Nordic Reach

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Surreal Jewelery

Sigurd Bronger of Norway makes rings, brooches and necklaces that look perfectly at home on display in a museum or art gallery.

How About a Room Full of Nothing?

The concept of Finnish designers Aamu Song and Johan Olin from Company (featured in a recent issue of Nordic Reach) is undoubtedly "futuristic." They have created a hotel without rooms, and without doors or walls between each personal sleeping area. When the guest arrives at "Canopy Village," they creep into their personal space, a cocoon-like bubble below the floor. Sitting in your personal container, your head (and your shoulders, depending upon your height) are above the floor, allowing yo...

Hot Docs From Up North

Documentary films have in recent years achieved unprecedented glory and success in the United States. Michael Moore's "Fahrenheit 9/11" not only was named best picture at the 2004 Cannes Film Festival, but also made big bucks at the box office. "Bowling for Columbine" attracted a large audience to theatres nationwide, and crystallized a lively debate about violence in schools. Similarly, the documentary "Super Size Me" was yet another U.S. documentary that became a global hit: That orgy of on...

Bingo for Moderna Museet

Pontus Hultén, one of the world's most brilliant museum personalities, has decided to donate his private collection to Stockholm's Moderna Museet. Any contemporary art museum in the world would have been delighted to receive the donation, which includes approximately 700 works by Constantin Brancusi, Salvador Dalí, Marcel Duchamp, Max Ernst, Sam Francis, Jasper Johns, Roy Lichtenstein, Kasimir Malevitj, Claes Oldenburg, Robert Rauschenberg, Niki de Saint Phalle, Jean Tinguely, Andy Warhol and...

Land of Light

I recommend a visit to nearby Râbjerg Mile, the largest shifting sand dune in Northern Europe. One can easily imagine that one is Lawrence of Arabia on the hilly dunes, and they are a great place to fly a kite because of the ever-present wind. The dunes are close to [Skagen]'s Grenen, a steadily expanding finger of beach at the very top of Northern Jutland where one can stand with one foot in two different seas, the Skagerrak and Kattegat. The most famous artist in this group was Denmark's P....

Scandinavian in New York

How do you work? Well, I am a stonemason, so it's very physical. It's dirty and hard. A bit like war and peace actually! With my work in stone, it's all about taking away material, about reducing and freeing something that's inside the stone. So I used to always have pre-conceived concepts about what I wanted to do, I am beginning to change this, though. With my painting and when I work in clay, I let it just grow. Because that's not there yet, the way something in stone is. It's more about l...

Götheborg Sails Again

The Vikings are back at sea, and this time they come in peace. Some 500 years after Scandinavians first explored North America and more than 200 years after Sweden declined as a world power, a new ship is embarking on a goodwill voyage meant to recreate a bit of Swedish history. The tall ship Götheborg left Sweden in October on a two-year odyssey that will take it across the Atlantic, Indian and Pacific oceans before she reaches her final destination in China. The original Götheborg sank myst...

Sophisticated Suburban Simplicity

[Rahel Belatchew Lerdell] knows and understands the concepts and principles of the 20(th) century Modernist movement and smoothly incorporates them into her distinctive design. With the completion of the house, Rahel has successfully synthesized the elements of the Bauhaus philosophy: Use of visual space and light; Use of the landscape to support the house; traditional indigenous materials, and the functional simplicity in the interior scheme. Rahel says she does have an overall good feeling ...

Maestro of Comedy

There's something very likeable about Magnus Mårtensson. Although tall and impressive under a mop of curly blond hair, he radiates joviality. He is funny, too. Perhaps funny adds a certain likeable charm. When Mårtensson performed his Victor Borgesque act at New York's Swedish Seamen's Church some months ago, the entire room tilted over and fell into his lap: The audience loved him. "I wrote my own comedies up to 9th grade," says Mårtensson as I catch up with him at Scandinavia House in New Y...

Crime in Icelandic

"We were looking for the next Henning Mankell," said St. Martin's Press Editor Marcia Markland. "And I think we found him! [Indridason] is very, very good." Joining Indridason at St. Martin's Press was Iceland's president Olafur Ragnar Grimsson who had reason to be proud of his subject.

Life As a Foreign Student

"I study church music here. I have already passed the church musician program at the Geijer School in Sweden," says Kajsa. "It's definitely more difficult to study here. Some of it might be because of the language."

Bringing Dorothy Parker Home

"It feels like I am finally at home with my show," said musical artist Sara Jangfeldt. "After all, New York City was Dorothy Parker's stomping ground." Enough Rope became an instant success and Jangfeldt has performed it -- in the same intimate milieu and with the same three musicians -- at Stockholm's Stadsteater, the Gothenburg Opera, the Gothenburg Stadsteater, in Moscow, and Capri."

Scandinavian Churches Welcomes New Pastors

From the earliest days of the first Scandinavians in the new land of America, it was the church that was the strongest institution for the colonists. As early as five years after the landing on the banks of the Delaware the first Governor of "New Sweden" Johan Printz had a chapel built for the colonists. To this day, churches are as important as centers not so much of worship as for social gatherings among expatriate Scandinavians.

Armchairs Fit for a President...Or a Princess

Crown Princess Victoria has been actively engaged in promoting Swedish design abroad, according to Anna Rygârd, project leader of Design Year 2005, "and it feels totally right to have this armchair in the Royal Palace."

Elegant Entrance to House of Sweden

One large glass wall, which will be about 3 meters tall, will be decorated in an "ice flower" pattern designed by Râman. Exactly opposite to this striking work, separated by a dark granite floor with a stripe pattern evocative of a typical Swedish rag-rug, will be a glass wall with water running down it like a curtain in slow, wave-like movements.

