Harry Andersson

He calls the current installation at Nordiska Galleriet a final sigh.

– It may sound a bit depressing, but I've made twenty-five or thirty vases now in total and I still think it's great fun, but I'm afraid it will get boring. So I stop making these vases now when it's the most fun. A tactic I use because I don't want it to become monotonous. But hey, never say never. Maybe I'll make some in secret.

The installation picks up where the solo exhibition She's your lover now (FORGETMENOT) left off, which consisted of twenty sculptures created exclusively for Nordiska Galleriet in the autumn of 2018. Harry's art moves in the borderland between tragic life stories, an eternal search and broken hearts spiced with roses, alcohol, skulls, melancholic fragments from a rock ballad and the occasional insect.

– I am very fascinated by life stories. Like the jazz musician Chet Baker who was very promising, but who became a poor heroin addict and died after a fall from his window in Amsterdam. Or Amy Winehouse, whose fate touched me deeply, I find it interesting. My art is very much about unrequited love. It's a concept I have, perhaps because it's easy to relate to. And I draw a lot of references from popular culture: from literature, film and music that inspire me.

There is a certain charm in the defective. There are so many perfect vases already.

Artist and cartoonist Harry Anderson was born in 1986 and grew up in Stockholm. Since childhood, it was clear that he would devote his life to some form of creative endeavour.

– I was creative as a child and drew a lot, but I always thought there were others who were better and drew better. I guess I always thought that to get into a better art school you have to master the basic techniques, like being able to paint photo-realistically. But somewhere along the way I came across the artist Dick Bengtsson, who doesn't paint like that at all, and felt a great sense of liberation. Through him, I started painting the way I wanted to.

After three years of preparatory studies at the Gerlesborg Art School in Stockholm, he was accepted into the six-year programme at the Royal Danish Academy of Fine Arts in Copenhagen.

– For the first seven years I just painted, which I thought I would always do. But then I started to get bored, it was lonely. Then there was a ceramics studio that I had always had my eye on. They looked so cosy when they were creating in there. Drinking tea and listening to music. So without knowing anything about how it was done, I went in. I had always been inspired by ceramicist Klara Kristalova's amazing naïve sculptures and felt tempted to give it a try myself.

Inspired also by the painted ceramics of Stig Lindberg and Grayson Perry, the coming years would be almost exclusively about learning to master clay.

– There was a lot of trial and error before I started to find the right one, even though I am not in any way looking for perfection, but rather feel that there is a certain charm in the defective. There are so many perfect vases already.

The romanticised image of the artist's life as free, self-realising and bohemian is far from Harry's reality.

– For me art is a profession, it's all about routines. I start the day in the studio at nine o'clock, at half past twelve I have lunch and at five I go home, no matter how good or bad the day has been. It doesn't work for me to wait for inspiration; if I get into an art slump, I paint my way out of it, or create ceramics. I'm constantly working and there's always something coming, for me there's no other way.

According to statistics, a higher education programme in the arts is one of the biggest losing trades you can make. Simply because there are very few people who can make a living from art. But this was not something that made Harry hesitate about his choice. And whether it's his determination, high productivity, work ethic or just the fact that he is a very exciting artist, he is humbled by the fact that his art is appreciated and generates an income to keep his work going. So when it comes to the future, the goal is crystal clear.

– I just want to keep doing what I'm doing today, spending my days working in my studio where I can realise any ideas I have. Like a lamp I'm working on right now. It's up to me. And I'm very aware of what a privilege that is. But of course, I have a romanticised image of New York, and it would be a dream come true to exhibit there.