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Jemne, Elsa Laubach (1887–1974)

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Black and white photograph of Elsa L. Jemne working at an easel, 1922.

Elsa L. Jemne working at an easel, 1922.

Elsa Laubach Jemne was a Minnesota artist active from the 1910s to the 1960s. Though skilled as an easel painter, she is better known for the murals she created for public buildings, including post offices and courthouses.

Jemne was born Elsa Laubach on July 7, 1887, in St. Paul. While she was able to attend classes at the St. Paul School of Art beginning in 1910, financial circumstances forced her to work as a commercial artist—a job that she resented for its creative monotony. By 1912, she had saved enough money to go to Philadelphia to attend the Pennsylvania Academy of Fine Arts, one of most prestigious art schools in the country.

In 1914, Jemne won a fellowship that allowed her to travel and work in Europe. It was Italy that truly impressed and influenced her. In viewing the country’s monasteries and churches, she became interested in the techniques and aesthetics of the fresco.

Jemne stayed in Europe for only part of her planned trip. In July 1914 came the outbreak of World War I. Trying to get home ahead of the war, she was stuck in Switzerland for three weeks and later made it to Paris in time to see enemy aircraft attack the city. Back in Philadelphia a few months later, Jemne began her third year at the Academy. Further travel had to wait until the war ended.

After graduating, Jemne came home to Minnesota. In 1917 came her first major recognition as an artist: a gold medal at the Second Annual Northwestern Exhibition for the painting The Red Haired Girl. An untitled painting done a few years later shows the same characteristics of Girl: a distinctive, flat, dreamlike style and the matte fresco-inspired technique that is a Jemne signature.

In 1925, Jemne was hired by the Great Northern Railway to paint images of Glacier National Park and members of the Blackfeet tribe. These portraits and images of pristine landscapes were intended to be part tourist advertisement, part historical record, and part Wild West fantasy. The paintings illustrate Jemne’s attention to detail and accuracy and were painted from life, as seen in a 1926 photograph. The style of these paintings is less painterly than many of her other works, but a slightly wistful feeling is still evident.

Jemne is well known as a muralist. Her first major work came in 1922, at the Stearns County Courthouse. The Art Deco-styled mural shows two figures riding in an idyllic landscape and is meant to be an imagining of Minnesota before Europeans arrived. Beginning in the 1930s, Jemne was commissioned to paint several murals under the Treasury Department’s Section of Fine Arts. A mural called Wilderness, installed in the Ely post office, shows a scene of Minnesota wildlife in the northwoods.

In order to accurately portray the iron ore industry in the other Ely post office mural, Jemne traveled to the Pioneer Mine in Ely and descended to the thirteenth level in the miners’ cage. Another mural, in the Minneapolis Armory, was funded by the Works Progress Administration. Done in 1937 and titled Minnesota, it depicts an allegorical figure of Minnesota surrounded by the people and symbols of the state. Jemne’s characteristic style is evident, as well as the influence of famous muralists like Violet Oakley and Diego Rivera. Her last major mural, a Scandinavian-inspired work for the American Swedish Institute, was completed in 1954.

Jemne was the wife and sometime collaborator of architect Magnus Jemne. One collaboration, the St. Paul Women’s City Club, was designed by the Jemnes in 1931 in the Art Moderne style. Now on the National Register of Historic Places, the building boasts decorative elements designed by Jemne. It was intended not only as a social club for elite urban women but as an intellectual gathering place for all Minnesota women.

Until 1962, when Jemne suffered a stroke, she consistently worked and exhibited. She taught at the Minneapolis School of Art and returned to easel painting in the 1940s and 1950s. The Walker Art Center’s 1949 centennial exhibition of Minnesota art included two of her paintings. Three solo shows of her work were held in the late 1950s and early 1960s, including a retrospective at the Walker Art Center in 1957.

Jemne died in St. Paul on June 26, 1974.

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  • Bibliography
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Hamsun, Marie. A Norwegian Family. Translated by Maida Castelhun Darnton and illustrated by Elsa Jemne. Philadelphia: J. B. Lippincott, 1934.

L’Enfant, Julie. Pioneer Modernists: Minnesota’s First Generation of Women Artists. Afton, MN: Afton Press, 2011.

——— . A Norwegian Farm. Translated by Maida Castelhun Darnton and illustrated by Elsa Jemne. Philadelphia: J. B. Lippincott, 1933.

MacKaye, Loring. We of Frabo Stand. Illustrated by Elsa Jemne. New York: Longmans, Green, 1944.

