Sophus Vermehren - Reading to the Sick Child, 1945

Sophus Vermehren (1866–1950) Denmark

Reading to the Sick Child, 1945

signed and dated lower right
oil on canvas
unframed 70 × 70 cm (27.6 × 27.6 in)
framed 87 × 87 cm (34.3 × 34.3 in)

Provenance:
Private collection, United Kingdom.

Condition report:
The painting is in good condition, with clear, vibrant colours.
Please contact the gallery for a more detailed condition report.

Essay:
A girl reads beside the bed of a young boy in this tender domestic scene by Sophus Vermehren. Surrounded by flowers, books and the familiar objects of a comfortably furnished room, the children occupy a world temporarily withdrawn from everyday activity. The boy rests against embroidered pillows, holding pencils above a sheet of drawing paper, while his companion concentrates upon the open book. Illness provides the occasion for their gathering, but the painting’s emotional centre is companionship: the quiet reassurance of someone choosing to remain close.

Born in Copenhagen in 1866, Vermehren belonged to an established Danish artistic family. His father and first teacher, Frederik Vermehren, was an important exponent of nineteenth century genre painting, distinguished by his closely observed figures and carefully described surroundings. Sophus continued his education at the Royal Danish Academy of Fine Arts between 1883 and 1892. Together with his brother Gustav, he subsequently ran a school preparing students for admission to the Academy, while also teaching drawing at Copenhagen’s Technical School. His achievements were recognised with the Eckersberg Medal in 1900.

The present work belongs to the closing years of this long career, yet its subject had occupied Vermehren much earlier. Weilbachs Kunstnerleksikon records a painting entitled Naar den Syge har faaet Ro, or When the Patient Has Found Rest, associated with his awards of 1900. The bedside scene of 1945 therefore returns to an established interest in illness, repose and the relationships surrounding them. His broader engagement with domestic subjects is also represented by Interior with Two Figures in the collection of Statens Museum for Kunst, Copenhagen.

The square format gives the composition a balanced, enclosing character. The seated girl establishes a strong vertical at the left, countered by the reclining figure and the broad diagonal of the bed. In the foreground, the rounded table brings the scene towards the viewer, its white cloth visually connecting with the bed linen behind. These pale surfaces create a continuous passage of light through the painting, while the blue wall provides a calm background against which faces, hands and objects remain clearly distinguished.

Vermehren’s treatment of the children is restrained and attentive. The girl’s lowered gaze and steady hold upon the book suggest concentration rather than a pose adopted for the viewer. The boy, meanwhile, is not presented solely as a passive patient. The pencils in his hands and the paper before him introduce drawing as another quiet occupation. Reading and image making become parallel activities, preserving something of ordinary childhood within the circumstances of the sickroom. The children’s precise relationship is unrecorded, but the closeness of the scene requires no further identification to be understood.

The foreground still life is particularly accomplished. A flowering plant in a terracotta pot stands beside a glass vase, a cup and saucer, and a plate of rusks. Each object has a distinct material presence: transparent glass, glazed porcelain, matte clay and the softly folded cloth. At the right, an amber bottle and a glass containing a spoon suggest the practical arrangements of care. These details do more than furnish the room. Together, nourishment, flowers, reading and drawing create an atmosphere of sustained attention to the boy’s comfort.

Painted when Vermehren was in his late seventies, Reading to the Sick Child demonstrates the continuing expressive possibilities of his carefully observed realism. Its narrative is modest, but its arrangement is sophisticated, bringing figures, still life and interior into a coherent whole. Rather than dramatise suffering, Vermehren gives pictorial importance to the ordinary gestures that make vulnerability more bearable. The result is an affectionate image of care, in which the act of reading becomes an expression of patience, presence and human connection.