One of the key works in Larsson’s transformation from academic painter to plein-air painter and chronicler of family happiness is Little Suzanne (1884). In October 1884, on a narrow strip of the discarded Salon painting of 1882, he painted his daughter Suzanne—and her mother leaning into the picture from the right to keep the baby from falling from the chair. The baby’s face breaks into a beaming smile when she catches sight of her father behind the easel. On the floor is a Japanese doll, again a reference to the importance of Japanese woodcuts; the picture’s unusual, extreme narrowness is also reminiscent of Japanese art. Larsson also painted in a pair of Moroccan slippers and patterned fabrics, additions made with lighter, freer brushwork than the background, bringing the picture to life.
Kristoffer Arvidsson from The Collection Gothenburg Museum of Art, Gothenburg 2014
