Hanna Rönnberg
1862–1946 · Finnish Realist painter and writer
Hanna Rönnberg (Hämeenlinna, 1862 – Kulosaari, 1946) was a Finnish painter and writer who belonged to the generation of women artists who adopted French Realism in the 1880s. She matters for her role in the artists' colony at Önningeby on the island of Åland, and for her writings about Scandinavian artists at the end of the century.
She trained at the Finnish Art Society's Drawing School in Helsinki and at the Royal Swedish Academy of Fine Arts in Stockholm, then continued her studies in Paris. From 1886 she returned to Önningeby year after year, where she befriended Elin Danielson. In 1888 she travelled to Denmark with Edvard Westman, and the two secretly became engaged, though they never married.
Her best works date from around 1890. Her early outdoor scenes on Åland were inspired by French plein air painting, and later she adopted brighter colours and looser, sweeping brushwork. As a writer she published short story collections such as Från Ålands skär (1899) and Brovaktens historier (1905), the latter winning a Swedish literary award, and in 1938 a book about the artists' colony.