Henrik von Gerber – Swensen’s Ice Cream, San Francisco

The early Spring sun in San Francisco outside the first Swensen’s Ice Cream on Union Street.

The company was started in 1948 by Earle Swensen, who had learned to make ice cream while serving in the U.S. Navy during World War II. Swensen opened his first shop at the corner of Union and Hyde Streets, along the cable car tracks in Russian Hill in San Francisco at what had been a failed ice cream parlor.

HENRIK VON GERBER b.1970

Born just outside Lund in Southern Sweden, Henrik von Gerber moved to Stockholm as a teenager. He was strongly influenced by Pop Art, as well as sixties fashion and music. Trends associated with British Mod culture, old films and Modernist painting recur in his work, which also reflects the colours and atmosphere of his travels.

The artist describes his paintings as Urban Still Life. Created from photographic images captured on location all over the world, these are then recreated in oils in his studio. Many of von Gerber’s paintings retain a photographic quality, presenting particular moments in time, as if momentarily frozen by the camera.