Theodor Kittelsen

Theodor Severin Kittelsen is born in 1857 in Kragerø, Telemark, the second of eight siblings. He spends the first decade of his life in a stable and well-respected home. Already at this time, he is showing a talent for drawing and painting.

But everything changes when Theodor is 11. His father dies of an unknown illness, and the family’s fortune takes a turn for the worse. Theodor must take on a job to help out with the family’s growing debt. He becomes an apprentice to a watchmaker in his hometown, then a house painter in Kristiania, then a watchmaker again in Arendal. Here, he meets Diderich Maria Aall, who becomes his patron. With a combination of Aall’s funding, support from family and friends, and state scholarships, Theodor is able to spend the next decade traveling around Norway and studying art in Kristiania, Munich, and Paris.

In 1882, five years before he will return to Norway for good, Kittelsen gets his break as a fairy tale illustrator. His friend, Erik Werenskiold, struggles to complete the latest commission from Asbjørnsen and Moe and recommends Kittelsen for the job. Asbjørnsen is initially skeptical. He worries that Kittelsen’s art might be too scary for children. It turns out that he needn’t have worried. When the latest edition of Norske folke- og huldre-eventyr is published in 1883 with Kittelsen’s illustrations gracing the pages, children are enamored with the images: the trolls are just as they’ve pictured them! The impact Kittelsen makes on the collective imagination of Norwegian children will be felt long into the future: his art will serve as inspiration for how trolls are pictured more than a century after his death.

In 1889, now 32 years old and newly relocated to Larvik, Kittelsen meets 21-year-old Inga Kristine Dahl. The daughter of a ship captain, Inga is a bright young woman, educated, cultured, and practically inclined, yet interested in the finer things in life, like art. The two are perfect for each other and fall madly in love. Within weeks, they are married. The very next year, the first of their nine children is born.

The years that follow are among the most productive of Kittelsen’s life. He doesn’t just illustrate Asbjørnsen and Moe’s fairy tales but creates independent series of drawings and watercolors, publishes landscapes he draws when traveling, and even writes his own books. Books of his illustrated stories Trollskab, The Black Death, and Soria Moria Castle are published in this later period of his career. He also works on satirical caricatures and commissions to make ends meet.

For his work, Kittelsen receives recognition and praise, even the Order of St. Olav for his contribution to Norwegian art. But financial stability never comes. Defeated by years of stress and economic struggles, Kittelsen succumbs to a prolonged and unknown illness in January 1914, only 56 years old.