Related Images

Black and white photograph of Elsa L. Jemne working at an easel, 1922.
Black and white photograph of Elsa L. Jemne working at an easel, 1922.
Black and white photograph of Elsa Jemne painting portrait of a Blackfoot woman, c.1915
Black and white photograph of Elsa Jemne painting portrait of a Blackfoot woman, c.1915
Color image of unknown title, obverse (Girl in a Tabard), oil-on-canvas painting by Elsa Jemne, 1920.
Color image of unknown title, obverse (Girl in a Tabard), oil-on-canvas painting by Elsa Jemne, 1920.
Color image of unknown title, reverse (Italian scene), oil-on-canvas painting by Elsa Jemne, undated.
Color image of unknown title, reverse (Italian scene), oil-on-canvas painting by Elsa Jemne, undated.
Stearns County Courthouse mural by Elsa Jemne
Stearns County Courthouse mural by Elsa Jemne
Color image of Yellow Kidney, Keeper of the Beaver Bundle, oil-on-canvas painting by Elsa Jemne, 1926.
Color image of Yellow Kidney, Keeper of the Beaver Bundle, oil-on-canvas painting by Elsa Jemne, 1926.
Color image of Mrs. Star, oil-on-canvas painting by Elsa Jemne, 1926.
Color image of Mrs. Star, oil-on-canvas painting by Elsa Jemne, 1926.
Color image of Portrait of An Indian Male, oil-on-canvas painting by Elsa Jemne, 1926.
Color image of Portrait of An Indian Male, oil-on-canvas painting by Elsa Jemne, 1926.
Color image of Untitled (Glacier Park), watercolor on paper, undated [1926?].
Color image of Untitled (Glacier Park), watercolor on paper, undated [1926?].
Black and white photograph of Magnus Jemne, husband of Elsa Laubach Jemne, c.1931.
Black and white photograph of Magnus Jemne, husband of Elsa Laubach Jemne, c.1931.
Black and white photograph of Knute Heldner holding a painting created by Elsa Jemne for the WPA Federal Art Project and exhibited at the Minnesota State Fair, c.1936.
Black and white photograph of Knute Heldner holding a painting created by Elsa Jemne for the WPA Federal Art Project and exhibited at the Minnesota State Fair, c.1936.
Black and white photograph of Clement Haupers and Elsa Jemne at Big Sand Lake, c.1929.
Black and white photograph of Clement Haupers and Elsa Jemne at Big Sand Lake, c.1929.
Black and white photograph of Federal Art Project murals by Lucia Wiley and Elsa Jemne in the Minneapolis Armory, October 15, 1936.
Black and white photograph of Federal Art Project murals by Lucia Wiley and Elsa Jemne in the Minneapolis Armory, October 15, 1936.
Black and white photograph of Elsa Laubach Jemne viewing Clement Haupers’ oil painting "Early Moon" in St. Paul, 1938.
Black and white photograph of Elsa Laubach Jemne viewing Clement Haupers’ oil painting "Early Moon" in St. Paul, 1938.
Color image of Wilderness, Elsa Jemne’s mural for the Ely Post Office, 1940.
Color image of Wilderness, Elsa Jemne’s mural for the Ely Post Office, 1940.
Color image of a detail view of Wilderness, Elsa Jemne’s mural for the Ely Post Office, 1940.
Color image of a detail view of Wilderness, Elsa Jemne’s mural for the Ely Post Office, 1940.
Black and white photograph of a mural in Minneapolis Armory by Elsa Jemne (seated before mural), c.1940.
Black and white photograph of a mural in Minneapolis Armory by Elsa Jemne (seated before mural), c.1940.
Color image of Iron Ore Mine, Elsa Jemne’s mural for the Ely Post office, 1940.
Color image of Iron Ore Mine, Elsa Jemne’s mural for the Ely Post office, 1940.
Color image of a detail view of Iron Ore Mine, Elsa Jemne’s mural for the Ely Post office, 1940.
Color image of a detail view of Iron Ore Mine, Elsa Jemne’s mural for the Ely Post office, 1940.

Turning Point

In 1914, Jemne travels to Europe for the first time. In Italy, she studies the techniques and aesthetics of fresco painting.

Chronology

1887

Elsa Laubach (later Jemne) is born in St. Paul on July 7.

1910

Jemne begins studying at the St Paul School of Art while working as a commercial artist at the Brown and Bigelow advertising firm.

1912

Jemne begins attending the Pennsylvania Academy of Fine Arts.

1914

Jemne receives the Emilon T. Cresson Fellowship, allowing for travel to Italy, France, and England. Her trip is cut short by the onset of World War I.

1915

Jemne receives a second Cresson Fellowship. Her travel to Europe is delayed until 1921.

1917

Jemne wins a gold medal for The Red Haired Girl at the Second Annual Northwestern Exhibition.

1921

Jemne contributes to the Art Deco style and artwork of the Women’s City Club of St. Paul, designed by her husband Magnus Jemne.

1937

The Treasury Department’s Section of Fine Arts (“the Section”) funds Jemne’s mural Development of the Land, in Ladysmith, Wisconsin. This mural has since been demolished.

1939

Jemne creates two “section” murals for the Ely Post Office: Wilderness and Iron Ore Mine.

1942

Jemne does a third “section” mural for the Hutchinson Post Office. One of three original panels survives.

1942

For the Works Progress Administration Federal Art Project, Jemne executes the mural Minnesota in the Minneapolis Armory.

1954

Jemne does her last large mural, for the American Swedish Institute.

1957

A solo show of Jemne’s works is held at Minneapolis’ Walker Art Center.

1974

Jemne dies in St. Paul on June 26.