Frants Diderik Boe

Finnish (1820-1891)

Born in Bergen, Norway in 1820, Frants Diderik Bøe studied at the Royal Danish Academy of Fine Arts in Copenhagen with architect Gustav Friedrich Hetsch and sculptor Herman Wilhelm Bissen.  He was also a pupil of the painter Christen Kjøke. In 1849, Bøe moved to Paris where he studied under the Danish still life painter Theude Grønland. In Paris Bøe established a reputation with his still lifes. He exhibited and received a prize for his work at the Vienna World’s Fair in 1873 and another at the Paris Salon in 1878. His eight years in Paris were by far his most creative period as an artist. At the height of his career in the mid-1800s, he was internationally recognized and sold his work to the French government, King Oscar I and the National Gallery, as well as in Great Britain and the United States. Bøe returned to Norway in 1857 and settled in Bergen.

Bøe’s works are held in the permanent collections of the National Gallery in Oslo, National Gallery of Denmark, National Museum of Stockholm, Oscarshall Summer Palace in Oslo, Rogaland Art Museum, and Gothenburg Art Museum.