Influenced by French Impressionism, he infused his works with soft light, nuanced color, and expressive brushwork. Throughout his career, Heiska’s oeuvre centered on Finnish nature and everyday country life, earning him recognition in his homeland and a reputation as a keen observer of his native countryside.
Mountain Landscape is an oil painting on panel signed and dated 1922. In the foreground, intricate melting ice patterns stretch across a pale blue expanse of water, the remnants of winter’s ice breakup. Heiska’s expressive brushwork in these icy patches conveys the transient, crystalline texture of thawing ice, imparting a sense of movement and seasonal change. The paint is applied with visible, lively strokes that catch and reflect light, demonstrating the artist’s impressionistic technique in capturing the ephemeral effects of nature’s transition from winter to spring.
At the center of the scene, a small distant cottage or farmhouse is nestled at the water’s edge, marked by a subtle yet visually arresting detail: a plume of smoke rises from its chimney. The smoke drifts horizontally across the sky, carried by gentle winds. This horizontal vapor trail naturally draws the viewer’s gaze toward the far horizon, effectively linking foreground and background. It serves as a compositional device that leads the eye into the depth of the landscape, while also evoking the calm daily life continuing within this remote setting. The presence of the smoke plume, white against the pale blue-gray sky, adds a human touch to an otherwise serene wilderness and emphasizes the stillness of the air in the moment captured.
In the distance, painted in cool tones, blue hills and fells form a calm backdrop across the horizon. The blue cast of the hills suggests the crisp light of early spring, when lingering snow and ice give the distant landscape a bluish hue. Above, the sky is light and open, its pale colors consistent with the cool clarity of the season. Heiska balances the composition between the detailed, textural foreground and the smooth, distant background, creating a harmonious vista.
The painting conveys a sense of stillness and anticipation, the silence of nature poised between winter’s end and spring’s beginning, a mood that Heiska often sought in his landscape works.
Executed in 1922, Mountain Landscape belongs to Heiska’s mature period, a time when he honed his landscape painting to combine realistic detail with impressionistic atmosphere. The early spring motif was a favored theme among Nordic artists of the period, allowing them to explore the interplay of light, reflection, and seasonal transformation. In this work, Heiska demonstrates a deft understanding of these elements.
We believe in simplicity; Therefore, all orders ship to your door without any additional costs for transport. We use professional shipping companies and pack all orders carefully with special art shipping boxes. All prices on our website include international shipping and transport insurance.
Be aware that you as a customer are responsible for paying any taxes such as import tax in the country of destination (applies to orders outside the EU).
