In 2011 Danelle Bergstrom spent an entire year in Sweden, undertaking a residency at Konstepidemin in Göteborg, a not-for-profit institution that provides 105 studios, but only five for international artists. Bergstrom is half-Swedish by birth, but born and raised in Australia. This was the first time she has been able to spend such an extended period in her father’s country. Her parents had divorced when Bergstrom was five years old, and she grew up with little knowledge of the European side of her family.

Travelling north into Lapland, Bergstrom was struck by the silence of the forests. For an artist accustomed to the cacophony of the Australian bush, the atmosphere was eerie and perhaps a little disturbing. Yet she admits to never previously having experienced such peacefulness and tranquility.

It was an opportunity for introspection, as Bergstrom was able to look back on a sad and difficult period in her life. Spending time in a foreign landscape to which she felt some residual connection, was a way of restoring the balance of her existence.

The paintings she made in Sweden put Bergstrom firmly within a tradition that sees landscape as a mirror of the mind. The recurrent motif of the empty boat on a calm expanse of water is an image of perfect repose, as if a mass of turbulent thoughts and emotions had been tamed. The boat may represent the self, but also a journey into the unknown.

Although there is a melancholy aspect to these paintings the outstanding feature is Bergstrom’s attempt to capture the special quality of Nordic light. Sunlight glistens on the surface of a lake that reflects sky, clouds and trees with mirror-like precision.

In these pictures Bergstrom has responded in a spontaneous, lyrical fashion to the experience of an unfamiliar landscape. There is a feeling of optimism in these works, a suggestion of catharsis and renewal. The exhibition describes a slow spiral outwards, from the dark recesses of the mind to the clear light of a Scandinavian summer’s day.

Excerpt from the exhibition catalogue essay by John McDonald, Arts Writer