In the Grandpa family, we highlight creative and exciting people in our community. This time, we meet artist Anja Fredell at Sockerbruket in Gothenburg. Anja studied textile art at HDK-Valand and primarily works with the hand-tufting technique, creating sculptures, images, and rugs. She also works part-time at Grandpa in Gothenburg!

On a chilly Wednesday in February, we meet Anja at Konstnärernas Kollektivverkstad, KKV. The workshop is located in the old sugar refinery, perched on a cliff at the harbor entrance, at the foot of the Älvsborg Bridge. KKV has been here since 1974, spread across two floors with studios and workshops for bronze casting, metalwork, carpentry, printmaking, and ceramics.

Hi Anja!

You mainly work with tufting. How did you get into it?

It was during my textile art studies at HDK-Valand that I discovered tufting. We got to try various textile techniques like weaving and embroidery, but most of them are very meticulous and slow, which doesn’t suit me. Tufting, on the other hand, is intense and physical, and it allows you to work intuitively with large color scales.

What type of projects do you work on?

Mainly exhibitions in galleries or art halls, where I have a lot of freedom to explore what fascinates me. I also work with public art, which is incredibly stimulating. I get to meet many different people and create art for places where people move through daily—like schools, nursing homes, or offices. You get to be part of enriching their everyday lives and making these spaces feel more alive and personal.

Where do you find inspiration?

I recently watched the documentary A Litany for Survival about poet Audre Lorde. In one scene, she says something like, “You don’t have to be inspired to write a poem. You need to reach down and touch the thing that’s boiling inside you.” That really resonates with me—the content is where it burns. But of course, I don’t always find that place easily. When that happens, I turn to books—I love fiction, but right now, I’m struggling through a really difficult book on Hannah Arendt. It contains everything I’ve ever wanted to know, but I understand maybe half of it…

I also like to go out into the forest or just sit in silence and wait, trying to immerse myself in quietness and sensory experiences. I visit exhibitions often and enjoy flipping through art books. Pierre Bonnard is a favorite, and the Nationalmuseum in Stockholm is hosting a major exhibition on him this spring—I’m definitely going to see it!

Do you have any artistic role models?

So many! Right now, I’m obsessed with Gilles Clément. He calls himself a gardener, but he’s an artist too. I’m particularly drawn to his work Jardins du Tiers-Paysage. He built four-meter-high concrete walls around an area in the middle of Saint-Nazaire, France, and inside, he lets nature grow wild and free. It’s a poetic statement on the meeting between the wild and the urban.

Ceramicist Betty Woodman has also been hugely influential for me, especially in how she works with color and form. But right now, I’m most drawn to Chaim Soutine. I’m fascinated by his landscape paintings—he uses landscapes as projections of emotions rather than depicting actual places. His work is incredibly powerful. Visually, my influences lean toward the expressionists, while conceptually, I connect more with surrealists who explore the subconscious and the unknown.

What does your creative process look like, from idea to finished piece?

In the beginning, I try to stay open and embrace uncertainty. I follow small threads of ideas without knowing where they’ll lead. Right now, I’m reading a lot about plants, cultivation, and pollinators—I don’t know exactly why, but I feel drawn to it, so I trust that something will emerge from it.

The next step comes when I discover what I didn’t even know I was looking for—then I can start working in the studio. At this point, I feel more secure and have a clearer direction. I begin defining color palettes and sketching. Finally, I start working on the actual piece, and that’s when the rollercoaster begins.

On good days, it feels like a force of nature, and I just ride the wave. On bad days, I feel lost, full of doubt, and self-criticism. I go back and forth between frustration and that creative flow until the piece is finished.

Do you have a dream project?

Dare I even say it? I have a few ideas, but I don’t want to jinx them. I can say that one dream is to work more internationally. But above all, my biggest and only true dream is simply to keep working as an artist, refining my expression, and going deeper.

How would you describe your personal style?

Some friends and I played a game recently where we each had to name three people who best captured someone’s style. For me, they said:

Jane Birkin, Uma Thurman in Pulp Fiction, and Debbie Harry.

Top three favorites at Grandpa right now?

I’m really into the Brixtol shirt Lyra Black Glitch Stripe Dip Dye. I also love the Wide Heidi jeans from Nudie and the Babe skirt from Munthe.

Do you have any upcoming exhibitions?

Gunnebo Slott: April 5–27

Market Art Fair at Liljevalchs: May 16–18

Solo exhibition at Lidköping Konsthall: September 6–October 25

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