Anna Casparsson

The Isle of Bliss

25.4 – 27.9 2026

Stockholm

With small stitches, Anna Casparsson embroidered magnificent and wilful motifs inspired by fairy tales, biblical stories and classical music. In the exhibition “The Isle of Bliss”, twenty-nine of her textile artworks are presented at Moderna Museet for the first time since 1960.

Anna Casparsson (1861–1961) was a textile artist, pianist and translator. For several decades, her home Villa Snäckan in Saltsjöbaden outside Stockholm was a meeting place for cultural figures, where they used to gather around the grand piano in the salon. Playing the piano was her great passion, but over time embroidery became her main form of expression.

Casparsson’s peculiar embroideries are characterised by opulence, detail and storytelling, and move freely between art and crafts. In her works, she reused materials such as silk and velvet, and embroidered pearls, sequins, shells, silver and gold thread, buttons, antique lace, mirror shards and much more into the works.

Anna Casparsson, The Isle of Bliss, 1950 Private collection. © Anna Casparsson 2026 Photo: Albin Dahlström/Moderna Museet

Visual worlds

Anna Casparsson created her works in and for the home – embroidered draperies, folding screens, grand piano covers, pillows, tablecloths and bags. The embroideries often grew into their own visual worlds, with elements from folk tales, biblical stories and classical music.

The titles used today for Casparsson’s works are often taken from words and phrases she herself embroidered into the images, not least from the Bible, as well as from fairy tales and stories such as “David and Goliath”, “The Ugly Duckling” and “Little Red Riding Hood”.

Anna Casparsson, The Ugly Duckling, n.d. Private collection. © Anna Casparsson 2026 Photo: Albin Dahlström/Moderna Museet

ABOUT THE ARTIST

Anna Casparsson was born in 1861 and grew up on the Lövingsborg estate, just outside Linköping. She began her creation in textiles during a period when interest in embroidery grew explosively in Sweden. But her own free style and choice of materials in motifs and patterns were something completely different from the ideals of sewing and needlework of the time.

For Anna Casparsson, embroidery was a personal and private creation. She rarely signed her works, and she gave away embroideries that she did not have room for at home to friends. It was not until she was in her eighties, in 1945, that her art was presented in her first major exhibition, which took place at the Grand Hôtel in Saltsjöbaden.

Anna Casparsson’s last major exhibition during her own lifetime opened at Moderna Museet in October 1960 – shortly before the artist’s 100th birthday. At that time, she was the second female living artist to have her own solo exhibition at the museum, shortly after Siri Derkert.