Friis Th. (1879 - 1959), (M. O. Curtis)

Mark Osman Curtis was a Scotchman who moved to Denmark during WW I.

He was somewhat of a hermit and was almost frantic about keeping his personal information a secret.

Despite this seclusion he is nonetheless known by virtually every art dealer in Denmark.

He, however, obviously found better comfort in the company of domestic animals and especially cows.

Thus his preferred choices of motifs were village- or tidal meadow scenes with cows and in the former case often with hens.

Apart from that he has also made some close-up portraits of calves, but common to his motifs is that humans are seen extremely rare in his paintings(mostly seen as Th.Friis with motifs from Skagen)

Curtis used several pseudonyms, e.g. "V. Birkholm", "Bertram", "Aage Wang", "Th. Friis", "Kofoed Hansen" and others.