National Day

National Day is Icelandic Independence Day, which is celebrated on the 17th of June. There are a lot of festivities going on:a parade,balloons,music,fireworks,crowded streets and plenty of food.

Below are some photos from today.

Art of Living

Urban Life

Bug's Life

Summery Day

The due date for the next review is coming close and closer, so today I had to go to the museum I’ve decided to write about and do some photos. It was such a lovely day – the sun was shining from the early morning, no clouds in the sky, no sharp wind. Perhaps that is why people were more talkative, more willing to smile and chat with one another.

I got acquainted with an elderly lady. I helped her with her walker when she arrived at the bus stop and gave her a sunny spot on the bench while waiting for the bus. We started to talk and naturally our conversation continued on the bus. She spoke in Icelandic; I tried my best to figure out what we were talking about and answered/asked occasional questions. (It is surprising how much you can understand and convey by listening carefully.) I found out that her name was Undur and she was 79 years old. She has 4 kids, 3 grandkids, and 2 grandchildren; some of them live in Iceland, some in Spain. She loves ballet and used to travel. She was going to her doctor appointment to check her hip and so on and so far.
She was such a sweetheart – petite, with curly short hair and blue lively eyes. She exuded such joy; it was such a pleasure talking with her that when we got off the bus, I strolled a bit more with her. We parted our way in Kringlan with hugs and kisses as if we knew each other for ages. I love such encounters – they stand on their own without any further development, as if their main function is just to brighten your day. Undur went to stroll around the mall, since she had some time before her doctor appointment and I went to the Asmundarsafn, Ásmundur Sveinsson Sculpture Museum. It was a splendid day to go there. The reason that I decided to write about this museum is simple – it is one of my favourite places in Reykjavik and it looks absolutely gorgeous in summer. The greenery of the trees plays against the white walls of the building, and blue sky serves as a wonderful backdrop. The sculptures scattered around in the garden come to live under the rays of the sun, and the inside space of the museum is lit with golden light coming from above. The shape of the building, sculpture garden outside, abundance of light inside, sparse placement of the sculptures, their angular upward movement – every time I come here I feel reenergized.

The sculptor, Ásmundur Sveinsson (1893 – 1982), was one of the pioneers of Icelandic sculpture. His creations vary from massive stone sculptures to pieces constructed out of iron and steel rods, from realistic figures to pure abstractions. The museum itself was his studio and living quarters, which he donated, along with his collection, to the City of Reykjavik. Below is my favourite work of his and you can see other photos here

Botanical Garden is not far away from the museum so I strolled there. It was filled with families strolling, picnicking, playing and feeding the ducks. Here is a little mound house, which perhaps is just a storage area, but looks like a house of the seven dwarfs.

On the way to the Botanical Gardens I passed by a man sleeping on the pavement. He just lay there with his left hand under his cheek and his right hand between his knees, a red bandana tied around the lower part of his face. I was tempted to come closer and check his pulse, but decided to do it on my way back. When I returned in a half hour or so he was gone, I guess his nap was finished.

I finished my day in Kringlan, browsing some stores and having solitary but, oh, so peaceful lunch. (The summer break is fun for the kids but sometimes it is nice to have a break from their summer break.)

Endless Light and Amusement

We entered the zone of endless light. Midnight feels like the middle of the day, and early morning - like noon. Since the usual sign of lateness - darkness- never really comes anymore, it is hard to keep track of time in the evening. The kids certainly use it to their advantage, and our sleeping patterns at the moment are odd.

Perhaps that was the reason that today for the first time I noticed two strange items on the menu of Jómfrúin, Danish restaurant at Lækjargata 4.

The Veterinarian's breakfast.

The Veterinarian's Supper.

Are Danish veterinarians particularly fond of liver pate or maybe they have to have rye bread and port aspic to carry them through the day?

The name of the restaurant "Jómfrúin" translates as "virgin", more precisely "female virgin" and its speciality are open-faced sandwiches or smørrebrod. Go figure the connection...

Art Festival (continued)

Selected images from the Art Festival:

"Atlantis" by Tea Makipaa and Halldor Ulfarsson. It is dropped in the water of the Tjornin Lake in the center of Reykjavik.

"SMART" by Andrea Maack. Blow-out of the pencil drawing, accompanying her perfume.



Unknown (for me) artist. Was too tired to ask question or search for explanations, so just snap a photo.


Paul Armand Getter "Tribute to Death." The story behind these creations - the "portrait" is the image of a young woman who died young. The sculpture piece in front of it is the lava rock from Iceland, smeared in the strawberry juice and sprinkled with rose petals(the latter was done by the artist and his two assistants as a performance.)




"Melting lava" by Halldor Asgeirsson

"Landscape" by Ernesto Neto. He is well known Brazilian artist, who creates abstract installations from stretchable nylon. His other pieces that I discovered on the I-net are very interesting - due to the size and colouring, this one - not so much.

