“Regretting things you’ve done is stupid, it’s a waste of time. I only regret things I haven’t yet done.”

At 64, Danish artist Tine Jakobsen has never felt a deeper sense of urgency to make, create and travel, than she does now. 

When I first visited Tine in May 2021, she was 59, but her disposition, four years later, has remained intact. “I feel like time is running faster and faster… There are so many things I would love to do. It’s like someone is running right behind me… it’s not that I am afraid of dying or anything…”

On that rainy Saturday afternoon in the spring of 2021, Tine welcomed me into her apartment in Frederiksberg, Copenhagen — part home, part studio — where she has lived with her husband Paul since 2018. After a long, isolating winter under COVID-19 lockdown, social restrictions had only just begun to ease. In that spirit, the interview (which lasted four hours) felt — for both of us — less like a formal exchange and more like a reminder of what it was to connect, to reflect, and to begin again with a slightly revised sense of self.

Inside Tine’s home is an atmosphere that feels both peaceful and precise — a space with a temperament of its own, not unlike the sensation of walking into a library. You instinctively lower your voice. “May I take your coat?” Tine asked as I stepped in. Even my damp jacket was swiftly absorbed into the order of the room — no clutter, no fuss, just a quiet sense that everything had its place. That same sense of calm and restraint moves gently through her work — Stand in front of one of her large-scale pieces long enough and I am convinced your heart will begin to beat a little slower. 

“You know, everything begins with your mother, right…” Tine starts as soon as we sit down. “She painted for the joy of painting… Flowers, landscapes, people… and although she never intended to sell any of her work, she enjoyed it, and that introduced me to something important: the idea that you could make things just for the pleasure of it.”

Born in Roskilde in 1961, Tine Jakobsen grew up in an environment where personal freedom was the norm. “In those days parents didn’t care what their kids did,” she says. “It was all, ‘You’re fantastic, do whatever you like, we approve.’ Many parents had that idea in Denmark in the ’70s when their kids were getting older.”

When you discover that Tine Jakobsen was trained as an architect and not a painter, you’ll begin to see an inherent spatial quality in her work. This isn’t just instinct — it’s intentional. 

“I like to paint rooms, within rooms, within rooms,” Tine explains. “Scale is important to me. If the work is too petite, it feels compressed — there’s less space for color to breathe, and it’s harder for the body to find its way in. I want there to be room for movement, for subtle transitions.

“Ever since architecture school, I’ve measured everything with my body.”

In 1983, Tine started her Architecture degree at the Royal Danish Academy in Copenhagen. “I always thought architecture was wonderful. As a kid, I drew houses and plans for how I wanted to live — always with swimming pools.” The architecture school wasn’t just about drawing buildings though. They discussed philosophy, physics, film, and art. “The idea was to combine all these elements with architecture and understand their interconnectivity.”

Back then, there wasn’t the framework that there is now; students designed their own schedules without structured plans or teachers guiding the way. Hundreds of courses were available, and this freedom appealed to Tine. “It also presented an important challenge: to build your own ‘dreams’ you must ultimately figure it out yourself. The sooner you learn that, the better.” 

“As long as you mean what you do, you can do anything” an architecture professor once said to Tine early on, and it was a line she often reflected on, one she still does. “Do I mean this?” she used to wonder. In time she realised that this “meaning” he spoke of was related to the commitment required to be a good architect, a responsible one. “I always had a longing to remove any responsibility towards my work once complete. That mentality wasn’t possible in architecture — there were too many constraints, too many plans and programs to follow. As soon as I moved to painting I finally felt free.”

In 1996, Tine was accepted into the prominent Spring Exhibition at Kunsthalle Charlottenborg — the third time her work was shown publicly. Today, Kunsthalle Charlottenborg is one of Copenhagen’s leading contemporary art institutions, housed in a historic 17th-century palace adjacent to the Royal Danish Academy of Fine Arts. “As I didn’t have the education as an artist, to then have the chance to show my work there felt like a moment of arrival — like I’d been let in.”

Four years later, in the year 2000, Tine completed her series, From Pink to Scarlett, developed at age 39. Her daughter’s - Dida and Flora’s - favorite period of work. Looking at it now, Tine sees this work as “Brave attempts to express an inbetween nature of people and events… not unlike a visual diary.” Unlike her work now, where stories are more veiled, these are overt and direct: One piece of a naked man standing before two large gates with a speech bubble reading “Step Inside,” another of a woman laying naked, giving birth under a tree. “When my daughters see these they want me to return to that time — where there were words, more energy, more play...” Tine pauses, “But to repaint in that style would be to return to a version of myself that seems much younger, one I’ve since lost — but, I believe, with time, I’ll find my way back to."

