Lucid dreams with Katarina Löfström
Every summer since we founded our architectural practice 26 years ago, we have produced a T-shirt in collaboration with an artist we like. It’s our way of honouring art and its role in our lives and living environments. The T-shirts are distributed to our friends, to thank them for the past year and wish them a great summer.
The motif for the 2024 Wester+Elsner T-shirt was created by Katarina Löfström.
If you were to meet her and ask her what kind of artist she is, she would probably answer: ‘Unclear’.
This is what happens when format and material are subordinate to context and idea. But the expression is unmistakable – a meditative play with shapes, colours and light – not infrequently in video format, but also as public performances and installations.
Katarina is currently on show, not only with this stylish T-shirt, but also with a solo exhibition at the Thielska Gallery, which runs until 20 October. This is what the gallery says in its artist presentation:
“With intense colour fields and soft shapes inspired by the sun-drenched surf party aesthetic of the 1970s, her video works evoke dreamlike states without beginning or end. The animated films are often born out of meditative electronic music – a method she has stuck to since her days in the pop music world when she had assignments as a scriptwriter for video directors such as Jonas Åkerlund.”
Her love of pop culture aesthetics made the T-shirt assignment particularly appealing.
‘Of course I wanted to make a flashy T-shirt!’
This is how she describes the image:
“I was drawn to targets because I was struck by the fact that they often resemble religious icons. They are about completely different things, but they have focus as a common denominator.”
While a bull’s-eye is associated with violence and hunting, religious symbols represent a spiritual and peaceful focus, directed inwards.
We at Wester+Elsner Architects wish you a happy summer!
Previuos years’ artists:
2023 JOHANNA (Hanna Hansdotter and Johan Paalzow)
2022 Astrid Sylwan
2021 Jonathan ”Ollio” Josefsson
2020 Cilla Ramnek
2019 Mats Bäcker
2018 Bea Szenfeld
2017 Jens Ahlbom
2016 Stefan Uhlinder
2015 Lotta Kühlhorn
2014 Jenny von Döbeln
2013 Jacob Dahlgren
2012 Stina Wirsén
2011 Denise Grünstein
2010 Mikael Pauli
2009 Helene Billgren
2008 Lars Arrhenius
2007 Lars Kleen
2006 Sirkka Lehtonen
2005 Kjell Ekström Önningeby
2004 Anders Wallin
2003 Ulf Rollof
2002 Björn Wessman
2001 Bertil Vallien
2000 Fredrik Wretman
1999 Gunnel Sahlin