Egill Jacobsen

Painter known for his colourful abstract mask paintings and his influence on modern Danish art. Raised in a middle-class home that dismissed art as a career, he abandoned tailoring to study at the Royal Academy’s private painting school (1932–1933), encouraged by Kræsten Iversen. After debuting in 1932, he travelled to Paris in 1934, where meeting Picasso and discovering African masks inspired his signature style of simple, colourful mask imagery.

In 1937 he exhibited with the group “Linien.” His 1938 work Ophobning marked a breakthrough, reflecting Europe’s tense political climate and his left-wing sympathies. During World War II, he co-founded the avant-garde magazine Helhesten, working with artists such as Asger Jorn and Ejler Bille - a collaboration that evolved into the CoBrA movement.

Inspired by psychoanalyst Sigurd Næsgaard’s lectures, Jacobsen embraced the subconscious and the “primitive” as creative forces against academic norms. His 1952 solo show at Galerie Birch was a major success, earning him the title “Master of the Masks.” The mask motif remained central to his work, reflecting his moods -darker in crises, lighter in joy.

Appointed in 1959 as the Royal Academy’s first abstract art professor, he became a major influence on younger artists, celebrated for his dynamic use of colour and expressive energy within postwar European modernism.