Jonas Johansson (b. 1987) is a designer, artist and educator from Glommen, Halland. He studied graphic design in Norrköping, Reims, and Stockholm, and has worked at design studios in Tokyo, Montreal, London and Munich. He taught at Beckmans (2017–2025) and Hyper Island (2014–2022).
Jonas runs the artist residency Visualia and Nordic Audiovisual Artists, plans courses at Svenska Tecknare, creates events with PLX and Lumen Project, collaborates with the lighting collective Svartljus, and co-founded Dome Dreaming, the Nordics' first fulldome film festival.
He shares his studio with SMASH and Rose Hallgren.
Firestarter
A supersized Zippo lighter that visitors ignite with their own flame.
Firestarter is an interactive installation presented at Nowhere in Monegros, a regional burn I have attended since 2015. Created together with Catalan artist Erik Schmitz and architect Rose Hallgren, the piece is an enlarged replica of the classic Zippo lighter. I wanted to work with fire as a material, so we learned propane systems, sensors, and ignition triggers from the ground up. You walk up, you light a fire. A small, rebellious act of speaking up. It lit the official closing ceremony.
Built from aluminium sheets on a steel frame with hand-cut patterns, LED lighting, Arduino, DMX, and an IR sensor. Constructed with help from Josep Giribet in the workshop of David Giribet at Calidos in Tarrega.
