Ingrid Ruin

The artist Ingrid Ruin began her artistic career in 1897 at the Ateneum, where the Finnish Art Society’s Drawing School ran a preparatory class. In 1901, Ingrid Ruin moved to Copenhagen in order to study at the Royal Danish Academy of Fine Arts.

After completing her studies, she became a private student of the Swedish artist Anders Zorn. This was to influence her for the rest of her life. Both critics and journalists were frequently to compare her work with that of Anders Zorn –unfortunately often in a negative manner.

A returning motif in the art of Ingrid Ruin is women in the archipelago, since the Ruin family’s summer house is situated on the island of Härligö in the archipelago of Ingå (Inkoo), some sixty kilometres west of Helsinki. Two of Ingrid Ruin’s paintings were later used as advertisements for the Finland Steamship Company. It is likely that it was the company’s longstanding advertising manager, Arnold Neumann (read his biography also), who made the decision to use her art.

Ingrid Ruin belongs to a group of artists who did not actively work in poster art, but who allowed their work to be used in advertising contexts. Her paintings were also found on postcards and covers of periodicals, including the magazines Husmodern, De Värnlösas Jul and Svenska Journalen.