From Pink to Scarlett marked a period of transition. The year prior to the 2000 exhibition, Tine had divorced from her first husband, and for the next decade, Paris became a kind of refuge — a place she returned to often, not only to immerse herself in art, but also because she had begun a relationship with a French man. He was also an artist. “It was convenient, because when I was in Denmark, I had my kids, and then when I was in Paris I was free to feel like a woman again, not a mother, or a wife, but an independent woman. It was almost like I was leading a double life. It’s not that I wanted that, or wanted things to be separate, but I liked that it was. It worked in this case. Many people, when they get new partners, want it all to be mixed together in a cocktail—and that can at times become very difficult.” 

I think of a recent New York Times article by Thessaly La Force called “When Two Artists Meet, and Then Marry.” Creatively charged partnerships often seem idyllic from the outside, but the reality is usually more complicated. I read an excerpt: “...It was messy and complicated, yet, despite it all, they shared an unshakable intellectual loyalty to one another…” I finished… “And when you begin to get attracted to complicated...” I start. She smiles, nodding knowingly. “It can become exhausting,” she finishes. We shake our heads in unison, aware that chasing “complicated” as a source of energy is never sustainable.

In between painting, traveling, and being a mother, Tine was also teaching a lot in Denmark. She recalls this period as some of her most productive years. Not because she was joyfully happy at all times, but because she was consistently challenged. I share the incisive line from Marina Abramović’, “Happiness makes people lazy” Tine nods, and believes this to be true, and it’s something she is most afraid of.

“Sometimes stability can be nice, other times, it can become a pillow where you just fall asleep…”

At this point, Tine walks to the back of the room and brings me a catalogue from one of her past exhibitions called, Soften Your Eyes which opened in 2005. The Editor of art newspaper, Kunstavisen, Tom Jørgensen, called this body of work, “A gentle way of making an immensely dramatic statement.”

Soften Your Eyes comprised a total of eight pieces painted at a scale of 60 x 70 inches. All pieces were sold except one, Tine didn’t want to let it go. That piece is called Beabel and/or Isatrice, compositions of two girls originally drawn from snapshots of her two daughters on vacation. “Are these two girls sitting together in this frame? Do they know each other? Is someone thinking of them both at the same time? It’s much more about what is going on in people’s minds and how we meet ourselves everyday, and have our own stories and realities.” 

Beabel and/or Isatrice has a cinematic quality to it, as if various frames have been taken out of a storyboard and merged, with the intention to be filmed. "You can always turn things around," Tine poses, “...and I think I twist things more than most people, look at them from different sides... once I am happy with one side, I go back around and look at it from the other side…” Listening to Tine, this tendency to interrogate moments doesn’t make life easy per se, but it’s a reminder to Tine that when it comes to the internal worlds of people, "We don't know anything."

Amidst the unknown and inevitable chaos of a life, Tine still sees — with the beauty of hindsight — that there is a coherence to it all. That said, "It's a luxury to look at yourself from so many angles” she finishes.

As hospitable as they are minimal, Tine’s work carries an unmistakable feminine sensibility — with colors, brushstrokes, and layers so delicate, luminous and soft, they become subtly disarming. Canvas after canvas holds a quietude free of distraction, creating so much space for the viewer that each piece, with patience, becomes its own mirror.

“There are personal stories and even secrets within the layers, and I don’t mind if they’re seen,” Tine says. “...but like architecture, it’s about building space for others to see themselves in.”

This so-called “feminine sensibility” in painting has long been misunderstood, even dismissed — its softness misread as a lack of force, when in fact, that softness in Tine’s gestures holds the charge. Even if you choose to look away, something will stay with you — a seedling of a memory impossible to unfeel.

You cannot hide from yourself in front of Tine’s work.

Outside her studio, Tine hangs three of her large scale paintings — two in the entrance, one in the lounge. “It feels very natural to live with my work, they fit into my life.”

Tine’s work doesn't demand attention, it offers it. Works that are steady, rooted, content in themselves. Whether you’re there or not, they will remain — like a tree in a forest, waiting. Essential and tranquil. As with nature itself, if you don’t take time to take in her work — if you’re in a rush, looking for something shiny or loud to grab your attention — your speed will miss its power.

“I am very minimalistic. I don’t like a lot of stuff. I like feeling free, and having too many things removes that freedom — like you couldn’t just get up and go if you wanted to. If I lived alone, it would look very different. I’d just need my books and a bed. The rest would be a studio.”

Tine lost her mother when she was just 25; her mother aged 55. “I turned 26 a month after she died. Back then, 55 didn’t seem so young. I didn’t feel that young either. But now, watching my daughter Dida with her own child, it all comes back once again. She’s 30 — she’s a wife, a mother — but I still look at her and see my daughter, still so young. We live very close, I help her a lot, and now I think, ‘What would you do without me?’” 

