GERHARD WIHLBORG. Oil on Board, signed.

Landscape. 24 x 33 cm.

GERHARD WIHLBORG "This is close, but still not as close as Kåseberga". That's what Gerhard Wihlborg and his comrade Gottfrid Olsson used to say when they were faced with something beautiful during their trip to Italy in 1921. (quote from Sigrid Svensson's text in Cimbrishamns-Bladet, midsummer 1924.) Gerhard was born in 1897 in Löderup and died in 1982 in Ystad. He first trained as a professional painter in 1912 and then continued his studies in decorative painting at the Technical School in 1916. During his studies, his interest in art was awakened and as a preparation for higher art studies, he studied at the Althin School of Painting in 1917 before continuing his education at the Royal Academy of Arts 1917–1923 where he In 1921 was awarded the Chancellor's Medal. During his studies at the Academy of Fine Arts, he also participated in Axel Tallberg's etching school at the Academy of Arts. After a study trip to Italy in 1921, he began exhibiting together with Skåne's art association, but his breakthrough as an artist first came with his own solo exhibition at Anderberg's konsthandel in Malmö in 1923.

In the earlier twenties, Wihlborg worked with a color scale and a manner reminiscent of the old Dutch masters with their peculiarly brilliant colors and almost enamel-hard surface. It is a very masterful painting, which comes through here with strict brushwork. But as the years go by, you notice that the hard and distinct drawing softens, the colors lose some of their enamel tone, but the luster still hides. However, the compositions are held together, whether it is a still life, a landscape or a portrait. From this colorful era he slipped, during his search for new means of expression, into what reviewers called the Cretaceous period. By then, Wihlborg had come out of the colorful period. The paintings seemed more cold, reflectively chilly and impersonal, although they bore the artist's mark in everything. From the Cretaceous period, Wihlborg turned to new forms of expression in terms of color, and during the 1950s and 1960s, you again find the joy of color and warmth on the canvases. In the middle of the 1930s, the artist ends up in something that, for those who previously enjoyed his male-dominant art, most of all seems like a revolution. The drawing and composition hold up, but the colors crackle. Were it not for the fact that red is not included to a greater extent, one would feel inclined to speak of fireworks.

Separately, he exhibited in Malmö in 1923, 1939, 1941 and 1942 and in Ystad in 1937, 1942, 1947 and 1958 in Landskrona and in Tomelilla in 1951. He was a regular exhibitor in Skåne's art association's salons in Malmö and as a member of the art association Aura in Lund, since 1928 he has participated in almost all of the association's exhibitions in Lund, Malmö, Ystad, Trelleborg, Norrköping and Stockholm. In addition, he participated in Sweden's general art association salons in Stockholm in 1919 and 1939. In 1965, he was awarded the Ystad municipality's cultural award.

Wihlborg lived on the parental farm in Grimshög, just outside Löderup. He was a faithful son of Österlen. There was the same security over him as over the Österlenska landscape and he was just as unobtrusive as this plain, which offers such infinite values of beauty to those who can see, but never forced itself on anyone.

Wihlborg is represented at Malmö museum, Landskrona museum, Kristianstad museum, Ystad art museum, Trelleborg museum, Skissernas museum and in Tomelilla art gallery. He is buried in the Old Cemetery in Löderup.

In the auction there are 3 works signed by Wihlborg's brush. In the undated work (probably done in the 40s/50s) a study of Kåseberga slopes in the background and the other work from 1935 is a depiction of the landscape around Kåseberga/Löderup.