Olle Bærtling

Olle Baertling (1911-1981) was a painter who trained with two key figures of modern European painting: Fernand Léger and André Lhote. His time with them gave him close contact with the formal concerns of Cubism and geometric abstraction, which both masters, each in his own way, pursued throughout the twentieth century.

His career moved toward abstraction, with a body of work that favours composition, balanced forms and colour over figurative representation. His canvases tend to be organised into clear planes and structures, placing him within non-figurative art of the mid-twentieth century.

His legacy is understood mainly as part of the postwar abstract renewal. Documentation about his career is limited, so specific details of his output should be treated with caution.