Janus la Cour

Janus la Cour was a Danish painter who is remembered for his landscapes painted in the classical style of the Eckersberg school. He was born near Ringkøbing, where his father was a pastor. He became a sailor after his confirmation and made several long voyages. During a stay in Quebec, Canada, he started to draw. He returned to Denmark and enrolled in the Royal Danish Academy of Fine Arts, but left without graduating. He also studied under Carl Dahl, a famous marine painter, and Jean-Léon Gérôme, a French academic painter. He exhibited his works regularly at the Charlottenborg Spring Exhibition and won the Neuhausenske Prize in 1879 for a painting of sunset on the Kattegat. He travelled extensively to Italy, Greenland, Egypt, and the Danish West Indies, and created many paintings inspired by his observations. He was commissioned by the brewer and art collector Carl Jacobsen to paint a series of eleven paintings from Egypt. He died in Copenhagen in 1909. His paintings are known for their realistic and atmospheric depiction of the sea and the landscapes. He is considered one of the most important Danish landscape painters of his time.