VIDEO: Charlotte Johannesson-Who Wants Perfect?

Meet Swedish artist Charlotte Johannesson, a pioneer in the intersection of digital and artisanal art. Charlotte Johannesson originally started making art using a weave. Trained traditionally in Sweden, she began experimenting with what a weaved picture could look like. She would use pop cultural icons such as Snoopy and political slogans of the 1960s and 70s in her work: “I think there must be something, some hint, to make it understandable,” she explains.

In the late 1970s, Johannesson traded one of her weavings for an Apple II computer, which would open up her work in a whole new way: “I felt like: okay, no more weaving. It’s done. I can’t do anything more with that; it’s done.” Like the weave, personal computers would be very hands-on in the late 1970s and early 1980s. Working with pixels on a computer was not that different from working on the weave. “I tried to really make something of these computer graphics,” she says and continues: “We said that the computer was an extension of the mind. We were thinking of progress and prosperity.”

Charlotte Johannesson (b. 1943, Sweden) is a largely self-taught artist who trained as a weaver in the late 1960s—in 1978, she taught herself to program to make graphics for the computer screen. From 1981 to 1985, Johannesson and her partner Sture ran the Digital Theatre, Scandinavia’s first digital arts laboratory. Recent solo exhibitions include Kunsthalle Friart Fribourg; Nottingham Contemporary (both 2023); Badischer Kunstverein, Karlsruhe; Hollybush Gardens, London (both 2022); and Museo Reina Sofia, Madrid (2021). Recent and upcoming group exhibitions include the 59th International Art Exhibition of La Biennale di Venezia, Venice (2022); Mudam, Luxembourg; Kunsthalle Bielefeld and Museum Marta Herford (all upcoming 2024) and Kunsthalle Wien, Vienna (2025).

 

 

Charlotte Johannesson was interviewed by Roxanne Bagheshirin Lærkesen in Skåne, Sweden, in November 2024. Camera: Rasmus Quistgaard, Edited and produced by Roxanne Bagheshirin Lærkesen, Music: Jesse David Keller (Upright Music). © Louisiana Channel, Louisiana Museum of Modern Art, 2025. Louisiana Channel is supported by Den A.P. Møllerske Støttefond, Ny Carlsbergfondet and C.L. Davids Fond og Samling