Artists

Jan Håfström

Press release

Time and memory run through Jan Håfström's art. In the exhibition "The Lost World", you encounter new works straight from his studio. Here, an artistic practice emerges in which the past makes itself felt in the present. About the exhibition Even as a child, Jan Håfström (b. 1937) would seek out a quiet corner of the family home where he could draw undisturbed. Since his debut in the 1960s, the studio has served as a sanctuary where he has continually explored new paths in his artistic practice. There, as he himself has put it, "a constant murmuring dialogue between different ages in life" takes place. In the studio, time moves in circles, as works may be reworked and gradually change form. Expressions, references and themes recur, connecting new works with earlier ones. The exhibition "The Lost World" takes as its starting point the artist's daily work in the studio. On the walls and floors of the studio, paintings, sculptures and painted objects come together in temporary clusters or consellations. In the exhibition, which is shown in the museum's smaller exhibition room on Floor 4, the objects are similarly presented as parts of larger installations rather than as individual works. Together, they offer a snapshot of an ongoing process of transformation. "In Jan Håfström's art, the past is rarely something distant or finished. Instead, it remains a tangible presence, as powerful as, or even more powerful than, the present." Matilda Olof-Ors, curator Impressions, Memories and Moods Jan Håfström has often described his work as an archaeological excavation of his own life. Memories and moods from childhood are reworked and are sometimes related to broader historical or contemporary events. In Håfström's visual world, today's humanitarian catastrophes, such as refugee crossings of the Mediterranean and the wars in Gaza and Ukraine, become intertwined with his childhood experiences of the Second World War. The works' references range from popular culture to the worlds of philosophy, literature and art. Many of them contain elements of loneliness and loss. Some objects have been carefully wrapped or covered, as if to protect and preserve them – or perhaps to hold together what might otherwise risk falling apart and being lost. Curator: Matilda Olof-Ors, Moderna Museet