"For many years, Blomstedt has been familiar with working near the borderline of the figurative and the non-figurative, but to arrest the viewer’s gaze at a single unequivocal image has never been characteristic of his art. On the contrary, ambivalence – the possibility of multiple interpretations – has always been a core concept of his oeuvre."
"In Blomstedt’s paintings, forms are individuals. In approaching ideal geometric forms (squares and rectangles), or drawing away from them, they appear to be living beings. One can be seen as turning towards the other, and the other can be seen to turn its back. Each form entails a gesture, just as studied and expressive as the drapery in the costume of a figure in an icon."
"The adjacent forms of colour create a narrative proceeding in the direction of the pictorial plane. The essential point of its rhythm is the way in which each form meets the ones next to it. Tones near each other resonate lyrically, while, for instance, the opposition of black and yellow creates dramatic phrases. The rectangular shapes of colour can thus be seen as actors, whose geometry speaks a body language belonging to all dialogues. Even the smallest deviation from the vertical and horizontal will make a shape active or passive. But Blomstedt also lets the forms float in a space of colours in direct frontal view, lending itself to the illusion of a stage."
"An objective painting is a mirror, a closed system with predictable solutions, which Blomstedt feels is useless. He is interested in what cannot be known beforehand, and in that which can be made visible in a painting. Each painting is an individual, with properties specific to it, and it alone. A painting can never offer final solutions. It can only suggest, for example by posing questions that are as precisely formulated as possible.
Excerpts from Timo Valjakka’s article ("Maalaus voi vain ehdottaa") in the catalogue of the Kairos exhibition, Galerie Anhava 2001.
