Frida Hansen designed around 80 wool open-warp transparent tapestry designs. These tapestries and their designs are worthy of a book in themselves (which I promise will be finished in 2026), but her legacy is much broader. She was vital to the revival of tapestry weaving in Norway in the 1890s. She was entrepreneurial; at the turn of the 20th century, her studio, Den Norske Billedvæveri [the Norwegian Tapestry Studio], employed more than 20 weavers—one of the largest tapestry workshops in Europe. She was also committed to teaching. She had already taught 150 women to weave in her courses by 1895.
Frida Hansen patented her transparent tapestry technique in 1897, but when she closed her studio in 1904, she released the patent. It was then used by many designers, many of them weavers she had taught or employed in her workshop.
Hansen not only taught many weavers of the next generation, but inspired them as well with her light-filled tapestries. The technique was popular and taught in weaving schools and private instruction courses around Norway at least until the late 1940s, according to newspaper ads.
As I’ve studied Frida Hansen and her transparencies over the past few years, I’ve discovered many open-warp tapestries designed by her followers. My sources include books, magazines, newspapers, museum listings, social media, and tips from friends (special shout-out to Tove Solbakken, Bjørn Sverre Hol Haugen, Annemor Sundbø, and Therese Solbakken).
My definition of “followers” is loose. It includes the designers who wove Frida Hansen’s transparent tapestry designs in her workshop and went on to design in the technique. It stretches to individual weavers who created their own designs and extends to today, when contemporary artists are still finding inspiration in her work.
Unlike Frida Hansen’s carefully documented designs, many of the tapestries woven in the first decades of the 1900s have incomplete provenance. Sometimes the designer can be identified, but we don’t know who wove the piece. Sometimes the weaver is known, but not the designer.
I’m organizing a notebook with printed photos of all the mystery-designer tapestries, which is getting quite fat. It helps to be able to leaf through images to find similarities in designs. Recently, I received photos of portières at the Asker Museum via Bjørn Sverre Hol Haugen. (Notice how different the colors appear depending on whether light is shining through from behind.)
I found a photo of the same design in my notebook, taken from Årbok for Nordfjord (2007). It was listed as a Frida Hansen design, but I don’t think that attribution is correct. The tapestry was part of a registry of weavings in Gloppen, Norway.
Who designed this tapestry with the backwards-looking birds? We don’t know.
This lack of provenance, and lack of design credit, is frustrating but understandable, given the context. The transparent tapestries were most often woven as functional textiles, as portieres or curtains, and regarded by few as art works. These designers’ names should not be forgotten, and their works should be identified and celebrated. I think Frida Hansen would agree.
As I work on my book this year, I will also be working on the unknown designer mysteries, as an important part of recognizing the lasting impact of Frida Hansen.