ArtNet News Features Lisa Wool-Rim Sjoblom’s “Coronavirus Art”

For an artist, addressing this unprecedented moment in history might feel both necessary and daunting. Distilling the complexities of any era while that era is still playing out isn’t easy, and, historically speaking, many works of art that have come to represent a significant point in time were made later—often addressing not the moment itself, but the conditions it incurs. And yet, intimidating though the task may be, artists can’t seem to help themselves—making art in reaction to the world is what they do. And, in this particular case, they also happen to be locked in their homes with little else on their plates.

There’s no one way to define “Coronavirus art.” A number of artists of Asian descent, such as Taeyoon Choi, Lisa Wool-Rim Sjöblom, and Laura Gao are confronting the latent racism in pandemic panic through illustration. Photographers are making ad-hoc still lifes with a quarantine flair, or taking somber portraits of people from outside. Street artists the world over are filling their neighborhoods with coronavirus-themed designs. And online “museum” dedicated to “art born during Covid19 quarantine” has even popped up.