Wilhelmina Krafft

Who was Wilhelmina Krafft?

Wilhelmina Krafft was a Swedish painter and portrait miniaturist, child of the painter Per Krafft the Elder and sister of the artist Per Krafft the Younger.

Wilhelmina Krafft was born in Stockholm. She and her brother acted as models for their father's child-portraits, a genre for which he was famous; one of these paintings portrays Per drawing and Wilhelmina at his feet in admiration and one other Wilhelmina alone praying. She studied as a child with her brother under the tutoring of the Royal Swedish Academy of Arts in the 1790s, where her main teacher was L. Sparrgren.

She and her brother debuted together in the 1797 year exhibition by the academy. Her work and talent impressed and she was decorated with the academy's second medal for her work at her first exhibition for her "beautiful prof. works in mignature". The next year, in the exhibition of 1798, she participated with her original miniature portraits. She died in Norrköping.

Her style of painting was cold and icy and as such typically representative of the neoclassical, empire-art of the time. Her daughter Pamela Clementina Noraéus also became a painter.