ArtistSwedish
Bengt Nordenborg
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Bengt Nordenborg was born on 20 October 1938 in Karlstad, Sweden. He trained at Slöjdföreningens skola in Gothenburg from 1956 to 1961, then continued at Valands konstskola from 1962 to 1967, an institution that shaped a generation of Swedish modernists. His early work was marked by a strong surrealist impulse -- dense, large-format compositions in which figures, objects and landscapes are rearranged into scenarios that hover between the comic and the unsettling, drawing comparisons to the visual language of Hieronymus Bosch.
Nordenborg held his first solo exhibition at Grafiska sällskapet in Stockholm in 1968, the same year his work toured internationally as part of a Swedish Graphic Art exhibition in Iceland. Through the late 1960s and 1970s he became a regular presence on the Nordic and international printmaking circuit: Young Scandinavian Art in Norway (1969), the II International Graphics Biennale in Florence (1970), Xylon V in Geneva and Berlin (1971), and a joint touring show in Tokyo and São Paulo (1972). Solo exhibitions followed at Galleri Belle in Västerås, Galleri Doktor Glas in Stockholm (1972), Hallands museum in Halmstad (1975), Kristinehamns konsthall (1978), and Stadsgalleriet in Halmstad (2002).
Lithography became his primary medium and the vehicle through which he is best known. His colour lithographs -- often signed and numbered, frequently in hors de commerce editions -- explore the same territory as his paintings: stilted domestic scenes, forest interiors populated with incongruous presences, figures caught in ambiguous states of rest. Works such as "Upptrappat lugn" (Escalating Calm), "Divan" and "Surrealistiskt skogsmotiv" (Surrealist Forest Motif) are characteristic titles that signal the atmosphere he pursued: ordinary words turned slightly wrong. In later decades the tone of his work shifted toward something warmer and more playful, without entirely abandoning the disquieting undertow.
Nordenborg is represented in the permanent collections of Moderna museet in Stockholm, Göteborgs konstmuseum, Borås konstmuseum, Malmö museum and Ystads konstmuseum -- a significant span across Sweden's major public collections for a graphic artist working primarily outside the capital.
On the secondary market, Nordenborg appears regularly at regional Swedish auction houses, with Göteborgs Auktionsverk, Karlstad Hammarö Auktionsverk and RA Auktionsverket Norrköping among the most active venues. Our platform holds 32 sold lots. Colour lithographs typically sell in the 300-950 SEK range, with a signed oil on panel reaching 1,815 SEK. The "Divan" hors de commerce lithograph sold at 600 EUR, the highest recorded price in our dataset.