On October 17, 2026, Moderna Museet will open the exhibition “A Lost World,” featuring paintings, sculptures and painted objects straight from Jan Håfström’s studio, just weeks after his art made an unexpected return to the Stockholm subway for the first time since 1979. For anyone considering a poster with a real piece of Swedish art history behind it, autumn 2026 is an unusually good time to get to know the artist behind the enigmatic man in a coat and hat: Mr Walker.
This guide explores what makes Håfström’s artistic practice unique, who Mr Walker really is, how his childhood and the war shaped his visual world, and how his works function as posters in different rooms at home.
He is 88 years old and shows no signs of slowing down. In 2025, a new sculpture by him was unveiled at the Stockholm School of Economics, and this autumn SVT will broadcast a documentary about him directed by Staffan Julén, another reminder that Håfström is in the midst of renewed attention rather than a retrospective anniversary phase.
Jan Håfström – the artist who made memory his life’s work
Jan Håfström (born 1937) grew up during the Second World War, from the age of two to eight, while war raged across Europe. He studied philosophy and art rather than following the path to the priesthood that his father Erik, who came from the Pentecostal movement, had once envisioned for him. Since childhood, the studio has served as a sanctuary, and Håfström himself has described his artistic practice as “an archaeological excavation of one’s own life,” a phrase that says almost everything about how he works: not linearly, but in layers, with old motifs dug up, repainted and placed in new contexts again and again over the decades.
He is considered one of the Swedish artists who first moved freely between pop art, conceptual art and traditional painting without committing to a single movement. This made him difficult to place in art history books, but all the more talked about over six decades of exhibitions, both in Sweden and internationally.
Why has Jan Håfström’s art become a collector’s item in Swedish homes?
Håfström’s art is regularly sold at Bukowskis and hangs in several Swedish museum collections, but what is really driving the renewed interest is his return to public spaces in autumn 2026: a new subway installation in September and a major solo exhibition at Moderna Museet in October. When an artist suddenly reappears in everyday life—on the way to work, on a platform—it sparks curiosity in a way that a single painting in a curated collection rarely can on its own.
Bozetto’s collection of famous artists reflects just this kind of renewed interest: artists who attract new audiences through current exhibitions and anniversaries often sell better as posters than they have in years, because buyers feel the subject is relevant right now rather than a timeless classic they “should” know.
Quick facts: Moderna Museet presents Jan Håfström’s “A Lost World” on Level 4 from October 17, 2026, to March 14, 2027, curated by Matilda Olof-Ors. That same autumn, his art returned to the subway with the work “Hotel Eden” at Zinkensdamm, his first subway installation since 1977–79, when he exhibited in the blue corridor at T-Centralen alongside Ulla Wiggen, Olle Kåks, and Ola Billgren.
The sculpture by Central Station also brings a park into use that otherwise rarely draws attention in the urban landscape, an example of how Håfström’s art deliberately serves both artistic and urban-planning purposes at once. The figure becomes a place to meet, not just a work to glance at while on the way to the commuter train.
Who is Mr Walker, the man in a coat and hat who has followed Håfström for fifty years?
Mr Walker is Håfström’s most recurring figure: a character in a coat and hat, often faceless, who appears in paintings and prints, and as a seven-meter-high sculpture near Stockholm Central Station. The figure originated in the comic-book character The Phantom, whose civilian alter ego is named Mr Walker.
A childhood hero becomes an alter ego
The Phantom was one of Håfström’s childhood heroes, and he has described the character’s “mockingly double nature” as something he has returned to throughout his artistic career. The man in a coat and hat in the sculpture by Central Station is described as “both running and falling at the same time,” depending on where the viewer stands in relation to the seven-meter-high figure—a kind of optical instability that Håfström deliberately built into the work.
More than a mascot
Mr Walker serves several roles in Håfström’s artistic practice: an alter ego, a father figure and a symbol of the creative person moving through the city. A visitor is said to have once told the artist: "I go there sometimes and wash my soul," a comment Håfström himself interprets as meaning that the character acts as a secular spiritual guide in the midst of an otherwise noisy urban environment.
"I go there sometimes and wash my soul."
Mr Walker’s roots in an American comic-strip character also make him a natural part of Bozetto’s pop art posters, alongside contemporary icons whose visual language comes from comic books, advertising and film rather than solely from art history.
How do childhood and the Second World War appear in Håfström’s art?
Håfström was between two and eight years old during the Second World War, and that period recurs throughout his visual world, not as direct war scenes but as an underlying tone of loss, absence and hidden places. Death motifs and graves appear repeatedly in his paintings, and according to the artist himself, in recent years his works have taken on an increasingly religious undertone, blending the sacred and the profane without distinguishing between the two.
The exhibition title "A Lost World" captures that movement perfectly. Curator Matilda Olof-Ors describes how "the past is rarely distant or over" in Håfström’s practice, but rather "a tangible presence". Motifs are repainted, reused and placed in new contexts year after year, as if time in his studio moves in circles rather than in a straight line forward through his career.
The bold outlines and limited palette that recur in his prints make him feel equally at home among Bozetto’s graphic posters and retro and vintage motifs from the same decades in which he made his debut, a period when both comic books and conceptual art shaped an entirely new visual language in Sweden.
In interviews ahead of this autumn’s exhibitions, Håfström himself has described how the religious undertone that has emerged in his later art is not about returning to the Pentecostal movement of his childhood, but rather about a search for meaning that runs parallel to his artistic practice. The sacred and the profane can coexist on the same canvas, sometimes in the same brushstroke, without one explaining away the other.
How does Jan Håfström’s art work as a poster in different rooms at home?
Mr Walker and Håfström’s graphic motifs work especially well in rooms where you want an artwork that raises a question rather than simply filling a space. The hallway is a natural choice because the figure itself is about moving between places, while the home office suits anyone who wants to surround themselves with an artistic practice built on reflection and revisiting rather than quick consumption.
Also consider how the poster works with the other pieces on the wall. Our 2026 guide to gallery walls explains how to arrange several motifs together, which is especially relevant for an artist like Håfström, whose figures often work best alongside a couple of smaller, calmer motifs rather than completely alone on a large wall.
Tip: Keep the frame simple and dark for graphic Swedish artists like Håfström. A thin black wooden frame or one of Bozetto’s canvas wooden frames brings out the contours without competing with the motif.
In the living room, a larger format works best, preferably 70x100, because Mr Walker’s silhouette needs a certain viewing distance for the optical instability between running and falling to fully register. Up close, such as in a bedroom or a small reading nook, the smaller graphic motifs from his work are a better fit, where the details of the brushstrokes and surface texture become part of the experience rather than the overall impression from a distance.
Anyone collecting several Swedish artists on the same wall would be wise to let Håfström represent the enigmatic and personal, while airier or nature-inspired motifs by other Swedish artists balance the composition. The contrast between the introspective and the open is often what makes a gallery wall with several voices interesting to look at for a long time, instead of becoming monotonous after the first week.
Frequently asked questions about Jan Håfström
See Bozetto's Swedish artist posters
If you'd like to hang a piece of Swedish art history from this autumn at home, just browse Bozetto's collection of famous artists, where graphic and pop-cultural motifs meet more classical masters in the same range.
Also read about Yayoi Kusama's journey from gallery to living room and Andy Warhol's line and image if you'd like to learn about more artists who have turned popular culture into art in the same way Håfström has with Mr Walker. Both show how a single recurring figure drawn from popular culture can carry an entire artistic career through decades of reinterpretation.