Ivan Ivarson

Ivan Ivarson (1900–1939) was Gothenburg born and bred, and as such perhaps best fits the image of a Gothenburg Colourist. He began by using muted colours, but after 1930 developed a distinctive way of handling colour with a vibrant, high-colour palette. Ivarson returned again and again to the same motifs: landscapes from the West Coast and France, women, flowers, and the occasional religious motif. Despite positive reviews, Ivarson only exhibited rarely, although he did show some pictures at the Gothenburg Art Gallery in 1936 and later the same year at the Färg och Form gallery in Stockholm. The following year he moved to France, where he lived in Paris and in Saint-Georges-de-Didonne on the Atlantic coast. France gave Ivarson the impetus to renew his techniques and develop his painting yet further, but during a visit to Paris in the summer of 1939 he died suddenly. Per Dahlström