Knitting and Identity in the 19th Century

In this presentation, Anna Schram Vejlby, curator of the The Hirschsprung Collection of Copenhagen, shares her thoughts on knitting and identity in the first decades of the 19th Century, as seen through portrait painting. She analyzes a series of protraits that depict their subjects as knitting and suggests that the knitting is meant to connote diligence, bourgeoisie socioeconomic status, and love in the context of the painting, as well as adding to the compositional themes. Very unfortunately this video does not include the slideshow Anna Schram Vejlby showed to her lecture's audience and referred to throughout her presentation, so we don't get to see the paintings she is talking about, but the upside of this is that you'll be free to concentrate on your own knitting while enjoying listening to her talk, as I did.