The Watercolours of Mats Gustafson

Editorial

25.02.2026

Mats Gustafson in his studio. Photo Laurie Lambrecht

For nearly five decades, Mats Gustafson has refined watercolour into a singular artistic practice defined by precision and sensitivity to form.

In ‘The Watercolours’, CFHILL presents a focused selection of works depicting the Nordic landscape: trees, spruces, stones and swans rendered with quiet intensity and restraint. Hovering between abstraction and figuration, Gustafson distills complex forms into essential compositions. Broad fields of diluted colour meet controlled, calligraphic lines, demonstrating his understanding of watercolour as both material and method. The works balance fragility and structure, atmosphere and clarity.

Mats Gustafson. Courtesy of CFHILL and the artist.
Mats Gustafson. Courtesy of CFHILL and the artist.
Mats Gustafson. Courtesy of CFHILL and the artist.

The presentation concludes with a curated selection of Gustafson’s fashion illustrations. Here, the same discipline appears in another register. Garments are suggested through gesture rather than described in detail; silhouettes emerge through reduction. Gustafson’s fashion illustrations are celebrated for their poetic minimalism and impact, capturing the essence of garments with a sensitivity that transcends typical fashion depiction.

Born in 1951, Gustafson began his career as a fashion illustrator in the late 1970s after studying at the Dramatiska Institutet in Stockholm, where he initially worked with stage design.

Mats Gustafson. Courtesy of CFHILL and the artist.

His work has also appeared in Vogue and Harper’s Bazaar, and in campaigns for Hermès, Tiffany & Co., Yohji Yamamoto and Comme des Garçons.

Alongside his fashion practice, Gustafson has developed an extensive body of nature paintings since the mid-1990s. These works offer a more introspective atmosphere. Animals, trees and open landscapes are rendered with measured restraint, exploring melancholy and the fragile beauty of the natural world. Though distinct in subject, they share the same clarity and control that define his fashion illustrations.