Hans Sandberg

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Sandberg was born in Frederiksberg, Copenhagen in 1950, but lived most of his life on a farm in Helsingør. Throughout his turbulent adolescence, Sandberg created art as a way to calm his mind where hashish, illegal pills, alcohol and powerful prescribed psychotropic drugs failed to help. In 1979 he became a patient for the first time at Frederiksborg County Central Hospital,  diagnosed ‘a schizophrenic patient”. He started receiving incapacity benefits in 1989, which enabled him create art full-time.

In Sandberg’s (1950-2016) artistic universe, we are invited right into the depth of a human mind. In an oversaturated image space, Sandberg processed the world that met him from childhood to death, and which seemed far too violent and unforgiving.

Sandberg suffered from schizophrenia and lived a reclusive life, but was active as an artist. He lived for his art and tried to understand and unite with the world through his works. With the potential of art as a refuge from the intrusive throngs of thoughts, the pen was guided in strict lines and patterns over the paper. Sandberg usually set aside a month for each work, put his initials on the paper in a box and drew throughout the days. So each work also requires time for us who view his works.

The drawings are filled with demons, surreal events and psychedelic train tracks. Sandberg often staged himself in a psychological picture room with the people and events he tried to understand – and the works revolve around psychological issues such as anxiety and the isolated person.

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