Here we present works by Carl Gustaf Bernhardson, whose theme was the life of the people of Bohuslän. They show the daily life and beliefs of the people of Central Bohuslän’s island world a hundred years ago.

Carl Gustaf Bernhardson

He was born in 1915 in a family of fishermen and smallholders on Skaftö in Central Bohuslän. The portrayal of how people had lived in bygone times became his great self-assumed life’s work. He produced nearly a thousand oil paintings, half of which are in our care here at the museum. A selection is on display in the Bernhardson Room, the rest can be studied in the Digital Museum. They are painted in a naive, poetic style well suited to the content. The room contains furniture and small objects from Bernhardson’s home, which were donated to the museum after his death in 1998.

The Museum published a book on Carl Bernhardson and his painting in 2010.