Lasse Åberg

“All art is a desire to reach to a higher state of being.”

Lasse Åberg is unique in Sweden for the breadth of his artistic interests and the remarkable success he enjoys in all of the assorted fields in which he is active. There can hardly be anyone in Sweden who does not know who he is. Film director, screenwriter, actor, illustrator, graphic designer and art collector are some of his numerous occupations. He is currently mainly engaged in creating his own museum, Åbergs Museum, in Bålsta outside Stockholm where one can view one of the world’s leading collections of Disney memorabilia.

On the 17th March 1962, a now famous exhibition entitled “4 Americans” opened at Stockholm’s Moderna Museet. One of the visitors to the exhibition was Lasse Åberg, then aged 22, who was a student at Konstfack — University College of Arts, Crafts and Design. The director of the museum, Pontus Hultén, who had excellent contacts in the new world of American Pop Art, had invited four of the leading exponents — RichardStankiewicz, Alfred Leslie, Robert Rauschenberg and Jasper Johns — to exhibit their work in Stockholm. Ulf Linde, art critic of the influential Dagens Nyheter, wrote that he had “never seen visual art of this sort — which was simply breathtaking”. The exhibition also greatly impressed Lasse Åberg.

“This was one of the major artistic shifts of the 20th century, comparable with Cubism. Pop Art was a protest against the so-called abstract expressionism of painters like Jackson Pollock and Willem De Kooning. Pop Art’s mantra was that if you could not find something to sketch or paint within a metre from where you were standing you were not a real artist. I liked this approach because I felt that posing as an artist was not really my thing.”

Lasse Åberg grew up in a working-class home in Fredhäll, Stockholm, where pictures on the walls depicted weather-beaten fishermen or crying children. Intellectuals and artists were viewed with indifferent detachment. Lasse had a natural talent for drawing and his family constantly affirmed this talent: “You draw so that it looks as though the picture has been printed”.

In 1955 Lasse accompanied his mother’s hairdresser friend Valborg to a drawing class. It was there that he began to think that art was something one could make a living at. And when one of the employees at the engineering firm where his father worked suddenly gave in his notice in order to become a fulltime artist Lasse really had something to think about. “But it was my mum who encouraged me to apply to Konstfack. And luckily I was offered a place.”

When was that?
In 1960.

What was Konstfack like at that time?
It was a fantastic time. But somewhat authoritarian. I was at Konstfack with Carl Johan De Geer, Robban Broberg, Owe Gustafsson, Barbro Bäckström, Jan Lööf, Ulrica Hydman Vallien, Bertil Vallien — an amazing group of people. And most of them arestill active.

Just a few years after the “4 Americans” exhibition at Moderna Museet Lasse Åberg started to collect Disney artefacts which he used to draw. “I collected all sorts of junk, bottles of bath foam with Mickey Mouse lids and suchlike. I was about 30 at the time. I had completed a master’s degree in graphic design at Konstfack. And I started playing with these images and exhibiting them. My first exhibition was together with Jim Dine at Östermalmsgalleriet. Or rather, he exhibited downstairs and I exhibited upstairs.”

Were you immediately accepted by the public asan artist?
I use humour as a sort of theme and I seem to have much the same sort of humour as many others, since a lot of people liked my work and that was very liberating. I make fun of famous artworks in many of my own images. I often develop my ideas from words. Rather silly ideas that I then develop minutiously.I had a certain amount of success in the 1980s and the early 1990s.

You were enormously successful?
Well, when it comes to reaching a wide audience I’m almost unsurpassed; right up there with CarlLarsson. My drawings hang on a great deal of walls.

Were you OK with this? Did you welcome your success?
Generally speaking yes. But there is always a small boy inside of one who is seriously ambitious. I would like to receive a bit more acceptance among the cultural establishment. But I have accepted my situation.

Have you regretted this lack of acceptance? Has it sometimes caused you to feel like giving up?
No. It was really only that exhibition with Jim Dine where I felt that I was trying to be a bit more of an artist than I really am. I felt somehow false. I felt that this was not really me and that I must be myself. I made drawings of unmade beds — actually quite fine in themselves — but I felt that this was not me.

Have you understood what you have been doing over the years?
Yes, it’s a bit like a chess knight, taking two steps forward and one to the side. I want to surprise the viewer. I have done paintings where people exclaim: Yes, this is a landscape. And then, ten minutes later, “But the cloud. That’s Mickey Mouse. I like that; tripping up the beholder. My images are a kind of conceptual illustration. I try to avoid talking about art when I talk about my images.

