Bridges Photographed by Lennart Olson

Bukowskis presents a themed auction featuring a collection of photographs by Lennart Olson.

Lennart Olson is one of Sweden's most prominent photographers of all time, and his works are represented in a range of prestigious museums worldwide, including the Museum of Modern Art in Stockholm, Centre Georges Pompidou, Bibliothéque Nationale in Paris, and The Museum of Modern Art in New York.

He was a prominent member of the group of photographers TIO FOTOGRAFER since 1958. In 2010, at the age of 84, he passed away, and since spring 2013, his entire artistic legacy has been managed by Halland Art Museum.

During the mid-20th century, Lennart Olson gained international recognition for his images of bridges, inspired by the concretism in general and especially by the artist Olle Baertling. Over the years, he photographed iconic bridges such as Tjörnbron, Västerbron, and Pont Neuf in Paris, as well as more modest bridges in Halland and Italy.

Olson's graphically black and white photographs received some criticism for being considered more as art than photography. However, his foremost advocate, Edward Steichen, the influential head of The Museum of Modern Arts photographic department in New York, disagreed. In an interview from 1959, Steichen said:

"Look at Lennart Olson, one of the most interesting young photographers. Not for the graphic elegance of the images, but for their significance, their visual interpretation of space, depth, boundlessness ... His lines cut into the universe, whirl into the ionosphere of vision."