Bartosz Kowal (PL) & Ferdinand Evaldsson (SE)

For WGW 2025, we propose a two-person presentation that connects the Swedish and Polish art scenes by bringing together Warsaw-based artist Bartosz Kowal (b. 1995, Poland) and Stockholm-based Ferdinand Evaldsson (b. 1987, Sweden).

Bartosz Kowal creates paintings that explore psychological themes through the fleeting, the intangible, and the half-remembered. In a world saturated with images, he resists adding yet another consumable visual object. Instead, he draws us into familiar yet often overlooked spaces, encouraging us to linger in threshold moments that usually slip away. Informed by archival photography and cinema, Kowal carefully selects his subjects and compositions, often zooming in on close-up portraits and subtle details, offering just enough to keep us wanting more.

Ferdinand Evaldsson’s wooden reliefs examine the human condition—fragile, nostalgic, yet also hopeful and quietly optimistic. He reflects on how the experience of being human resides not only in our physical bodies, but also in the “thingness” of life: our architecture, natural surroundings, rain, moths, and books. Through iconography and symbolism, Evaldsson connects to shared histories and continues a tradition of storytelling. Stories hold immense power, and collective memory often mirrors personal memory, preserved in objects, buildings, and oral traditions. Like

Kowal, Evaldsson captures the fragmented, recurring nature of memory, translating it into visual form. Ornamentation in his work echoes how memories surface and fade, reducing complex events to symbolic images. His painted reliefs, which are made with pigment, gelatin, and chalk; use color and imagery to depict scenes of trauma and reflection. Animals, grasping hands, and insects illustrate the cyclical, looping nature of memory.

We are excited by the potential of presenting these two distinctive and deeply thoughtful artists together.