Can´t help myself - got to write a little more

I´m returning to Svalbard this weekend to do two things - go hiking and open a small exhibition in one of the local café´s (Fruene kaffe & vinbar). I´m exhibitng photos this time - you can see one of them underneath and more of them here.


And that´s all - I´m not starting blogging again, I´m not. Not now, anyway.

Website news

I have finally got around to updating my website, so now my exhibition at Galleri Svalbard can be admired by everyone.


To the left is a detail of the installation "Himmelhøyt".

Fame a last!

Ta-da! The local press finally did it´s job! Svalbardposten this week proudly presents an article about yours truly:)




The article is about a talk/discussion the local photo-club arranged last Tuesday - it went quite well, I think. I talked a lot, at least, and the (small) audience asked interested questions. I hate how I look on the photo, but then I always do, so never mind.

Of course, the publicitity arrives a bit late, on Monday, I´ll take it all down (I´ll show photos from the exhibition on my homepage soon, I just need time to prepare it).

The artist Turid Ulldal is up next in the Galleri Svalbard, her exhibition opens on the 17th of May. I have the highest respect for her works, and am a tiny bit proud that I´ve exhibited in the same gallery as her.


And by-the-by: This is the third week in a row members of this household has been in the local rag, so I suppose William will be in next week´s edition. I wonder in which context...

More images from Barentsburg

We bought cards in Barentsburg, here are a few of them.














Presumably from the town´s golden days (it says 1976 on the jacket).

Glimt av september

That´s it. Anyone can go and see my stuff (and love it or slaughter it as they please), it´s not only mine anymore. It´s the weirdest feeling, like baring your soul to the world - and I don´t know if I´ll ever get used to it.

Well, here´s pictures. I´ll take proper ones later.







Exhausted artist with most of her fan group.

Almost there

I know I wrote earlier that the opening of my exhibition is on the 13th of April - that was changed ages ago, without me mentioning it here. So, it´s due next Sunday and right now I´m busy-busy with the final preparations.

On the left is the poster/flyer the Gallery has distributed - with a detail of one of the works. I´ll show you pictures later.



And, as expected, I´m dead nervous and wonder why this ever seemed like a good idea. Aargh.

Women In Art

This is not Svalbard-related, but as it´s done so well, I wanted to share it.
Also, it fits my mood really well, right now.
So, enjoy. And thank you, Charlie, for sending it to me.

Solfestuke 2008 II

Today was Sun-day at Longyearbyen school - that is, the classes between 1-4 had a productive day making suns in all shapes and sizes. Lots of nice suns were created, out of yarn, paper, feathers and ribbons. I was there as a help, and it was busy! But inbetween I had time to take pictures, and here´s a few of them.



Thomas with self-made papermask.


Vilde with yarn.



Windy, cold day - but the kids played outside, with the huge pile of proper snow to climb on -



and real ice to slip around on.


And an extremely uneven snow-ground didn´t discourage Peter and the other footballers from playing.


Sunshine only on the nearest mountaintops - but not long now ...!

Grand opening of the Seed Vault

The Global Seed Vault finally opens today, and we aren´t invited. But yesterday we were, to the final rehearsal - together with a large part of the local population. The weather was really bad, and the drivers of the 5 large buses that took us up the winding, narrow road to the vault, through the blizzard in complete darkness, did an excellent job. The weather today is a lot better, but still windy.

Anyway - we weren´t allowed to take pictures during the ceremony, but here´s one of the host, Fredrik Skavlan.


Underneath is the scene where Mari Boine and Coco Mbassi performed, and where Nobelprice-winner Wangari Maathai spoke about deliveries of seeds. They´ll be doing the same things today, more about that here.


Afterwards, we took some snapshots of the beautiful ice-art in the halls.



And we did a little posing, Emma and I...


The art-piece that´s on the entrance of the vault looks really nice, but as the weather was so horrible last night, I couldn´t get a good shot of it, and I have nicked the one under from here. It´s made by the Norwegian artist Dyveke Sanne.

The bear in front is made of ice, by the way...


The whole town has been flooded with camera-teams for several days - it´s quite entertaining to see reporters and camera teams snooping around the streets and shops, carrying heavy gear. Here and here are a couple of reports. There´ll probably be more before this day is over.

Update 8 o´clock: you´ll find the whole ceremony here.

Julehefte, by Thomas

This is written and illustrated by Thomas in December 2006, when we were talking a lot about the move to Svalbard. It´s the dramatic story about Tuba who survives a plane-crash by the help of a dolphin, and returns to her happy parents in Longyearbyen.



TUBA – JULEHEFTE


Det var en gang en jente som het Tuba. Hun var bare 6 År Gammel. Hun bodde på SvalBard. Hun hadde fått mange Problemer. På fredag ble Hun angripet av en Isbjørn, og på søndag ble hun overkjørt av hjulene på et Jetfly som skulle ut til Rullebanen og Lette. dagen etter ble hun Plaget av noen rampegutter på Skolen.



Men neste dag ble det verre. Nemlig når hun skulle ta en flytur, styrtet flyet ned i Havet. Flyet hadde verken rednignsvest eller redningsbåt, og hun Kunne ikke svømme.




