Oluf Høst

Vinterdagen dør (The dying of a Wintersday), 1943. Depicting the setting sun through the entryway of Bognemark, Høst's farm in Gudhjem, Bornholm - one of his most frequent motifs.

Oluf Høst (18 March 1884 – 14 May 1966) was a Danish Expressionist painter, the only member of the Bornholm school who was a native Bornholmer. Although he studied in Copenhagen, he returned to the Danish island of Bornholm in 1929 where he remained with his family for the rest of his life. Bognemark, a little farmhouse near Gudhjem, was one of Høst's favourite motifs. From 1935 on, he painted the farm some 200 times under varying conditions at different times of the year, often reflecting his particular mood at the time. His home in Gudhjem, built from two fishermen's cottages with a rocky garden in the rear, is named "Norresân" after the nearby harbour, Nørresand Havn, where he painted many of his works. Inspired above all by Cézanne, Høst's work was also strongly influenced by the Nordic tradition as a result of the changing seasons and weather. This is evident in the way he depicted changes of light and mood. Høst commented:

In 1943, Ole, the older of his two sons who had joined the SS, died in Barvinkove (Barwenkowo), a small town on the Eastern Front in Russia. Høst felt guilty for the rest of his life about introducing his son to his friend Fritz Waschnitius, an Austrian-born translator and writer who was a Nazi supporter. It was no doubt Waschnitius who had encouraged Ole to fight with the Germans. Over the next few years, Høst painted a series of pictures of the Bognemark farm as if it was facing towards Barwenkowo.

Høst is also known for his subtly expressed acerbic views in the 1,800 diaries he called "log books", written with such clarity and self-criticism. After his death, they were kept in secret by the Royal Library as Høst had specified they should not be revealed until 50 years after his death. In 1957 he was awarded the Prince Eugen Medal.

He also exhibited with success at Den Frie Udstilling (The Free Exhibition) from 1926. However, he was so attached to his paintings that he did not want to lose them and therefore did not exhibit for years on end. He was so fastidious about his paintings that even after their sale to private individuals or museums he would return with brushes and paints to touch them up, frequently reclaiming them for "completion". Many of his paintings, 50 in all, have indeed never been completed.