ArtistSwedish
Gert Nyström
2 active items
Gert Nyström worked as an in-house designer for two of Sweden's most productive mid-century lighting manufacturers: Fagerhults Belysning, founded in Habo in 1945, and Hyllinge Glasbruk, the Skane-based glassworks that operated from 1962 until 1978. His output during the 1960s and early 1970s sits squarely within the Scandinavian Modern tradition, combining functional construction with materials that caught and transformed light - pressed glass, hand-blown glass, and opal glass shades set against brass or chrome frames.
The design that has defined Nyström's reputation is the Festival chandelier, produced in collaboration between Fagerhults Belysning and Orrefors, the glass manufacturer best known for its art glass. Launched in the late 1950s and produced through the 1960s, Festival consists of a metal armature fitted with interlocking pressed-glass cylinders arranged in tiered rings. The glass elements, manufactured by Orrefors, are thick and textured, producing a diffused, shimmering glow when lit. The chandelier was produced in multiple configurations - as a pendant, a flush mount, and a wall sconce - and in varying scales, with the largest versions featuring five tiers and more than 140 glass elements. It was aimed at grand dining rooms and public interiors, and examples survive in both private collections and institutional spaces.
Alongside Festival, Nyström designed the Ark series for Fagerhult, a pendant and chandelier line that took a different formal direction. Where Festival stacked cylindrical glass modules, the Ark designs arranged opal glass shades radially on brass frameworks, creating softer, more diffuse illumination. A wall lamp variant attributed to Nyström dates to 1969, and pair formats were common, suggesting the series was developed with both residential and commercial interiors in mind.
For Hyllinge Glasbruk, Nyström produced a distinct body of work in coloured glass. Table lamps in rich oxblood red, cobalt blue, and green, blown or pressed at the Skane factory, carry a sensibility closer to decorative art than to the functional industrial lighting of the Festival series. These pieces have attracted growing collector interest since Hyllinge's closure made them finite in supply. A hand-blown art glass pendant lamp, also from Hyllinge and dating to the 1970s, represents the later phase of his work there.
Nyström also designed a kerosene lamp (fotogenlampa) for Hyllinge, a model that appears in Swedish auction listings and speaks to the breadth of his brief at the glassworks - not purely decorative objects but functional domestic forms in glass.
On the Nordic auction market, Nyström's work circulates primarily through Swedish regional houses. His best-documented results include a Festival taklampa sold at Bukowskis Stockholm for 17,000 SEK and a wall-lamp set of the same model reaching 8,800 SEK at Formstad Auktioner. Prices for Hyllinge table lamps are generally lower, typically 500-2,300 SEK, though pairs attract stronger bids. The Festival chandelier is the most liquid of his works internationally, appearing on platforms such as 1stDibs and Pamono as well as at Scandinavian auction houses including Bukowskis, Thelin and Johansson, and Norrlands Auktionsverk.