Axel Linderholm

“I must have been about twelve years old when my parents travelled to America. Back then, it truly felt like a journey to the other side of the world. Among the souvenirs they brought home was a small bundle of postcards from the Universal Studios Hollywood Tour they had taken.

The one that fascinated me most showed the famous Jaws Ride. A boat filled with visitors appeared to be under attack by a gigantic shark.

Every time I looked at that postcard, my imagination ran wild. It was as if I had made the journey myself. As if I were sitting in that boat. I felt the same mixture of anticipation, excitement and thrill, as though I had experienced the attraction firsthand. That single postcard became my souvenir too.

Today, Axel Linderholm’s paintings awaken that very same sense of wonder in me. With every painting, I embark on a journey. He takes me into a blue night in Copenhagen, into a purple-pink birch forest where nymphs meet, into a mind filled with worlds, and into a café where a boy sits drawing at a round table.

They are souvenirs of emotions, moments and events that I may never have experienced myself, yet somehow they have become mine as well.”