This September, HVK presents its Chair, Josephine Siskind, as Artist of the Month – an artist whose remarkable journey has taken her from Chicago and Berlin to Havana, Mexico City and Stockholm. Her work carries traces of these different worlds while remaining deeply focused on one universal subject: the human experience.
From Chicago to Havana – the beginnings of an artistic journey
Josephine Siskind was born in Chicago and grew up in Berlin. During her youth, her family moved to Havana, Cuba – a period that would prove significant for her artistic development. It was there that she discovered the powerful visual language of Mexican mural painting and became fascinated by its ability to connect art with history, society and human experience.
At the age of 21, she moved to New York to continue her artistic education at the Art Students League of New York.
Her path then led her to Mexico City, where she studied for seven years at the Academy of Fine Arts. There she received a rigorous classical education under distinguished artists including Pablo O’Higgins, Benito Messeguer and Arnold Belkin.
The influence of Mexican muralism, combined with classical artistic discipline, became an important foundation for the visual language she would later develop throughout her career.
Sweden – a new chapter
Josephine Siskind first exhibited in Sweden in Stockholm in 1979. Supported by a scholarship from the Swedish Institute, she subsequently decided to make Sweden her home.
It marked the beginning of another important chapter in an already international life.
Since then, Siskind has participated in numerous exhibitions in Sweden and abroad. Her works have been presented at venues including Kulturhuset, Sveagalleriet and Gummessons in Stockholm, Bülowska Galleriet in Malmö, the Vasa Museum, Malmöhus Museum and Södertälje Konsthall.
Her international exhibitions have also taken her beyond Sweden, including presentations at the Carrousel du Louvre in Paris and Kulturhaus Köpenick in Berlin.
Art within the public space
Siskind’s artistic practice is not confined to galleries and museums. She has also created several works for public environments, including commissions for Svenska Bostäder in Stockholm.
Among them are enamel fruit works created for a public interior in Hässelby Gård and large-scale murals at Tensta torg.
These projects reconnect her work with one of the artistic traditions that fascinated her from an early age: the idea that art can become part of everyday life and exist in direct dialogue with people and places.
Behind the visible
At the heart of Josephine Siskind’s painting lies an exploration of the human inner landscape.
Identity, vulnerability, transformation and hope repeatedly emerge within her work. Through symbolism and organic forms, she searches beyond immediate appearances, investigating emotional and psychological realities that cannot always be expressed through words.
Her paintings invite the viewer not simply to look, but to interpret.
Forms can become symbols. Bodies and organic structures seem to carry memories. The visible world becomes a doorway into something more intimate – a space where fragility can coexist with strength and uncertainty with hope.
This search for what exists beneath the surface gives Siskind’s work its deeply human dimension.
Josephine Siskind – Artist of the Month
In September, Josephine Siskind is presented as HVK’s Artist of the Month (Månadens Konstnär).
The presentation is also an opportunity to revisit an artistic career shaped by movement between countries, cultures and artistic traditions – from Chicago and Berlin to Havana and Mexico City, and finally Sweden.
Today, alongside her artistic practice, Josephine Siskind serves as Chair of HVK, continuing her engagement with the artistic community while pursuing her own creative work.
Her story demonstrates how an artist’s visual language can evolve across borders without losing its individual identity.
From the monumental tradition of Mexican muralism to intimate investigations of human vulnerability, Josephine Siskind has spent decades exploring the relationship between the external world and our inner realities.
And perhaps this is precisely where the enduring power of her work can be found: in the search for what lies behind the visible.
Josephine Siskind – Artist of the Month, September 2026
More works by Josephine Siskind can be discovered through her artist presentation on Konst.se.
06.09.2026 Stockholm
Halina Rosa
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