Ardek
- Artist: Olle Baertling
- Date: 1963
- Medium: Oil paint on canvas
- Dimensions: support: 1949 x 968 mm
- Museum: Tate Modern
- Collection record: Tate Modern website
Listen to the free audio guide
About this artwork
This is 'Ardek' by Olle Baertling, painted in 1963. The piece is an oil on canvas measuring about 195 by 97 centimetres. It’s a pure abstract work that uses sharp geometric lines and a limited palette dominated by violet, black and a cold blue‑green tone that Baertling called his “Baertling‑white.” The artist worked slowly, layering paint and tweaking the lines until the colour temperature felt just right. He would hang unfinished canvases in his studio, study them day after day, and only when the colours were perfect would he let the painting “live” on the wall. In “Ardek” the lines are almost vertical and create a sense of dynamic movement, as if the surface itself were a space in motion. This work is part of the “Abstraction and Society” display, where it sits beside other pieces that explore similar ideas of immaterial space and high velocity.
See it in person
Ardek is in the collection of Tate Modern on Bankside, London — free to enter. Point your phone at any artwork there and audioguide.london plays a free audio guide in six languages — no app download needed.