When Dida was born five years after her death, the absence hit harder. “I missed her so much. I had so many questions — about how to do things, how she had done things.” 

When Dida was almost a year old, Tine had a woman come three days a week — just six hours a day — to look after her. “That time was essential for me,” Tine says. “When your life as an artist is suddenly split by having children, the hours you have alone feel fleeting, almost sacred. I became intensely productive in those windows. I felt responsible to use them well.” By the time her second daughter Flora, was born, things felt easier. “She was so calm, always sleeping. I just brought her with me to the studio. She never got in the way. It was really quite amazing.”

As Tine reflects on her relationships and how they’ve impacted her work, what emerges again is a reminder of her independence—a selfhood she protects fiercely. “I think it’s important to say it out loud — in any relationship, to hold onto the idea: ‘I am independent.’ It’s not about not needing someone — but about knowing you can stand on your own. That said, without family around me, my life would naturally look very different.”

With all that said, Tine reminds me that it’s “...incredibly important to maintain communication with the big relationships in your life. They will always provide you with something and cutting them out of your life completely when a relationship ends isn’t an option for me.”

“I love to return. I have returned to so many places in the physical world, and a part of going forward is going backwards. I go backwards a lot.”

China is a particularly special place for Tine — she has traveled there almost every year for the past 16 years and has exhibited her work there more than 10 times. It offers her a perspective she can’t find in Copenhagen. “Denmark is one of the smallest countries in Europe,” she says. “In many ways, we’re fortunate — the healthcare system, the freedom to speak openly, to criticize the government, to express ourselves in art without fear. When I speak with people in China, they often say they envy that freedom. At the same time, I find so much value in the cultural differences — in Denmark, we tend to do things in very particular ways. We eat the same food, share the same habits, and it creates a kind of unity. A unity you might want to escape from. In China, I’m reminded that other ways of living are possible — and that’s a perspective I need.”

It’s not only culture — it’s scale. “When you see the landscape, traveling from train, one to the other, you travel for 15 hours and when you look at a map, you've barely moved…” That kind of immensity shifts something. Time stretches differently. The vastness of space forces a recalibration — of pace, of perception. This relationship between physical scale and psychological space is deeply connected to how Tine thinks about painting.

When I ask Tine what she would consider doing if it weren’t for painting, she rattles off a long and eclectic list of alternate routes. Each with equal levels of energy and enthusiasm from one to the next. “A filmmaker... but that was before I studied architecture… Reading Japanese and studying Japanese culture... Anthropology and Greek studies… something to do with the earth!” she laughs. “There’s so much. I am open to so many possibilities. Today I think I am interested in much more than when I was younger.” 

Alongside the pandemic, she suspects age has also amplified this state of urgency, a feeling of losing time, but “It's so difficult to explain this urge to produce” Tine assures, “I think if I knew where it came from then I would probably stop.” Even now "I still doubt myself,” she begins again, “...and I have not come to any grand conclusions of ‘who I am’ necessarily… so maybe this is where the urge comes from... and to continue working towards this state of knowing."

Solitude, she says, has always been essential. “I love long days alone in the studio, and that’s what I love about traveling alone too — it lets everything else fade into the background: teaching, family, the rest of life. It’s a little egoistic as well, but it can shape how you experience the world.”

After hours in conversation, Tine continues to meet my gaze, steady and without hesitation — a rare kind of direct, and continual eye contact. Only when reaching for a memory does she look away, as if quietly searching through the files of her mind. Just like her paintings, you’ll have trouble hiding yourself when in Tine’s presence.

The tranquility of her paintings wouldn’t necessarily give the impression that the artist is anything more than at peace with her life and the world she has created for herself. “Within all these layers, and past lives I’ve built within my work, sometimes I myself can’t even tell whether it’s the same life, there’s been so many periods…” 

Now in 2025 in a recent conversation, age 64, Tine returns and contradicts her thought in 2021… “Of course I am afraid of dying… but sometimes you have to ask yourself, what are you running away from, or what are you running towards?”

“Returning to yourself doesn’t need to be so hard”

“...Sometimes it can feel like you’ve been asleep for years — and then, one day, something small brings a new spark to your thinking. It could be as simple as a good book, a good show...” She believes life moves in circles: “We go out, and we come back around. Out again, and back again.” She finishes… “And regretting things you’ve done is still stupid?” I ask, “Yes,” Tine nods, “I do believe so.”

Tine’s work captures moments suspended in time — the stillness before the storm or the quiet aftermath, but never the chaos itself. Her work feels like a snapshot of absence: the tension of anticipation, the solitude after loss, and the subtle rhythms of aging and passing days… and it can be felt, because when she paints, she means it.