"Never again" by Monica Bonvicini. It was a pity that I didn't manage to make photos with people rocking on these "chairs."

Art Festival

It is the Art Festival time in Reykjavik. It was officially opened yesterday and will continue till June 5th. There will be exhibitions, performances and concert programs. For almost a week before this event all major art galleries and museums were closed to public in preparation for the big opening. Today their doors were finally opened to the viewers. My friend and I hit all the major openings. In the course of the evening we:

• Saw a young artist presenting her perfume; work of an elderly French gentleman, who, quoting his wife, is “obsessed with rocks, lava and women”; witnessed the attempt to melt lava, which almost ended up in an explosion after the artist accidentally set the cord connecting a blowtorch with a gas tank on fire; viewed an environmental exhibition “Endangered water”; poked an abstract installation made from stretchy nylon material, two part of which were balanced with 12 kg of lava stones and round pebbles; rocked in a hammock –like structures, and enjoyed the calming light of the candle.

• Became convinced that most of the galleries prefer to keep their art offerings as mysterious as possible, and refuse to put titles anywhere near the exhibited pieces.

• Discovered that some galleries offer champagne and sodas, some - stick to beer, and some offer the most unfortunate selection of wine. I suspect that free drinks are the major attraction of the Art Festival.

• Noticed that Icelanders tend to stop and talk in the most inconvenient places, regardless if they on the way or not. (Perhaps the previous point explains this peculiar habit.)

• Voted that the most entertaining show of all is people watching and the best place for it is the National Art Gallery.

The most surprising event of the evening – meeting with Doctor Ruth. Apparently, she is a special guest of the Art Festival and will give a talk on Sunday in the Reykjavik Art Museum. I am not sure what surprised me most - the fact that she was chosen as a special guest of the art festival in Iceland, the fact that I recognized her or the fact that she will give a talk in the art museum.

Now and Then

Writing about Hallgrimskirkja church and its architect, Guðjón Samúelsson, made me want to find more of his work around Reykjavík. Today I was in one of the building that was designed by him - the National Gallery of Iceland. To be more precise, the building that now is occupied by the National Gallery of Iceland was designed by him. Back in 1916 it was designed for storing ice for the fishing company Herðubreið. Later it was turned into a dance hall, and successfully functioned in this capacity until the fire (1971) wrecked it. In 1972 it was bought to house the National Gallery. Of course, it went through the major reconstruction but the new building was modeled on the older one. And thus it went – from storing ice to storing the collection of art work.

Funny bit of today – the conversation took place in a kiosk where you can buy tickets or monthly passes for the buses.

- I would like to buy 10 children tickets, please.
- No. (Silence)
- Why not?
- You cannot do this. (Silence)

- Why?
- You cannot buy 10 children tickets, you have to buy twenty.

Hallgrimskirkja Church and the Art Contest

On the photo you can see Hallgrímskirkja church. It is one of the tallest building in Reykjavík and you can see it from everywhere. On a clear day you can see it even from Hafnafjörður, where we live and which is more than 30 km away from Reykjavík. It took 34 years (1940-1974) to build this church and its architect, Guðjón Samúelsson, died before it was finished. The name of the church honours the Icelandic poet Reverend Hallgrímur Pétursson. I am not particularly taken by its design but you cannot help but admire its grandeur. It became our orienteer in Reykjavik, as I imagine it is for a thousand of tourists who pass through the city.

Perhaps that was the reason why my older son chose to draw it for the FS art contest. I am really impressed with his determination – he chose what he wanted to draw, printed and filled in the entry form and was sure to finish his drawing before his father’s departure to the States.

And, here is the the finished project:

He certainly deserves kudos for trying.

Search For Artists and Dinner Invitation

I have just returned from the opening of the Streymið – La Durée exhibition in the National Art Gallery. It is the exhibition of the three artists – – Emmanuelle Antille, from Switzerland, Gabríela Friðriksdóttir and Guðny Rósa Ingimarsdóttir, from Iceland. For me there are two reasons to go to an opening of an art exhibition – first, to take a glimpse at it, in order to decide if I would like to write about it, and second, to make a contact with an artist, if possible, or if an artist is unavailable, with a curator. An art exhibition in Iceland is a puzzle – in most of the cases, you know nothing about thea artist, there is not a lot of information, even helpful titles are often missing or extremely hard to locate. So, it is crucial to have somebody who will be able to confirm your guesses.

Knowing all the above, I searched the internet for every bit of information (in English) about the artists of the Streymið exhibition, and by today felt more or less prepared to face their work. The opening was at eight in the evening and the crowd was buzzing on the first floor of the gallery starting from seven thirty. Due to the age of the artists, they all are in their mid thirties, and close connection of one of them with Björk, there were a lot of hip and trendy personalities there. I wished I could have done a series of photos “Guests of the exhibit”: the make-up, the choices of styles and colours begged to be immortalized. Plus, how often you can see a young man with heavily contoured eyes, skinny jeans, and a la eighties hair speaking with a proper, silver-haired lady?