Bobo Stenson: A Life in Jazz

"I started playing the piano when I was five," says [Bobo Stenson], "back home in Västerås." His was a musical family, yet becoming a musician didn't really enter Stenson's mind.

Nordic Unity - Myth or Reality?

"The Finns have a very good knowledge of us, but we don't know as much about them," says diplomat Claes Jernaeus, head of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs international press room. The senior diplomat observes that if one asks a Swedish intellectual to name 20 contemporary American or British novelists, they would have no trouble with the task, "but they could probably only name one or two each from Finland, Norway and Denmark. Our interest in our Nordic neighbors is less than it should be, wh...

Tidbits

Founded in March 2004 by Erik Wachtmeister, 50, the son of a Swedish ambassador to the United States, this exclusive assembly aims to become the world's "leading global social-networking community." In order to join, one has to be invited. But in order to be invited, at least five existing members have to recommend you. But belonging to this ritzy fraternity has its advantages. To celebrate the one-year anniversary of the company, a party was staged in St. Tropez attended by Paris and Nicky H...

Raf: 'Here We Go Again'

[Johan Renck]'s love for independent artists has to do with his love of good music. Good music, rather than the size of the artist, determines whether or not he'll do a video. The fact is, that he himself was a pop star at the height of indie-pop during the 90's. He was, under the alias Stakka Bo, on most top-ten lists in Europe, even climbing the US charts with the album Supermarket and the dance hit Here We Go Again. But Renck was known even before that, as a trendsetter in Stockholm's inne...

Rockabilly Rebels

An exhibit called "Rockabilly Rebels" was shown this fall in Stockholm's House of Culture (Kulturhuset). In the exhibit we see 16 images of people in the Rockabilly scene which were taken by Swedish photographer Daniel Sahlberg. Hot rod cars are one key element of Rockabilly, and it was in that context the photographer first made contact with the subculture.

Made in Scandinavia

Jockum Nordström, the "Artist of the Year" in New York for the 2005 Armory Show, has adopted an unusual new wearable canvas for his latest work. Pencil drawings of sailboats and small birds are featured on a collection of men and women's underwear launched in September by Whyred, a fashion firm based in Stockholm. The 100 percent cotton underwear decorated with Nordström's designs is the first in a series of collaborations planned between Whyred and contemporary artists. The artsy briefs will...

Heaven in Helsinki

About half a year earlier, [Silvio Berlusconi] had boasted that Parma, Italy was selected as host of the EU's new food authority, rather than archrival Helsinki, because of the superior quality of Italian food. The Italian leader complained that in order to win support from other European countries, he had to first "endure" Finnish food. French President Jacques Chirac, presumably incited by the wit of his Italian counterpart, added fuel to the fire a few weeks later by suggesting that the on...

Swedish Summerhouse Retreat

"Relaxing in the bathroom looking out on to the sunny landscape and seeing the reflected light shining in is an everyday pleasure," he says. Also, in both of his studios, [Olle Andersson] was very careful when calculating the exterior views and sun angles during the different light phases of the summer months. Andersson notes that "at a certain time every day, a blue `light painting' will appear on a white wall in the studio, created by the sun reflecting through cobalt blue drinking glasses....

Dining with Queen Christina at Grythyttan

The name of the Swedish 17th century village Grythyttan refers to a place where pots are made, since "gryta" means pot, and "hytta" is a smelting-house or foundry. The only problem with this perfectly reasonable-sounding linguistic theory is that, as far as the historians know, no pots have ever been made in Grythyttan! Don't be surprised if you see the Swedish Prime Minister or various other celebrities strolling by outside your window as you enjoy your meal at Grythyttan Inn. This is a very...

New York Students to Attend Nobel Festivities

Three New York City high school students left for Sweden for a weeklong, all-expense paid trip December 6 to attend the Nobel Prize Award Ceremony, the world-famous Nobel Banquet and related activities.

Frank Brunner: Watery Reflections 45°

New York destinations such as the Brooklyn Botanical Garden, the sculptural garden of MoMA, and the front of the Metropolitan Museum. The surface of the paintings has been worked over and over, revealing the relationship with nature, art, and people. Objects such as tossed coins and debris create a three-dimensional experience. The reflections are seen upside-down, and that's also how [Frank Brunner] paints them.

Agneta Nilsson, Siri Eliason and Ambassador Jan Eliasson

[Agneta Nilsson], the founder of SWEA, the Swedish Women's Educational Association, was the recipient of the Great Swedish Heritage Award. Few people have done more to promote Swedish culture and traditions in America than Mrs. Nilsson. Established in 1979, SWEA is now a global organization for Swedish and Swedish speaking women with 8,000 members in 76 chapters in 33 countries. Its mission is to cultivate and nurture the Swedish language, to support and spread Swedish culture and traditions,...

Led Zeppelin and Gergiev Win Polar Music Prizes

The British band and Russian conductor Valery Gergiev on Monday were named winners of the 2006 Polar Music Prize. The award was founded in 1989 by Stig Anderson, manager of Swedish pop group ABBA, through a donation to The Royal Swedish Academy of Music.

A Touch Danish

"When I lived in Denmark as an Ambassador, I hardly got to meet real Danes," says [John Loeb Jr.]. "But there was this gallery owner, Jakob Asbæk, who had events at his gallery every Saturday. I began going there, buying some contemporary Danish paintings." "I think I have helped, in a small way, to get people to look at Danish art," says Loeb. That kind of promotion has not gone unnoticed; the Danish American Society chose Loeb as their "2005 Man of the Year".

Talented Scandinavians Awarded

The American Scandinavian Society in New York granted awards to some well-deserved people in the Arts, who show skill, talent, promise, and are connected to Scandinavia.