ArtistSwedish
Göran Brunius
4 active items
Per Göran Gomer Brunius was born on 2 August 1911 on Lidingö, outside Stockholm, and died on 6 April 2005. His career unfolded across painting, sculpture, printmaking, and writing, shaped by a rigorous European training and an abiding interest in the natural world.
Brunius began his formal training at Otte Sköld's painting school in Stockholm and at Bror Hjorth's and Nils Möllerberg's sculpture school between 1930 and 1931. He then entered the Royal Swedish Academy of Fine Arts in Stockholm, studying there from 1932 to 1937. During that period he also spent time at Maison Watteau in Paris from 1934 to 1935, and later studied at the Círculo de Bellas Artes in Madrid, giving his formation a genuinely international dimension.
As a painter, Brunius worked primarily in the open air, painting directly before his subjects. His approach varied: in his graphic work he pursued a strictly realistic style, often in both large and small etching formats, while on canvas he was more impressionistic and at times nearly expressionistic. His subjects ranged across the Swedish landscape, archipelago shorelines, and motifs from Lappland, but he was equally drawn to birds and to figures from cultures he encountered in travel, including Mayan Indians and Berbers.
The ornithological thread in his work extended into writing. He published "Se på fåglar" in 1955 and "Svenskt fågellexikon" in 1962, both reflecting the same sharp observational attention that characterizes his graphic work with birds. Works like "Fåglar svepa över Finnskär" and his numerous studies of individual species show a naturalist's precision combined with a graphic sensibility.
His work entered the permanent collections of Nationalmuseum, Moderna museet, Gävle museum, Kalmar konstmuseum, and Institut Tessin in Paris, among others. He was also a member of the Accademia delle Arti del Disegno in Florence. He was the son of art critic August Brunius and is buried at Lidingö cemetery.
At auction, Brunius appears most often through Stockholms Auktionsverk and regional Swedish houses. Prices sit at a modest but consistent level, with landscapes and Stockholm views performing best. "Gamla Stan från Fåfängan" has reached 2,901 SEK and "Fjärden" sold for 1,500 SEK, while landscape works have also sold for 800 EUR in international contexts.