About Viki Thorbjorn
Art as mirror. Art as memory. Art as return.
I’ve painted for as long as I can remember, though not always from the same place.
As a child, art was shelter. It gave me somewhere to put my attention when words were thin. I learned precision, control and the strange comfort of making something visible when I could not always explain what I felt.
Later, I trained as an athlete. My body learned discipline the way my hand had. Effort was measured. Results mattered. Strength became a language too, but like most languages built around performance, it came with a cost.
Painting stayed.
Even when it became habit. Even when life became loud. Even when I was trying to hold too much together with willpower and a slightly unreasonable amount of stubbornness.
What changed was stillness.
When life finally went quiet, the work shifted. I stopped painting to prove what I could do and started painting to meet what was real. The work became less about control and more about listening. Less about performance and more about presence.
That is where the practice lives now.
The practice today
My work lives in three connected rooms.
Art holds presence in a space. Writing gives language to what the quiet reveals. Movement builds strength the body can trust.
They are not separate identities. They are different ways of working with the same question:
What helps people return to themselves?
The artwork gives form to emotion. The writing names what often stays unspoken. The movement work brings the body back into the conversation, because the body usually knows the truth before the mind has finished making excuses.
This is the centre of my practice: presence over performance, quiet over noise, integrity over speed.
If you want the movement side, visit Movement – Strength in Body. I teach calm, structured yoga and Pilates in Nottingham. Sessions are 45 minutes. Adults and teens. Beginners welcome.
If you want the writing, you can start with Stillness Is a Weapon.
The artwork
My paintings arrive in layers. Colour is chosen for what it unsettles and steadies. Marks are made, then edited. Edges are left open on purpose. Some areas are allowed to breathe. Others carry more weight.
The aim is not to decorate. The aim is to create an anchor.
A finished piece should change the feeling of a space without shouting across it. It should hold something. Stillness, memory, tension, softness, relief, strength. The kind of thing you feel in your body before you have a neat sentence for it.
My finished works are offered as collector-grade canvas prints, produced to a high standard for private collectors, interiors, retreats and emotionally intelligent spaces.
Private commissions are created one-to-one through written reflection, then produced as a single canvas print for the collector.
Writing and stillness
Writing became part of the practice because some things needed language as well as colour.
My book, Stillness Is a Weapon, explores creative recovery, emotional truth, silence, refusal and the private work of returning to yourself. It is not a book about becoming softer for the world. God forbid. It is about becoming more honest inside your own life.
The writing sits beside the artwork, not underneath it. Both are interested in the same thing: what becomes visible when we stop performing long enough to notice what is actually there.
Movement and the body
Movement has always been part of my life. Before I taught yoga and Pilates, I was an athlete. I know what it means to train hard, to push, to build discipline, and to learn the body through repetition, effort and structure.
I also know what happens when the body says no.
My movement work is not about punishment, performance or pretending that everyone needs to become a human pretzel by Thursday. It is calm, structured and practical. It is built around strength, mobility, posture, body awareness and the quiet confidence of feeling more at home in yourself.
I teach movement for adults, children, schools and workplaces through yoga, Pilates and structured embodied practice.
Materials and care
I work with high-quality, long-life materials and production partners I trust.
The canvas works are produced with care, using professional processes suited to collector-grade presentation. Choices around production, packaging and suppliers are made with quality, sustainability and animal welfare in mind wherever possible.
Beauty and care belong together. Otherwise it’s just expensive decoration having an identity crisis.
Recognition
My practice has been recognised through recent awards and thoughtful features, including:
- Abstract Art Businesswoman of the Year, UK, 2024
- Abstract Artist of the Year, 2024/25
- Best Abstract Artist 2025, UK, LUXlife Magazine
- MA Creative Practice, distinction
For formal details, press information, bios and interview guidance, visit the Press Kit.
What guides the work
Presence over performance. Quiet over noise. Integrity over speed.
The studio is built on simple principles: make carefully, release intentionally and let the work speak for itself.
I’m not interested in making work that only looks good in a square crop. I am interested in work that changes how a space feels. Work that gives people somewhere to land. Work that holds a kind of truth without needing to explain itself to death.
Art, writing and movement are different languages, but they all ask the same thing:
Can you come back to yourself here?
Ways to begin
If you are drawn to the artwork, start with the selected works or request access to the private catalogue.
If you want a piece created through personal reflection, explore Capsule Commission.
If you want the writing, begin with Stillness Is a Weapon.
If you want the movement side, visit Movement for classes, school programmes and workplace wellbeing.
If something stirs in you, trust that
You are not here by mistake. And this work is not for everyone.
Not every piece is for every person. Not every room needs this kind of presence. Not every body of work needs to explain itself to be understood.
But if something in you softened while reading this, or steadied, or recognised itself for a second, trust that.
You will know when one is for you.
Viki
Contact, collaboration & media
For artwork enquiries, private catalogue access, commissions, movement work, collaborations or written media requests, please contact the studio.
I do not currently take part in podcasts, video interviews or live broadcast interviews, but I welcome written conversations that hold emotional depth, clarity and intention.