Martin Wickström

Martin Wickström belongs to the generation of post modernist painters that freely borrows expressions from pop culture and advertising, as well as pop art and photo realism. The painting 'Kind of Blue' (2006) is one in a series expanding over several years where Martin Wickström pictures the play between light and shade on the facades of buildings facing the streets in suburbs, villages and citys ranging from little Finspång to New York City. As always the colors are strong, the cropping is brave and the painting technique flawless.

The facades appear as thin and as flat as a painting. The afternoon light, both dream-like and melancholic, is minutely rendered with its shadows, sunspots and reflections on empty windows. No humans are visible. Wickström allows the viewer to imagine worlds hidden behind the facades. There is a kind of indifference to the world in these surfaces. The contrasts are powerful; the detail is precise and the painting perfect. Yet beneath the seemingly flawless surface lurks an abyss. The motifs are often both deeply personal and at the same time socially critical.

Martin Wickström graduated from the Royal Institute of Art in Stockholm in 1987. He had his breakthrough in the mid-1990s and is today counted as one of Sweden’s most important contemporary artists.