Gunnar Nordström 1921-2021

Erik Gunnar Nordström was born in Älvros, central Sweden on 20th Febrary 1921. He is a Swedish painter and commercial artist.

Nordström’s grew up in a parish just outside Eksjö, where his father was a minister with the Swedish Evangelical Mission. In 1937, at the age of 16 Nordström moved to Stockholm to take up an apprenticeship as a decorator at the Nordiska Kompaniet Department store in Stockholm.

In 1940, Nordström successfully submitted a work to a jury exhibition run by Isaac Grünewald (1889-1946). Isaac Grünewald was a Swedish expressionist painter who is now widely acknowledged as being responsible for introducing Modernism to Sweden.

In 1946, Nordström attended the newly formed Académie Libre Art School in Stockholm. Académie Libre was founded by a group of concretistic artists (and operated until 1957) - Most notably, it’s teachers included the Swedish artists Lennart Rodhe (1916-2005) and Pierre Olofsson (1921-1996). The following year Nordström attended the Otte Sköld School of Painting (Otte Skölds målarskola) where he completed two year course in drawing and painting.

Nordström first exhibition was in 1945 at the Norrbottens museum, Luleå with the artist Eva Brite-Louise Kellberg - They married in 1946 and had a subsequent exhibition together in Umeå in 1947. Nordström had solo exhibitions at Örebro in (1945), Jönköping (1946), Enköping (1949 and 1951), and at Galerie Aesthetica, Stockholm (1951) and annually in Sundsvall (between 1951 and 1978). Group exhibitions include the Swedish-French art gallery (Svensk-franska konstgalleriet) in Stockholm (1951), Galerie Aesthetica (1955) and at Liljevalchs Spring Salon (1954). Internationally, Nordström exhibited in Helsinki, Miami and Biarritz in France.

As a commercial artist, Nordström produced book covers and illustrations and was employed by the Bonnier Group as a draftsman working on their Dagens Nyheter (Today's News) and Expressen newspapers

Nordström’s public works include a mural entitled ‘Aerovision’ at the Aeronautical Research Institute in Stockholm (1955) and the painting ‘Katedral’ (Cathedral) at at Chalmers University in Gothenburg (1950)

Gunnar Nordström died on 13th April 2021, aged 100.

Gunnar Nordström