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The Woman with the Handbag - Wikipedia

Created: 2020-06-19 19:27  |  Source: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Woman_with_the_Handbag

The Woman with the Handbag

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The photograph by Hans Runesson

The Woman with the Handbag (Swedish: Kvinnan med handväskan, or Tanten med handväskan, "The old lady with the handbag")[1] is a photograph taken in Växjö, Sweden on 13 April 1985 by photojournalist Hans Runesson. It depicts a 38-year-old woman, Danuta Danielsson, hitting a marching neo-Nazi with a handbag.[2]

According to scholar Samuel Merrill, the photograph became popular because it captures what Henri Cartier-Bresson called the "decisive moment" of an action or composition, it anticipates and insinuates rather than explicitly demonstrates violence, and it depicts what seems to be a vulnerable elderly woman confronting a young archetypal neo-Nazi.[3]

History​[edit]

The photograph was taken during a small demonstration of The Nordic Realm Party supporters on 13 April 1985, shortly after a public speech delivered by the Left Party-Communists leader Lars Werner in the centre of Växjö.[4] It was published in the next day on the front page of the Swedish national newspapers Dagens Nyheter, and on 15 April in two British newspapers, The Times and The Daily Express.[3] Another photograph taken by Runesson during the event shows the ten Neo-Nazis being chased and physically confronted by a crowd made up of Växjö residents, until the activists eventually managed to shelter in the toilets of the city's train station.[3]

Runesson's photograph was selected as the Swedish Picture of the Year (Årets bild) 1985 and later as the Picture of the Century by the magazine Vi and the Photographic Historical Society of Sweden.[5]

The photograph was produced using gelatin silver process and editioned by gallerist Pelle Unger.[6] Twelve copies, three AP and three PP has been produced in the size 58 by 80 centimetres (23 in × 31 in) and price ranges between €3000–6000.[7]

Protagonists​[edit]

Danuta Danielsson, the woman in the photo, was born in 1947 in Poland and moved to Sweden after marrying a Swedish man she had met at a jazz festival. She was of Jewish Polish heritage and her Jewish mother had been imprisoned in Majdanek concentration camp during The Holocaust.[5][8][9]

Danielsson chose to remain anonymous after the event due to fears of criminal prosecution and neo-Nazi reprisal, and her name remained unknown to the public for nearly three decades. During this period, she came to be seen in the Swedish public opinion as a personification of the tant ('old lady'), symbolizing "mundane and unstated wisdom, civil courage and moral alignment."[1] Danielsson had mental health issues, and she died by suicide in 1988 after jumping from Växjö's water tower.[10]

The lady in the photograph was revealed to be Danielsson by the press in 2014, in the midst of debates over the installation of a statue as a public memorial of the event. Her son condemned the idea and stated that Danielsson had never liked the photograph and regretted its fame. He also dispelled the rumors that she was herself a Jewish concentration camp survivor and that she did not know what she was doing at the time of the event because of her mental health issues.[10]

The man hit by Danielsson is identified as Seppo Seluska, a militant from the Nordic Realm Party later convicted for the torture and murder of a gay Jewish person.[11][12][13]

Statues​[edit]

A local artist, Susanna Arwin, expressed desire to raise a life-sized statue of Danielsson in Växjö but in February 2015 it was decided against for two reasons, the first being that council members were concerned such a statue could be interpreted as promoting violence and the second being that Danielsson's surviving family reported that they would be unhappy with Danielsson memorialized in such a manner.[14][15][16][17] To protest the decision people across Sweden began adding handbags to statues.[18][19][20]

In September 2015, the celebrity Lasse Diding announced he had bought the statue and intended to donate it to Varberg municipality. The statue was later unveiled at Varberg Fortress but the Varberg board of culture voted in April 2016 not to accept the donation.[21]

The statue now resides in the garden of Lasse Diding's Villa Wäring in Varberg and a second statue has been unveiled in the town of Alingsås.[22]

References​[edit]

  1. ^ Jump up to: a b Merrill 2020, p. 121.
  2. ^ Merrill 2020, p. 112.
  3. ^ Jump up to: a b c Merrill 2020, pp. 119–120.
  4. ^ Merrill 2020, p. 119.
  5. ^ Jump up to: a b "Berättelsen om det förra århundradets bästa foto" (in Swedish). Dagens Nyheter. 15 February 2014. Archived from the original on 17 February 2015. Retrieved 18 January 2015.
  6. ^ "Pelle Unger Gallery Stockholm photo journalism". Pelle Unger Gallery Stockholm photo journalism. Retrieved 2016-07-28.
  7. ^ ""hans runesson" – Search at Stockholms Auktionsverk". auktionsverket.se. Retrieved 2016-07-28.
  8. ^ Haggren, Kerstin (2016-05-08). "Sonen: "Jag önskar att bilden aldrig funnits"". Smålandsposten (in Swedish). Retrieved 2020-02-01.
  9. ^ https://rarehistoricalphotos.com/woman-nazi-handbag-sweden-1985/. Missing or empty |title= (help)
  10. ^ Jump up to: a b Merrill 2020, p. 122.
  11. ^ Maestre, Antonio (26 November 2019). "Nadia es nuestra Danuta". LaSexta (in Spanish). Retrieved 2020-06-07.
  12. ^ Pienszka, Magdalena (2020). "Kobieta z torebką atakuje skinheada. Za legendarnym zdjęciem stoi smutna historia". WP Ksiazki (in Polish). Retrieved 2020-06-07.
  13. ^ Previdelli, Fabio (2 May 2020). "Muito além da foto: Danuta Danielsson, a mulher que deu bolsada em um neonazista". Aventuras na História (in Portuguese). Retrieved 2020-06-07.
  14. ^ Swedish town nixes statue of woman hitting neo-Nazi, by Judah Ari Gross; in the Times of Israel; published March 1, 2015; retrieved December 9, 2016
  15. ^ ""Tanten med väskan" blir staty i brons" (in Swedish). Dagens Nyheter. 1 April 2014. Retrieved 18 January 2015.
  16. ^ "Snart blir "Tanten med väskan" staty" (in Swedish). SVT Nyheter. 18 November 2014. Retrieved 18 January 2015.
  17. ^ "Tantstaty stoppas i Växjö" (in Swedish). Sveriges radio, Studio Ett. Retrieved 18 February 2015.
  18. ^ Noack, Rick (February 28, 2015). "Sweden blocks plan to honor woman who hit a neo-Nazi with a purse". The Washington Post.
  19. ^ "Swedes rally in bizarre handbag protest". www.thelocal.se. Retrieved 2020-06-09.
  20. ^ "Statue handbag protest takes off". Sveriges Radio. 2015-02-19. Retrieved 2020-06-09.
  21. ^ "With the handbag as a weapon | Leninpriset". Retrieved 2020-06-14.
  22. ^ Andersson, Johanna (2018-06-16). "Omdebatterad staty på plats i Alingsås". SVT Nyheter (in Swedish). Retrieved 2020-06-09.

Bibliography​[edit]

External links​[edit]