Male Nude and two Women

Thorvald Erichsen was a Norwegian painter who studied in Paris and absorbed French Post-Impressionist influences, producing work that bridges Scandinavian naturalism and the more radical colour experiments of the French avant-garde. This composition of a male nude with two women, from 1903, is an unusually ambitious figure study for his output — a subject that required serious academic engagement with the classical tradition of figure composition. Held in the National Museum of Art, Architecture and Design in Oslo, it documents Erichsen's serious engagement with figurative tradition alongside his better-known landscape work.

The composition engages with the classical tradition of mixing male and female nudes in a pastoral or studio setting. Erichsen's handling shows his Post-Impressionist training in the bold colour relationships and loose, confident brushwork, which give the figures a modern vitality rather than academic stiffness.