The painting above is an excellent example of the graphical, colorful style employed by Agnes Cleve in the late 1920s and early 1930s. It can appear a bit deceptive at first. The bold use of colorful lines make the work have the appearance of a painting done in pastel, although it is an oil on canvas. Also a bit confusing is the prominent sign "Vatican" in the foreground that might lead the viewer to see this as a city scene in Rome. The picture is actually showing a view in Paris from a hotel balcony looking East down the Rue du Vieux Colombier with the two towers of the 17th century Catholic church Église Saint-Sulpice in the background. The sign "Vatican" refers to the hotel's proximity to the prominent Catholic Church. The shutters and balcony rail shown on the left are still there today. The hotel is now called Hôtel Atlantis Saint-Germain-Des-Prés. This painting is likely a later work based on sketches done while she and her husband John Jon-And were staying in Paris.

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     Agnes Cleve was a visual artist born in Uppsala in 1876, the daughter of Per Teoder Cleve, professor of chemistry at Uppsala University, and Alma Öhbom, a writer. At 16 years old she graduated from the Uppsala Advanced School for Girls (Uppsala Högre Elementarläroverket för Flickor). She then attended the School of Technology (Faculty of Arts) in Stockholm from 1892−1894. During the mid-1890s she worked as a laboratory assistant, which included making illustrative drawings. In 1897 she began studying at Gothenburg Museum drawing and painting school (Valand Academy of Arts), where she periodically attended classes with Carl Wilhelmsson as her teacher. Her fellow students included artists Maj Bring, Mollie Faustman, Tora Vega Holmström, Vera Nilsson, and Ellen Trotzig.

     In 1901 Agnes Cleve married the lawyer Ernst Lindesjöö. They had two children together. Later Cleve and Carl Wilhelmson began a relationship, which eventually led to her divorce in 1911 and to Carl Wilhelmson’s move to Stockholm.
    After the difficult divorce, she traveled to Paris and began studying cubism at the Académie de La Palette in 1914. There she met John Jon-And who was to soon be her husband. In Paris they created cubists works in their own radical style and thus were among the pioneers of modernism in Sweden.

     The pair became friends with Gabriele Münter and Wassily Kandinsky, part of the German artists’ group Der Blaue Reiter. The couple were also exposed to another form of cubism in the works of Robert and Sonja Delauny. Agnes Cleve and John Jon-And returned to Sweden before the outbreak of the First World War where they bought a small farm at Hurdan by the Gullmarsfjord in the middle of Bohuslän Archipelago on the West coast of Sweden. The place was called "Källviken" and became a gathering place for several artists including Münter and Kandinsky in 1917.

     They were frequent travelers and went abroad almost every year. In 1916 the couple spent three months in New York where modern city life inspired them to create several cubist painting depicting skyscrapers, people, fire engines, fire, and water. Along with traveling extensively in Europe, they also embarked on trips to Tunis, Algiers, and Istanbul.
    In the 1920s both she and Jon-And changed their artistic styles to a more graphical expressionist look. She painted figurative motifs with exotic models, window views, portraits, cityscapes, and west coast motifs, yet her art was found sparingly at exhibitions in Europe. From 1922 to 1927 Agnes Cleve and John Jon-And live in Gothenburg, during which period they exhibited works at the Röhsska Museum and Agnes Cleve participated in a display at the Gothenburg Museum drawing and painting school (Göteborgs Musei rit- och målarskola). In collaboration with her husband, who was a scenographer at the Lorensberg theatre, she created the interior decoration for the theater restaurant.

     In 1929 she held her first solo exhibition at the Gummeson art gallery in Stockholm and this became her major public breakthrough. The critics had certain difficulties in relating to her radical oil paintings, but her water colours of Bohuslän and Skagen were highly acclaimed and the journal "Idun" published an illustrated report of the exhibition. In 1931 she showed her art at Gothenburg Art Gallery with her husband and Gösta Chatham, and a year later at the Artists' House in Stockholm. She also participated in two international exhibitions, "The 1933 Exposition d’oeuvres des femmes artistes" held at the Stedelijk Museum in Amsterdam, and the 1937 exhibition entitled, "Les femmes artistes d’Europe held at Jeu de Paume" in Paris.
    The first major museum exhibition of her work was held at Norrköping Art Museum in 1988. Later in 1995, Konsthallen - Bohusläns Museum held the exhibition "Agnes Cleve & John Jon-And - two modernist pioneers."  In 2014 the Mjellby Art Museum held an exhibition entitled, "Agnes Cleve: Svensk modernist i världen".

     The artist is represented in the following public collections:

• National Museum in Stockholm

• Moderna Museet in Stockholm

• Gothenburg Art Museum

• Uppsala Art Museum

• Bohusläns Museum

• County Museum Gävleborg

• Mjellby Art Museum