Rack groups
Rackengruppen was an artists ' colony in the Swedish province of Värmland at the beginning of the 20th century , named after the lake Racken north of the city of Arvika .
Rackengruppen was a circle of friends of artists who settled at Lake Racken. The central figure was Gustaf Fjæstad , who moved to Taserud with his future wife Maja in 1898 and rented the studio villa of the sculptor Christian Eriksson , who had moved to Stockholm . Björn Ahlgrensson and his wife Elsa soon followed , who settled in Perserud, and a little later his brother-in-law, the painter Fritz Lindström . The Fjæstads sisters also moved to Arvika and set up a weaving workshop and Sweden's first handicraft shop. These painters were joined by local artists such as Alfred Ekstam , Thure Ander and Bror Lindh , who together formed the core of the artist colony. The colony slowly dissolved in the interwar period, and the death of the last painter at the lake, Fritz Lindström, in 1962 set the final point.
What the group had in common was a national romantic longing for nature and rural folklore, which is reflected in the theme of their art. The group did not have a common program. But their landscape and genre pictures, often in the twilight, show post-impressionist influences, especially synthetism .
In memory of the Rackengruppen artists ' colony , the Rackstad Museum was founded in Arvika in the 1980s .