Exhibited: “Olaf Rude 1886–1986”, Bornholms Kunstmuseum, Lolland-Falster Kunstmuseum, Kunstpavillionen Esbjerg “Kunstforeningens samling” and Vejle Kunstmuseum, 1986, cat. no. 15, reprod. p. 34. Provenance: Sculptress Helen Schou. Olaf Rude is among the most important Danish classical modernists. About the time of the First World War, Rude belonged to a group of artists who were changing the painting. Instead of cultivating the recognisable motif as the symbolists did, this group of artists focused on the formal artistic effects of the painting. In this change, a clear inspiration can be seen from the French cubists like Picasso and Braque whose pioneering works from the early 20th century got the modernism and the non-figurative painting started in earnest. During this period, 1915–1920, to Rude, it was no longer about cultivating the recognisable painting, but about liberating the imagery, leading to an abstract and context free painting. In an interview with the art historian Carl V. Petersen, Olaf Rude defines his art: “The paintings are created at the canvas. They built themselves, not like representations of nature, nor like a sense of nature or what you would understand as symbolism, but entirely like an interplay between lines and colours, evolving on the surface according to their own laws in a system of levels and masses, having their own content, meaning and atmosphere, in themselves, in their balance, in their rhythm”. In the present work, “The female rider Anna Ludvigsen” from 1917, the depiction of the human figure has been simplified and reduced; it is of the same importance as the other elements in the painting. This way of equating the elements makes the motif appear like a still life which emphasizes the objective of the cubism; creating an abstract and context-free painting.