Stig Eklund
In his art, Jef Bourgeau explores cultural icons and trends, exquisitely veiling his own identity behind style, various media and invented doppelgangers. His refined use of light and shadow lends itself well to themes of mystery, loss and solitude. Nearly all the subjects of Jef Bourgeau's work are creations marked by projections of longing and desire. In each is his translation of and compassion for one of the most difficult and complex aspects of human reality: the constant discrepancy between our perception of and hope for truth, and our experience of it.
Jef Bourgeau (1950) lives and works in Detroit. His art has exhibited across the USA, Europe and Asia, and he is represented in important private and museum collections globally.
Stig Eklund was born in Bergen, Norway in 1976.
An undiagnosed dyslexic, Stig Eklund left secondary education at the age of sixteen. He spent his remaining teen years working at a cardboard factory in his home town. During that time, utilizing the materials at hand, he began to make and experiment with several pinhole cameras. The work from these rudimentary cameras developed into dark, moody photographs. He has remarked that he can only see "right" through a camera lens.
Eklund's mature camera style is so strong that it can even shroud a street lamp, so that, instead of light, it seemingly emits darkness and shadows. His vision drapes geometrically clashing urban beauty with the sooty persona of its denizens, succinctly captured by a Norwegian artist who spends much of the year in Detroit's glowering twilight.