Patrick Nilsson

Extraction from interview in catalogue for ”The scandinavian show” Bristol Biennial 2012 curated by Arild Eriksen NKD, Norway.
Interview conducted by norwegian curator and artist Karolin Tampere.
Used by kind permission.

”Karolin Tampere:
During one of my visits to your studio at ISCP in New York in 2008, I remember noticing several newspaper cuttings on the wall; in particular a picture of Diego Maradona, a celebrity I hadn’t thought about for a long time. Could you tell my about what presently preoccupies you as an artist, and what has changed since then?

Patrick Nilsson:
The picture of Maradona is taken on Cuba in 2004, when he was there to get treatment for his cocaine addiction. It’ s amazing, he poses like he was the revolutionary Che Guevara. If you look closer, you will see that his back is covered by sand. This leads me to believe that before the photographer arrived, Maradona was sipping his Pina Colada and eying chicks.

I do think I’m attracted by contrast, contrast and conflict. It’s in me, in one way or other. My impulse and will to express myself does in no way origin in art. I see it as a terminal disease that I’m delighted to have contracted, without it I would have been miserable, I think. I feel very strongly that I have something as unfashionable as a need of expressing myself.

There are no recipes for art, that’s what makes it so exciting. There is nothing to solve, it’s both intense and comforting.”