Geese by a Lake. A Storm is Brewing. Dragør, the Island of Amager

Dating to 1893, this canvas depicts geese beside a lake at Dragør on the island of Amager as a storm gathers overhead, combining landscape and animal painting within a charged atmospheric moment. Dragør was a location Johansen visited repeatedly across his career, finding in its flat coastal terrain and vernacular village character a subject distinct from the urban interiors of his domestic paintings. The gathering storm gave the composition a dynamic quality absent from his quieter interior scenes, requiring him to capture the movement of clouds, the restlessness of water, and the behavioural responses of the geese to changing atmospheric pressure. Animal painting within a landscape setting had a distinguished tradition in Danish and Dutch art, and Johansen engaged with this tradition while keeping his approach empirical and observational rather than anecdotal or sentimental. The Amager landscape — low, open, and wind-exposed — offered a particular quality of light that differed from the enclosed spaces of Copenhagen's domestic interiors.

The approaching storm dominates the upper half of the composition, with Johansen using broad, fluid strokes to convey the mass and movement of cloud formations. The lake surface reflects the agitated sky, creating tonal correspondences between top and bottom of the picture. The geese in the foreground are rendered with sufficient naturalistic accuracy to convey species identity while remaining subordinate to the atmospheric drama.