Suzette Holten

Suzette Holten was born in Copenhagen on 29 January 1863, the third child of P.C. Skovgaard and his wife Georgia. She lost her mother when she was only five years old and was raised by her father, a prominent painter of the Danish Golden Age. He introduced her to the works of his friends and colleagues, such as Lundbye, Marstrand and Constantin Hansen, and encouraged her to draw. After his death in 1875, she moved into the home of the painter Thorald Læssøe where she continued to have contacts with the artistic community. She studied drawing under Carl Thomsen, Laurits Tuxen and Frans Schwartz, but as a woman, she was unable to attend the Royal Danish Academy of Fine Arts. She was mostly self-taught as a painter, but also learned from her brothers Joakim and Niels, who also became painters. She continued her studies in Paris together with her friends Elise Konstantin-Hansen, Edma Frølich and Sofie Holten. She also established a close friendship with the sculptor Anne Marie Brodersen, who later married Carl Nielsen. She became one of the avant-garde artists associated with Kunstnernes Frie Studieskoler, which had been established to provide an alternative to the traditional methods of the Academy. In 1891, together with J. F. Willumsen, Vilhelm Hammershøi and Agnes and Harald Slott-Møller, she was a founder of Den Frie Udstilling, which offered an alternative to the Academy's exhibitions at Charlottenborg. She played an active part in establishing the institution and frequently exhibited her paintings there. Following her death in 1937, Den Frie Udstilling held a commemorative exhibition of her works. Holten worked with various media and genres, including ceramics, landscapes, flower paintings, portraits and embroideries. She experimented with forms and colors, influenced by art nouveau and Japanese art, but remained within the realistic style. She created and decorated ceramics with artists such as Thorvald Bindesbøll and Theodor Philipsen at Johan Wallmann's pottery in Utterslev and at G. Eifrig's workshop in Valby. Some of her pieces were exhibited at Copenhagen's Nordic Exhibition of 1888. She also worked as an embroiderer, creating an altar cloth for Roskilde Cathedral. She married the merchant Hans Nicolai Holten in 1894 and had a son, Aage Holten, who became a painter and architect. She died in Copenhagen on 11 February 1937.