EQ Magazine’s Daniel Hilpert met Swedish artist Johan Wahlstrom at this industrial loft in Greenville, Jersey City, a new artist community. The neighborhood’s cheap rents and location in close proximity to NYC makes the industrial warehouses a natural fit.

Johan is working on an abstract expressionist series of portraits, many of which feature Donald Trump tweeting.  His work typically depicts today’s society, social and political issues. The work has figurative elements such as distorted faces that have become almost abstract to highlight emotions and expressions.

Johan’s most recent work is about the mass commodification of the culture industry, where the population is increasingly made up of passive consumers of the culture economy. There is an element of anxiety in his work – the giant eye of Big Data is focusing on just about everybody, counting every hit, like and dislike.

Johan’s work is carried by George Berges in SoHo.