Aasta Hansteen: Painter and Reformer Aasta Hansteen was a Norwegian painter, writer, and early feminist. Born in Christiania, she began her art education in Copenhagen between 1840 and 1841 to learn drawing, later spending three years at the Kunstakademie Düsseldorf studying fine brush alignment. Associated with the Düsseldorf school of painting, she exhibited her work at the 1855 World's Fair in Paris. Upon returning to Norway, she served as the only portrait artist in Christiania for several years. Her most famous painting is a portrait of her father, which is on permanent exhibit at the N…