Tímarit Þjóðræknisfélags Íslendinga - 01.01.1962, Page 74

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TÍMARIT ÞJÓÐRÆKNISFÉLAGS ÍSLENDINGA
and in the third, “Esau,” “Job”
(both 1940), and “Jacob Wrestling
with the Angel” (1940-1942).
The visitor will also note that
Jónsson frequently expressed him-
self in a symbolic manner. A good
example is “Natura mater” (1906):
Here nature is pictured as simul-
taneously the giver and destroyer
of life—as a mother suckling
her children at her bosom and
as a beast of prey clutching and
crushing them with her claws. “In
the expression of her countenance
it is as if good and evil blend im-
perceptably in a vague mixture . . .
Jónsson’s Natura mater bears at
the same time the impress of the
mountain, of man and of beast and
cypresses from her hair.”11 That is,
the artist has here captured the
duality of nature—the creative
and destructive forces—and at the
same time represented all the king-
doms of nature.
Two outstanding elements in
Jónsson’s art remain to be discussed.
First of these is the originality and
individualism of his expression: He
cannot be assigned to any category,
school, or ism; he stands alone.
So ingrained, indeed, was his aver-
sion to extraneous influences that,
as soon as he detected any in any-
thing at which he was working, he
would abandon it.12 An aspect of his
individualism, it may be added, was
his original use of Icelandic land-
scape features, such as “stuðlaberg”
(columnar basalt) and rocky ridges,
in many of his works. The other
outstanding element, which no
11. Gudmundur Finnbogason, “Einar Jónsson:
The poet Sculptor,” Myndir, p. 76.
12. Ibid., p. 80.
13. Einar Jónsson, p. 10.
viewer can fail to notice, is the
philosophical and religious em-
phasis in the majority of Jónsson’s
works, especially his later ones.
The explanation for these two
elements in Jónsson’s art is to be
sought, naturally enough, in the
artist’s philosophy of life, which
also included some definite views
on the nature and purposes of art.
Let us look first at his philosophy
of life. After a temporary period
of skepticism during his early years
abroad, Jónsson—through the study
of works by the Swedish mystic
Swedenborg—returned to a re-
ligious view of life. (Cf. August
Strinberg’s religious conversion
through the same agency). Avidly
he went on to study spiritualism,
theosophy, and various other mysti-
cal doctrines, without, however,
allying himself with any one parti-
cular school of thought. From these
influences evolved Jónsson’s
private philosophy—a mystical con-
ception of existence. Briefly out-
lined, it may be stated in the follow-
ing terms: All existence is an idea
in the mind of the great Creator,
the outward world therefore being
a mere reflection of spiritual facts.
Thus our life and existence is one
grand metaphor, or symbol. Fur-
thermore, man is essentially divine
in nature, and his perfectability as-
sured through a process of succes-
sive incarnations, culminating with
liberation from the “wheel of exis-
tence” as the self attains to the true
eternal life—the Christ-life. The
foundation of his philosophy of life,
in Jónsson’s words, was “. . . the
faith in God and in eternity—more