Born of Fjords and Folklore
Along Norway’s northern coastline, where mountains plunge into icy fjords and glaciers echo with wind, artist Storöy was shaped by a landscape both majestic and merciless. Raised in this elemental environment, Storöy absorbed not just the physical presence of nature but its mythic charge. For her, nature wasn’t scenic; it was sentient. Legends and folklore, told and retold through generations, infused her childhood with images of hidden creatures and indomitable female figures. These formative impressions wove themselves into the DNA of her artistic vision, not as quaint nods to the past but as vivid frameworks for storytelling through image.
Storöy’s early love for drawing emerged in tandem with her passion for reading, each feeding the other in a cycle of visual and narrative curiosity. Rather than pursue a rigid path, she followed an interdisciplinary course through design, illustration and fine art studies in Oslo and Milan. This exposure to diverse methodologies and philosophies of art became a crucible for her evolving practice. The friction between these disciplines gave rise to a language of images that bridges clean visual design with expressive, exploratory illustration. Storöy’s work stands apart for its refusal to be defined by one school or style, constantly morphing as it absorbs new influences and technologies.
Now based in Hamar, Storöy continues to build immersive worlds through her art, melding the ancient with the digital. Her work is a form of visual narration, where mythological motifs surface in contemporary structures and symbols from nature take on modern, abstracted forms. She invites viewers to enter these layered compositions not as passive observers but as interpreters, piecing together meaning from the fragments of story, memory and emotion that she embeds into each image.
Storöy: From Graphic Design to Narrative Alchemy
The journey from designer to artist was not a rupture but a slow metamorphosis. In her early twenties, Storöy began as a freelance graphic designer and illustrator, working across various sectors. These early experiences offered more than just a technical foundation — they trained her eye in visual communication and sharpened her understanding of how images function in different contexts. Later, working in a design studio, she became known taking on the “odd” or unconventional projects, those that required more than surface aesthetics. These assignments aligned perfectly with her instinct to seek depth, subtext and visual intrigue.
Far from resisting commercial experience, Storöy integrated it into her creative development. Learning the mechanics of design — from concept strategy to brand storytelling — gave her tools that now support the more intuitive side of her art. It also reinforced her belief in process: that the act of making is as important as the final outcome. Simultaneously, she began exhibiting her personal artwork locally, gradually expanding to international shows. Each exhibition became an experiment in translating her voice across formats, from quiet gallery pieces to louder, more surrealist expressions. These cumulative steps allowed her to cultivate a practice that is both adaptive and distinctive.
Her artistic evolution has remained deeply tied to the impulse that started it all: the drive to visualize narrative. Storöy’s current works are infused with a maximalist flair — colorful, textured and often surreal. She embraces the unpredictable, both in medium and in message. Her goal is not merely to depict but to suggest: to point at the undercurrents of memory, emotion and identity that exist beneath the surface of the visible. Each piece becomes an open-ended dialogue between the artist and the viewer, with meaning always in flux.
Unpredictable Harmonies and Hybrid Techniques
Refusing to tether herself to any single medium, Storöy operates within a hybridized creative practice that merges analogue textures with digital precision. Her approach is fluid: hand-drawn elements, chalk marks, oil paint strokes and spray can splashes form the groundwork, before being scanned or photographed and transformed further through digital platforms. She often uses a MacBook Pro M4 and Wacom Intuos tablet to process and sculpt these initial layers, building complexity through a kind of iterative editing. For her, the interplay between organic marks and digital tools is not merely a technical preference — it’s central to the poetic ambiguity she seeks in her compositions.
Themes in Storöy’s work emerge subtly, often cloaked in symbolism or obscured by surreal juxtapositions. She explores personal and collective memory, the slippery nature of identity and the fragile connections between people and their environments. Her earlier works, characterized by hushed color palettes and subdued emotion, have in recent years given way to bolder, more eccentric compositions. Figures, animals and abstract shapes collide in scenes that are both inviting and uncanny. These images often evoke dream states — moments of suspended logic where time, space and narrative coherence fracture to allow other kinds of sense to take over.
This artistic shift towards a more surreal and colorful approach mirrors Storöy’s own evolving worldview. She is less interested in clarity and more captivated by the possibilities of ambiguity. The compositions encourage viewers to engage not with what is immediately legible, but with what lingers at the edges of understanding. This philosophy is perhaps most clearly expressed in her upcoming project: a series that aims to depict hidden worlds nested within familiar forms. Whether it’s a landscape blooming from a creature or an object opening into a surreal narrative, the work insists that the world is always stranger, more layered and more beautiful than it first appears.
Storöy: Influences, Inspirations and the Art of Switching Gears
Storöy’s artistic vocabulary is shaped not only by her surroundings and education but also by a diverse set of artistic influences. Among the most profound is James Jean, whose mythic imagery and intricate universes resonate deeply with Storöy’s own fascination with narrative depth. She also cites Garis Edelweiss for his surreal color harmonies and composition, as well as the kinetic energy of Etam Cru’s street art. These artists reflect Storöy’s commitment to visual storytelling that is both experimental and emotionally resonant. From the delicate, feminine reveries of Amy Sol to the bold, Deco-inspired works of Tamara de Lempicka, Storöy draws inspiration from across the visual spectrum — absorbing, adapting and transforming their impact into something wholly her own.
This openness to influence parallels her approach to workspace and process. Storöy’s studio is a blend of traditional and modern, where brushes and paints sit alongside digital tablets and sound equipment. Music and literature are more than background elements; they’re catalysts, helping her access different emotional and thematic registers. When stuck on a piece, she doesn’t force resolution. Instead, she shifts mediums or projects, allowing her mind to reorient. This adaptive method reflects her belief that creativity thrives not on control but on movement — between tools, ideas and states of mind.
Storöy’s comfort with switching gears also feeds her artistic philosophy. She embraces the notion that unpredictability is not an obstacle but a source of energy. In the past, she gravitated towards traditional painting, believing it might offer her a fixed artistic identity. But over time, she realized that such boundaries limited the scope of her exploration. By choosing to identify as a graphic artist, she affirms her right to blend methods and approaches freely. Her current body of work and the project she is preparing — where the ordinary cracks open to reveal fantastical inner worlds — stands as a testament to this principle. For Storöy, every image is a threshold and every threshold is an invitation to imagine something more.
