Gunnar Berndtson

Gunnar Berndtson painted portraits and elegant interior scenes in the polished French academic style. His pictures are finely detailed, with careful attention to fabric, furniture and light.

He was born in Helsinki and studied at the École des Beaux-Arts in Paris under Jean-Léon Gérôme from 1876 to 1882. He was part of the circle around Albert Edelfelt. He exhibited at the Paris Salon from 1878 and spent time in Egypt in 1882 to 1883. He won the Finnish State Prize for portraiture in 1889 and taught at the art school in Helsinki, where Magnus Enckell and Ellen Thesleff were among his students.

Eero Järnefelt is a portrait of a fellow Finnish painter. Look at the precise rendering of faces.