The Danish Connection: Helen Bruton and Kirsten Kjaer

A new biography of Danish artist Kirsten Kjaer by Hanne Abildgaard (Strandberg Publishing, 2023)

The cover features a self-portrait by Kjaer from 1931.

During my research into the lives and careers of the Bruton sisters, I've encountered many fascinating women artists and photographers who were their friends. The Brutons and their female contemporaries benefited from of a network of women artists who helped and supported each other.

Early in my research, I found several letters by Helen Bruton that included references to a friend named Kirsten.  I had no idea who Kirsten was until, out of the blue, I received an email in July 2020 from a Danish author and researcher named Hanne Abildgaard. Abildgaard was writing a book about the Danish artist Kirsten Kjaer, and she told me that Kjaer and Helen Bruton had been good friends. Abildgaard and I realized that although we were on opposite sides of the globe, we were both working on biographies of underknown women artists who just happened to be friends! We continued to email and were able to share valuable resources (letters, photos, and newspaper articles) that were important to both of our projects. 

Kirsten Kjaer in Monterey, 1928
(From Kirsten Kjaer: Menneske Maler)

Kirsten Kjaer (1893-1985) was born on a dairy farm in a rural area of Denmark.  When she was 25 she married the painter Frode Nielson (who would later change his name to Frode Dann).  Unsure what she wanted to do with her life, she tried acting for while and suffered from bouts of tuberculosis and depression.  She finally picked up a paint brush at the age of 32 and found her true calling.  In 1926, she and her husband traveled to California, where their painting careers flourished. They lived in Santa Rosa, Pasadena, San Francisco, and Monterey, where they met the Bruton sisters and other local artists of the Monterey Group.  

Helen Bruton and Kirsten Kjaer became close friends in Monterey. Kjaer -- who was self-taught -- specialized in portrait painting, and she painted this portrait of Helen:

Kirsten Kjaer's portrait of Helen Bruton (1928 or 1929)
(From Kirsten Kjaer: Menneske Maler) 

          

Kirsten Kjaer playing a banjo.
Helen Bruton's print Cass Street is hanging on the wall to the right.
(From Kirsten Kjaer: Menneske Maler)

In 1929, Helen Bruton moved to Southern California to create her tile murals at USC. By this time, Kirsten Kjaer and her husband, Frode, had moved to Pasadena. Kjaer and Bruton resumed their friendship and reconnected with another artist friend named Katharine "Katy" Skeele who was also living in the area. (Although they didn't know it at the time, Kirsten and Katy would end up married to the same man.)

Helen Bruton and Kirsten Kjaer in Pasadena, 1929
 (From Kirsten Kjaer: Menneske Maler) 

Shortly after her arrival in Los Angeles, Helen wrote, "I haven't made any new friends, and if it were not for Kirsten, who leaves soon, and Katy, I would be quite alone in the world."(1)  As Helen mentions, Kirsten had decided to return to Denmark. After her departure, Helen missed her friend terribly, writing "I miss you more than I can say... Somehow you had a way of inspiring me with confidence in myself that I need sadly."(2)

Kjaer returned to Denmark, but her husband, Frode, remained in California (they divorced in 1934). The split was amicable, although soon after his wife left, Frode began pursuing her friend Katy Skeele. No one seemed too concerned about this development, and nearly two decades later, Frode and Katy were married at the Ojai home of Esther Bruton and her husband Carl Gilman. 

Monrovia News-Post, June 27, 1946

After returning to Denmark, Kjaer continued to develop her successful career as a portrait painter. During WWII, she was active in the resistance movement. In her later years, she travelled extensively and remained productive as a painter. Helen Bruton and Kjaer maintained a close friendship throughout their lives. Bruton traveled to Denmark in 1964 to visit Kjaer (and purchased a new Volvo which she had shipped back to Monterey). Kjaer and Helen Bruton both died in 1985. 

Kirsten Kjaer painting in Denmark.
(From the Kirsten Kjaer Museum website)

In 1981, the Kirsten Kjaer Museum was founded in Frostrup, Denmark. The museum holds Kjaer's paintings, personal effects, and archives, and it features rotating exhibitions, concerts, and housing for guest artists. 

Kirsten Kjaer: Menneske Maler [Kirsten Kjaer: Human Painter] (Strandberg Publishing, 2023) is only available in Danish. Yet the photographs and artwork in this beautifully illustrated biography speak volumes. Congratulations to Hanne Abildgaard for bringing to light the life and career of Kirsten Kjaer, a fascinating painter who was part of the Bruton sisters' circle of friends.

(1) Helen Bruton, letter to Ina Perham and Lucy Valentine Pierce, June 13, [1929], Perham Private Collection.

(2) Helen Bruton, letter to Kirsten Kjaer, August 7, 1929, Kirsten Kjaer Papers.