When did you first come across psaligraphy?
One day, when I was 16, I saw a man sitting by the lake at Copenhagen’s Tivoli Gardens who was cutting a piece of art from paper. Back at home, I grabbed my mother’s embroidery scissors, and I have been cutting every day since.
Why did you choose craft as a profession?
I worked as a television producer until the early 2000s, when I was diagnosed with a neurological disorder characterised by chronic pain and exhaustion. I turned to paper cutting to keep my mind busy when my illness forced me to take a leave of absence from work for several months.
©Bit Vejle
What happened next?
A co-worker visited me in Norway, where I was living. Stunned by what I was creating, he called the Museum of Decorative Arts and Design in Trondheim. Encouraged by the curators, I eventually quit my job and focused exclusively on my paper cutting.
How does your inspiration come to you?
Designs often pop up in my head as I’m falling asleep. After I wake up, I rip off a swatch from a specially sourced 10,000-metre paper roll on which I draft some lines to indicate the general shape of the cut. Then, I just start: this is where the magic kicks in.