Välskärin (kertomattomat) kertomukset – Magdalena Åberg

My grandfather was a field doctor, a frontline medic during the Winter War and Continuation War.

The only stories that remain of him for future generations are those, nearly silenced, of how he didn’t live very well or for long after the war, broken by his experiences.

Later, I sought a connection to him by painting possible narratives from his frontline years, attempting to move beyond the general myths of grit and heroism to capture the daily reality of wartime medicine.

Since our family lacks photographs that tell this story, I have used material from the SA-archive as an auxiliary tool.

The process has become more personally important to me than I could have imagined when I started a few years ago. From a blank, mostly black sheet of paper, my grandfather has become a spiritual and bloody figure to me—someone who did a lot of good before eventually facing a tragic end.

Translated with ChatGPT