Isis Maakestad is a visual artist based in Gothenburg. Isis work is raw, alive, shifting. Charcoal, oil pastels, paint – layered, ripped, reassembled on yellowing paper. No fixed formats, no rigid rules. Just movement, intensity, and a strange, delicate power.
Isis Maakestad, born 1986, is a visual artist and illustrator based in Gothenburg, Sweden. She took her bachelor’s exam in fine arts at The Art Academy in Bergen Norway 2016. Subsequently she has been working with different projects such as exhibitions and murals.
Maakestad’s artwork takes several forms; painting, illustration, collage, ceramic. She often works with a muted color palette and a decorative sparseness which feels pleasantly instinctual. The cropping in the compositions in Isis paintings increases the dynamics of her subjects and gives space for an unknown narrative. Significantly she never let perfection ruin her art.
For Fine Little Day Isis have created the iconic pattern Bouquet. The textile collections consists of jacquard-woven linen as fabric by the meter, kitchen linen and tablecloths. You may also find her work on posters, cushion covers, caps, wall hangings and trays in FSC-marked laminated birch.
Fine Little Days' creative director and founder, Elisabeth Dunker, met her in her studio and talked about her inspiring work. Read the interview with her here.
Q: Tell us a bit how your interest in art develop?
A: I had the luck to grow up with a mum who always was very creative. She worked in theater and did paintings in oil. So painting and drawing have been around me as part of my natural environment. When I was around 20 I decided that paint and drawing is something I wanted to develop more with real focus.
Q: What are some of the highlights of your life as an artist so far?
A: I must say that the highlight so far has been meeting some of my best friends and while exploring ceramics!
Q: If you could spend the day with any artist, past or present, who would it be?
A: Louise Bourgeois for sure! I Love her work and the energy she did put into her work. How she made the personal universal and the way she explored different materials. Her work never leaves me untouched.
Q: Can you tell us a bit about your creative process?
A: My process often starts very intuitive. Maybe I want to try a new material and take it from there. But while in the process I often think in series and that is where a narrative is born. I try to stay open to the process as long as I can until I feel a balance and rythm.
Q: Do you think there were other roads you could have taken, other than art? If so, what are they?
A: Yes! Before my art studies I really thought (and sometimes still do) that I wanted to be a psychologist or anthropologist. I think its very fascinating exploring behaviors, languages and the ways we communicate.
”Bouquet is a pattern that followed me for several years and which I gradually developed. Insoured by the movement of plants in nature, I see it almost as a choreography like flowers in a meadow in motion. Each flower is unique in itself, but together they make greater motion.”
