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Ester Henning

Swedish artist (1887–1985)

Correspondence, annotated notebooks and portrait silhouettes prepared for research
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Record originEnglish Wikipedia
Text licenseCC BY-SA 4.0
Source revisionAug 29, 2025
Entity authorityQ4953594
Source-derived summary

Ester Matilda Henning (28 October 1887 – 1 May 1985) was a Swedish artist. From 1919 she spent the remaining 60 years of her life in a mental institution.

Ester Matilda Henning was born on 28 October 1887 in Yngshyttan outside Filipstad. She was born fourth of seven daughters to a poor cobbler. She moved to Mora at the age of 12 to work as a nanny.

Her art has been exhibited at three main exhibitions: in 1946 in Gothenburg, in 1963 at the Beckomberga Hospital and in 1970 at the Liljevalchs konsthall in Stockholm.

In 2009 Maud Nycander and Kersti Grunditz made a documentary about her life and her art that was shown on Sveriges Television.

Anna Jörgensdotter wrote a novel in 2015 inspired by her life titled Drömmen om Ester.

References

Irja Bergström (1989). "Ensam fågel – jag vet vem det är" : Ester Henning : konstnärinna på hospital.

Editorial summary

Begin with the source’s own compact description: “Ester Henning” is swedish artist (1887–1985). The dossier treats that line as a proposition to test through Ester, Henning and Swedish, not as a finished interpretation.

Editorial reviewStrongest as a route into the people, institutions and dated events that shaped the subject’s public record. The current lead gives the account dated anchors—1887, 1985, 1919, 1946—that can be checked directly. The linked authority record independently contributes the date 1887-10-28. For this dossier, Ester, Henning and Swedish is the immediate research focus.
Editorial analysis

Why this record matters

The phrase “swedish artist (1887–1985)” supplies a clear boundary for inquiry. It also exposes the unanswered questions: who defined that boundary, when it became stable and which sources sit outside it.

Evidence profile

The entry’s evidential value lies in the named roles, institutions and publications that can be tested against primary documentation. The source revision retrieved here is dated Aug 29, 2025. The linked authority identifier is Q4953594. VIAF identifies the subject as 3347219. The Library of Congress control number is n90630565. 3 of 3 selected statements include explicit references; 0 carry qualifiers and 0 use preferred rank. The first chronological checks are 1887, 1985, 1919 and 1946.

Critical limits

A concise life account rarely captures disputed attribution, private networks or the changing language used to describe a career. The source lead contains qualifying language; that uncertainty should survive quotation, summary and reuse. Authority statements aid reconciliation but still require their own references, qualifiers and ranks to be checked.

How to read it

Read biographical claims against dates, named institutions and the cited references. Distinguish a subject’s later reputation from evidence produced during their lifetime.

Best used for
  • Establishing names and roles
  • Building a first chronology
  • Locating cited institutions
Verify next

Personal papers, civil or court records, institutional files and the scholarship cited by the source.

Three-step research path

  1. Establish the record: confirm the title “Ester Henning”, its source revision and the description used here.
  2. Expand the search: follow Ester Henning primary sources, Ester Henning archive and Ester research across catalogues and specialist indexes.
  3. Test the account: compare the strongest cited source with the responsible institution’s current record and note any disagreement.

Questions for further research

  1. Which source most directly establishes the central claim about “Ester Henning”?
  2. Which primary records establish identity, chronology and institutional ties?
  3. How has the subject’s reputation changed across later accounts?
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Source & attribution

This entry incorporates text from Ester Henning” on English Wikipedia. Contributors are listed in the page history. Text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 License. Selected authority identifiers and statements are retrieved from Wikidata under CC0; their references and qualifiers remain part of the verification path.