Inga-Wiktoria Påve
by Maria Molin
Inga-Wiktoria Påve’s art is deeply rooted in her Sami cultural heritage. When staying at the Ricklundgården Artist Residency last autumn she worked on four portraits of Sami women from different generations. In these paintings the women’s caps are in focus. In Sami culture, the caps symbolize cultural continuity even when other parts of their clothes were exchanged for modern Western attire. She will often experiment with the materials using acrylic paint, watercolour or oil along with silk silver, brass, wood, and other materials she has gathered in her arctic surroundings. During the one-year basic art education at the Gotland Art School she tried out various techniques and she was later educated as an art teacher at the University of Umeå. She has also studied traditional Sami crafts at the Sami Edication Centre in Jokkmokk. Identity issues and cultural sustainability are essential themes in Inga-Wiktoria Påve’s work. For half of the year she works with design and illustration commisions e.g. for picture books, teaching materials and poetry books several of which have been nominated for various awards – and during the other half of the year she works on her own projects and exhibitions as well as helping her family with the reindeer herding.

Sanni Seppä
by Sofia Simelius
A couple of years ago Sanni Seppä started to use her instagram account as the main platform to share her art and her life. She never dreamed of an artistic carrier in her childhood. She had a low self-esteem due to reading disabilities and mobbing from school mates. The change occurred when she was 23 and met her ex-partner who was an artist. She realised that art could be a way for her as well, and she attended art school in Tammerfors where she experienced the feeling of being good at something. She became very ambituous and pushed herself too hard leading to a stress burnout. Art had initially been a salvation – then it became a curse. She used to create very large wall-size drawings using wooden crayons and also with acrylics, but during the corona pandemic she discovered watercolour. She is enthusiastic about the characteristics of the watercolour medium and how it liberated her brush strokes. Sanni Seppä’s works always had references to her personal every-day life, details from her home, her pets, and her friends. With watercolour she also started to paint self-portraits. She sometimes accepts illustration commissions if she can combine them with her activistic viewpoint, she works part time as a salesperson, and she can look forward to a major summer exhibition next year.

Jens Rosing (1925-2008)
by Marianne Gross
This year marks the 100-year anniversary for the birth of the Greenlandic artist, writer, museum director, and adventurer Jens Rosing. When he was 11-12 years old he was sent to Denmark to complete his school education and afterwards he graduated from the Danish Art Academy in Copenhagen. He published his first book (with his own illustrations and text) in 1954. It was about his experiences working with reindeer in Norway. Although being a professional artist and illustrator he also found the time to work as a curator (and later director) at the Greenland National Museum. He went on numerous scientific expeditions; on one of them he played a part in discovering 8 well-preserved mummies from the 15th century, later described in his book “Himlen er lav” (The sky is low). Animals in natural surroundings was his preferred subject matter. He made quick black-and-white sketches on the spot to capture the essence of their behaviour. In the studio he would have more time to perfect meticulous watercolour illustrations. Many of these motives were used in Greenlandic stamps – more than 150 in all. In 1989 he created a polar bear for Greenland’s national coat of arms. It is still in use to this day.

Presentation of Members of ECWS – AAC – Agrupació d’Aquarel-listes de Catalunya
by Marianne Gross
The AAC was founded in 1865 and is therefore one of the oldest watercolour associations In Europe. In the very beginning it all started with an informal workshop gathering for a group of painters passionate about watercolour. The group also held a public exhibition together. Later on the group became part of other artistic organizations that also represented other media, but in 1919 they formed an independent and designated watercolour group they now called the Agrupació d’Aquarel-listes de Catalunya. Ten years after organizing the international ECWS watercolour symposium in Llançá as a celebration for the society’s 150th anniversary, the AAC will be hosting the 28th ECWS International Symposium in October 2025. The symposium will take place in Barcelona, where the headquarters of the society is currently placed. The programme includes an exciting array of watercolour workshops, master classes by renowned Catalan artists, product demonstrations and plein-air painting opportunities for visitors. The highlight of the symposium is of course the extensive exhibition showcasing some of the best works from the members of the European watercolour network.

Ida Röden – NAS Residency
by Ida Rödén
At the Nordic Watercolour Museum I spend my artist residency together with the fictional character Joanna Brandt: a figure in the borderland between a historic person and a companion in arts, who loves the sea. My first drawing at the residency is the island of Fenja that I encountered during my polar expedition on board the icebreaker Oden. According to some sources Joanna Brandt took part in an expedition to the North Pole in 1773 dressed as a boy. This was one of the only ways she was able to come along on this trip. She called herself Jon Brandt and worked as an assistant to a older natural scientist. I also start on a watercolour painting of the island Gerdt at 86 degrees latitude. An island is just the top of a mountain range, a limited point in eternity. Under the guidance of Brandt I draw the future islands that still lie several thousand metres under the surface of the ocean. She is real and fictional, a part of the story but also a symbol of the search. I also painted the island of Modgunn. The waves around the island seem unreasonable, the wind direction impossible to determine. But art does not have to be reasonable. Like science, art operates in the borderlands where the world is still being formed and where we need to embrace uncertainty as companions or colleagues.