Does it start with you having an idea?
I always carry a little notebook with me and I jot down all my ideas. I’m definitely avaricious when it comes to ideas. There are never enough of them.

Do you have one notebook for film ideas and one for drawings?
No, I have a scrapbook for everything, with quotations, and if I find a good cartoon I’ll paste it in too.

Do you decide later what it is to be?
Sometimes, because things can mature over time. And suddenly one gets the intuition that now is the time to make something out of this idea.

It’s difficult to classify Lasse Åberg. Few Swedes have made a name for themselves in so many different fields: as an illustrator, filmmaker, visual artist, iconic children’s TV figure (the entire Trazan jungle hut from the TV programme Trazan&Banarne on three floors as well as the tandem bicycle are now available to all children at Lasse’s own Åbergs Museum in Bålsta out- side Stockholm), screenwriter, musician, actor…

All the activities seem to have run into each other like a torrent and his productivity is almost impossible to survey. He draws all the time and he and his wife, Inger Åberg, travel round Sweden exhibiting their art throughout the year. His museum contains the world’s finest collection of Disney memorabilia and works of art. He naturally designed the Mickey Mouse chairs in the restaurant himself, as well as much of the interior design. Yet he always seems unassuming and calm, verging on lethargic.

Have you always sketched, whatever you have been doing in life?
Yes. For me it is a type of therapy. I have been enormously productive. I have produced more than 300 lithographic designs, illustrations, books. When I’m drawing I find myself in cat time. Time somehow stops. I think that it’s very important for people to have access to this bubble.

Do you ever find time to watch TV?
Absolutely. My wife and I are connoisseurs of crappy TV shows: ‘Swedish Hollywood Housewives’, ‘Come Dine with Me’, and suchlike. It’s a kind of curiosity about people.

Returning to your serious interest in art. You have bought a lot of art. Do you remember the first work you purchased?
I bought Hockney pretty early on. I am especially fond of his early drawings. His rather dry approach.

Which Swedish artists inspire you?
Dan Wolgers has brilliant ideas. Jockum Nordström has created a sort of anti-style that I very much admire. And the real idol when it comes to paper-based art is PG Thelander who I think is fantastic. There are also Lennart Aschenbrenner, Roj Friberg, RagnarPersson, Karin Wikström, Lars Lerin and many others.

Do you read Swedish comic strips? (The attack on Charlie Hebdo took place three days prior to the interview.)
I have a subscription to the magazine published by Seriefrämjandet — Swedish Comics Association. I particularly like Rocky. Now there are a lot of very gifted young women. Sara Granér, for example. And Liv Strömquist. Comic strips are so different from what they used to be. Comic strips were formerly something to be consumed and thrown away; a way for people who didn’t make it in art to earn a living. Nowadays artists choose the comic strip as a medium of expression rather than making a film or writing a book.

Do you look at a lot of art?
Yes, all the time. The technique and the ideas are what interest me most. The other day I was at the Waldemarsudde gallery with my wife. We are soon going to view an exhibition of work by Per B Sundberg who is a very gifted ceramic and glass artist with lots of humorous ideas. And Jim Dine will be coming soon.

“I can respect the artists of earlier times, I can admire them. But I have seen enough of them. I like contemporary work.”

It sounds as though both skill and ideas are necessary if you are going to be interested in an artist.
That’s true. One cannot just go out and paint the landscape, in my opinion. I think some sort of concept is essential. I can respect the artists of earlier times, I can admire them. But I have seen enough of them. I like contemporary work.

Are you never nostalgic?
I’m amazingly nostalgic. I have produced books about the 1950s and suchlike. But not when it comes to art.

What can you say about the artistic climate today?
There seems to be an enormous lot going on. That is, in terms of creativity. Then the state of the economy determines whether one sells or not.

Do you have any advice for young people who want to devote themselves to art?
You need to rely on your gut feeling, and not feel that you have to adapt yourself to the current artistic climate. Try to find your own niche. All art is a desire to reach to a higher state of being. If you can live off your art that is fantastic. Unfortunately most artists cannot.

Before we end the conversation Lasse Åberg tells me that he wishes that his father, the lathe operator, had lived for long enough to enjoy his son’s success. And he hands me a book. One of his own works,naturally. In the book he quotes some words of Andy Warhol: “Don’t think about making art, just get it done. Let everyone else decide if it’s good or bad, whether they love it or hate it. While they are deciding, make even more art.”

Text: Sara Paborn
Photo: Patrik Sehlstedt
© Wetterling Gallery