Participants
Ella Tillema (born 1983 in Stockholm) is an artist based in Diö. Tillema founded Diö Art Hall, which is part of the Småland Biennale. She studied at Malmö Art Academy from 2005 to 2010 and has since held solo exhibitions at Ystad Art Museum, Gävleborg County Museum, Passagen Linköping Art Hall, Galleri Verkligheten in Umeå, and Ljungberg Museum. She was awarded the Lengertz Art Prize in 2012 and the Ljungberg Museum Scholarship in 2014, and in 2020 she received LO's Culture Prize.
Through large-scale figurative oil painting, text, screen printing, and music, Ella Tillema tells stories about our contemporary society, focusing on injustices and the vulnerability of the individual. Every year since 2009, Tillema publishes a political pamphlet in a numbered edition with titles such as “Handbook for Fucking the System” and “My Heart is a Bomb,” but she is primarily known for her vibrant painting. With an uncompromising appeal, she unites the poetic with activism on pressing issues concerning the present and future. The focus is on the system and how we can mobilize resistance against its oppressive mechanisms. The vulnerable is a recurring theme in Tillema's painting. The size of the paintings envelops the viewer and opens the mind to existential abysses.