Så derfor sank Hun ned på Havets Bunn. Men så ble det Bedre. Hun ble nemlig reddet av en Delfin. Delfinen svømte opp på Land med Tuba.



Så dro delfinen av gårde for å fange fisk til Tuba. Neste dag våknet Tuba. Hun spiste fisken hun hadde fått av delfinen til frokost. Etterpå begynte hun og øve på å svømme. Plutselig kunne hun det.


Ja, hun kunne tilomed dykke. Hun svømte tilbake til longyearbyen. Foreldrene hennes var svært engstelige for Hvor hun hadde vært. Plutselig kom det en liten S-T-E-M-M-E.
Det lød - hei,hei! Hhæææ?! Det er…………………T-U-B-A-! SKATTEN MIN. Du er Tilbake!! Ja, det er jeg.


Slutt


God Jul!

This is what I do

I realize I haven´t really mentioned what I fill my days with - some of you might´ve wondered what I do when I´m not writing blog-entries or dodging polar bears. Well, this is what I do:

Mainly, I work on my own projects. I have an exhibition coming up at the Galleri Svalbard in April that I´m really excited about (and a little anxious...). I´m pleased that I´ve got the chance to work on something proper - it´s a good room for big pieces and I´m planning to use the whole space.

Also, I have another project that I´m working on, which I hope will turn into something, in a gallery somewhere, sometime... Some of it looks like this:


The idea is to have it printed on textiles. But it may never get that far.

I´ve been teaching a little at the local school too - guess what, gymnastics! Anyone who knew me when I was a kid should laugh heartily at this point, as I hated gymnastics (it´s not really gymnastics, I suppose, but more encouraging 8-9 year-olds to run around and - hopefully - having fun at the same time).


... stretching out is essential.



I also teach a bit of arts-and-craft, which I think I´m better qualified to do. In January, as a part of arts-and-crafts, I´m going to teach 13-15 year-olds a photo-editing program called paint.net - that should be fun. And another project for January is teaching at a drawing-course for grown-ups. That is, it will only happen if the course gets enough participants. I hope it will, as that could be fun too.

And, I´ve also upgraded my website recently - I think it looks a lot better than it did. I´ve moved it´s location too, but hopefully you won´t notice.

So, this was a peek into how I while away the dark winter days: busy, but not too busy.

Which is, incidentally, just the way I like it.

UNIS and Olafur Eliasson

The UNIS-building is quite interesting, consisting of two parts, an old building from the nineties or so, when UNIS was established, and a quite new one, finished in 2005. Personally I don´t like the exterior very much, but the inside is wonderful. The new part of the building is big and cosy at the same time - airy corridors and slanting walls, and a quiet atmosphere (the quietness may partly be due to the fact that noone wears shoes, as it´s a tradition in Longyearbyen to remove your shoes when you enter most buildings).

It´s difficult to introduce art into such a defined environment, I suppose, because there´s little of that on the walls (except for traditional prints in the corridors). But the Danish artist Olafur Eliasson has made a piece that was presented earlier this week (actually, they called it a Public Inaugeration Ceremony. Whatever. It included champagne).




His installation consists of long pieces of glass(?) on the outside of the window, treated with a kind of foil or film that functions as a lens. A strong lightsource on the outside passes through the installation and is perceived as a spectre of colours on the inside. But it changes as you pass, so it has a nice interactive feel to it.

Up till now nobody has really noticed the installation (it´s been up for several weeks), because apparently there´s been some difficulties with the lighting. But they´ve definetely got it right now - it looked really nice, I think.

I only wonder what it will be like when the sun returns. The artist didn´t know himself, it seemed. The window faces north, so the only time the sun has approximately a similar angle on the installation is around midnight. When the building is empty.


It must be have been difficult introducing art into surroundings that look so amazing in themselves - the view towards Hiorthfjellet and the huge sky, and the architecture of the room in itself is hard to compete with. You could argue that the art-piece really is redundant.

But still, I like Eliasson´s art - I´ve never seen one of his works in real-life, but from the moment someone described his Weather Project with the gigantic "sun" in Tate Modern in London, I´ve been a fan.


He gave a talk about his ideas around the installation, about the relationship between light as we perceive it and real light, and how he wanted the installation to give associations to natural light-phenomena like the northern lights or a rainbow.

Listening to his talk gave me associations to being back at the art school in Bergen - I enjoyed it a lot! But I suppose I´ve become used to the confusing logic of art-production. I think, however, that a lot of the listeners were left more bewildered than enlightened...

Anyway - here´s his homepage. He´s a busy man.



PS: Let´s hope it doesn´t suffer the same destiny as a previous art-piece did, a sculpture made in 1995 by Paul Brand, that was removed quite brutally in 2005 when the new part of the building was planned, and then ended up on the tip on the mainland. I understand that it was supposed to transport water that would freeze and create an ice sculpture - but that it stopped working during the first winter, and never was repaired. The locals were not fond of it, and the whole incident is now treated as a joke. Too bad ...