Lise Svanholm, A Catalogue Raisonné of the Works of Laurits Tuxen, 1990, no. 745.

Exhibited: Presumably one of the studies from Skagen no. 500–508 exhibited at Charlottenborg in 1909 - it could be no. 501 “Sunbathing” or no. 506 “After the bath”. Charlottenborg, Laurits Tuxen mindeudstilling, 1929 no. 205.

Literature: Gertrud Oelsner, “Tuxen genfødt? Det moderne badeliv kommer til Skagen” (Tuxen reborn? Modern bathing life comes to Skagen) pp. 121–137 in the exhibition catalogue “Tuxen - farver, friluft og fyrster”, 2014, mentioned p. 130 and reproduced p. 131.

Provenance: Winkel & Magnussen auction 341, 1947, no. 195. Auktionshuset Århus, Skanderborgvej 104–106, auction 710, 1996, no. 1188. Bruun Rasmussen Vejle, auction 111, 2007, no. 57 reproduced p, 35.

In 1901, Tuxen together with his wife, Frederikke, acquired a house in Skagen to be able to live there in the summer, and here he began his career as a Skagen painter. At this time Skagen had become a fashionable bathing place, and in the summer people came in large numbers to relax and recreate. In the following years, Tuxen paints a number of vitalistic works from the beaches around Skagen with a focus on the naked female body. These works are a tribute to the healthy naked body that enjoys the sun, the air, the sea and the beach without any shame. Like the young woman in this painting - simply enjoying the sun's rays on her naked body lying directly on the warm sand in the dunes - maybe she's drying after a dip in the sea.

P. S. Krøyer painted the same woman at the same model session on the beach in 1908 (H. Chr. Christensen, A Catalogue Raisonné of the Works of P. S. Krøyer, 1923, no. 776). Krøyer has been sitting and painting at his easel a little to the right of Tuxen, as the model on his work is painted a little from the right as opposed to Tuxen's work, where she is seen from the front.

See cat. no. 45 also by Tuxen. At the reverse of that work is a study for the present work.