Reflections of a Disjointed World

The testimonial artwork of Anastasia Grieg

Anastasia Miankowa Grieg, born Anastasia Chassay in Oslo in 1923, had early dreams of being a dancer. Awarded a scholarship by Queen Maud of Norway, was sent to prestigious ballet schools in the 1930s. When the Second World War broke out, she returned to Norway. Arrested in 1942 by the Gestapo, the young Anastasia was sent to a concentration camp. In 1944, managing to reach Switzerland in hopes of a new beginning in a refugee camp, she was graced by Norwegian students who helped her contact officials and save her life. Throughout her life, Grieg kept these atrocious experiences to herself. Her dancing career never resumed and though her body never rejoined the thrills of dancing steps, a new route emerged from within herself; one which allowed her to heal and to give thanks to those who saved her life, uniting the world through an altogether different kind of movement, through the grand power of solidarity. In all her grief came artistic resuscitation and Anastasia Grieg’s journey unfolded to one of a prodigious artist, adamant on keeping a testimonial value within her work.  

Animated by the reconnection with drawing, which she had loved as a young child, she pursued her gifts in French art schools in Nice and Paris, taught by André Lothe and close in friendship to Henri Matisse. Sprouting from within these worlds, she became greatly affected by the consequences of the Algerian War. In the 1950s, she took on a position as an assistant nurse in the Algerian mountains. In a trademark effort to heal and mend from witnessing atrocities again within her lifetime, she took to painting these scenes; a way to immortalise the souls encountered along the way and project the horrors in hope of a universal understanding. It was following these experiences that Anastasia chose to continually be on the move, forever travelling to communicate and unify different experiences, materialising the worry she carried for humanity. Her restlessness seasoned her immense productivity.

Anastasia in her studio in Kaholmen, 1973.