David and Saul

Born in Stockholm to a family that had immigrated from Prussia in the late eighteenth century, Ernst Josephson settled in Paris in 1879. In his early paintings, he primarily focused on historical and biblical subjects inspired by the Old Masters. In the 1880s, influenced by Gustave Courbet and Édouard Manet, his style became more realist and impressionist. Josephson became a leader of the Opponents, a Paris-based group of modernist Swedish artists who rebelled against the artistic conservatism of their native land. While suffering from mental illness during the last two decades of his life, Josephson was extremely productive in an innovative expressionist mode.