Josefine Östberg Olsson holds an MA degree in Fine Art, Valand Academy (2016). Östberg Olsson works mainly through performance and has exhibited at several galleries in Sweden and is represented in collections both in Sweden and internationally.
In Fluid and Dirt, a series of digitally printed fabrics, the motifs have emerged through the physical act of thoroughly cleaning a V8 engine, a performance by Östberg Olsson that lasted for 4 days, through layers of dirt, engine oil, gearbox oil, and other car-related liquids. The cloths have later been printed digitally on textiles, creating the distance needed from smell and stickiness to turn the motifs into images, resulting in abstract landscapes of darkness and light on cotton cloth, images of a heart-breaking goodbye, when she decided never to drive a combustion engine again.
Östberg Olsson writes: “Feeling a roaring V8 setting off at full speed gives me goosebumps, and through my performance practice I have, until now, driven a V8 engine many times. For me it’s about desire, a desire for risk-taking at full speed, all summed up in the car...”
www.josefineostbergolsson.se