It was endlessly entertaining to watch people but I tried to spot the artists. You think they would be introduced during the opening ceremony, but no such luck. The layout of the exhibition gave me some hints: the first floor was devoted to the work of Emmanuelle Antille, on the second floor, a hall on the left – to the work of Garbríela Friðriksdóttir, and a hall on the right – to the work of Guðný Rósa Ingimarsdóttir. It was logical to think that artists will be located near their work.

It was not hard to figure out Emmanuelle, she wore an uncomfortable look of a person who felt out of place in the sea of knowing each other people. I came up to her and hesitantly asked, “Emmanuelle?” Things went smoothly from here – after introduction and figuring out that she would be leaving tomorrow morning, I just got her email.

Then it was time to find the star of the show, a highly publicized Garbríela Friðriksdóttir. She represented Iceland at the Venice Biennale in 2005, created a video for one of the Bjork’s songs, published a book, so overall the Icelanders are very proud of her. It wasn't difficult to find information about her but I found only one photo, which wasn’t the best quality. We (my friend and I) looked at her creations, keeping attention on the crowd as well. Soon I detected a swirl of people, congregated around one particlular person. She was stationary while everybody else was moving towards her and exchanged kisses and pleasantries. She looked similar to the photo I have found on the internet. Using a break in the flow of the crowd, I made a bee-line towards her – my guess was almost right, she appeared to be a sister of the artist and I got a contact information from her. It is a pleasure talking to people here - as long as you are willing to make a first move.

Two out of three under 30 minutes in the crowd of Icelanders, not bad at all.

The third hall didn’t reveal anybody close to the photo of Guðný Rósa – there were similar looking women, but they were either too old or too young. After looking through her work we went to the first floor. There, standing among the crowd and sipping, finally, wine, I saw a woman in her thirties, who looked like she could have been her. Feeling slightly silly because of all my detective work, I approached her and she was indeed who I thought she was. Considering that she lives in Belgium, leaving Iceland on Sunday morning, and recently changed her email address, it was very lucky for me to find her.

My goal was accomplished and here comes an unexpected bonus. While we were getting ready to leave, I noticed a very friendly, slightly tipsy woman in her fifties, who had offered her assistance in finding one of the artists not long ago. (I knew she worked in the gallery because I spoke with her on Wednesday and she was very sweet and helpful) I stopped to say “good-bye” and “thank you”. She was thrilled to hear that I found everybody I wanted to speak with and after some questions invited me for dinner. Considering that I didn’t know her name and that we saw each other only once before, the following conversation was hilarious.

- Would you like to come to dinner one day?
- Yes, sure, this can be nice. (I got my card and offered it to her)
- My husband is a very good cook, what would you like him to cook for you?

Her husband appeared. She, reading my name from the card:

- Darling, this is Victoria, I invited her for dinner. Ask her what she would like to eat.

I tried to mention that perhaps they should think about dinner invitation, its date and time. She, without paying attention to it:

- We have a beautiful apartment on the seventh floor, gorgeous view; dinner will be great.

(Her husband)
– Yes, it would be good. How about Sunday? Let me write our address in you little black book.

(Mercifully, besides address and time, he wrote their names without surname though, no telephone number also).

- Great, dinner than.

So, what do you think, a dinner invitation from sweet but tipsy strangers, will they successfully forget about it tomorrow morning or should I worry about offending them by not showing up?

And they said the Icelanders are distant.

A glance from the street.

Horror Movie Material

Now, with snow all melted and rain asserted itself, it is overwhelmingly grey here. Its quiet rustle in the middle of February creates an illusion of spring. I hope the temperature will not plummet overnight; it will be way too slippery then.

Due to the cold that went through our household like an avalanche, we missed all the excitement of the Festival of Light. Perhaps we will catch it next year. Considering that it is a week of school break, the timing of the cold is rather inconvenient.

Yesterday the rain wasn’t so persistent, it stopped from time to time, and since everybody felt more or less well, we went downtown. The goal was simple – to get out of the house, finally!

We stopped at Tjörnin Lake to feed ducks. They are so used to being fed that they simply approach anybody who slow down and soundly demand treats. The way they go at you with determination and open beaks feels somewhat threatening. It can be a good start for a horror movie. It will open up with a peaceful shot of the lake – bright sun sparkling water – swans are gliding, sounds of laughter echoing from the water. A tourist approaches a lake and stopped at the bank enchanted by its beauty. He did several shots, all of them you will see through his camera. Then he crouched down to take a better shot of the swans. You’ll see several more scenes through his camera; suddenly a big eye filled the whole screen. (A duck is looking at him through his lenses). Startled, the tourist fell down. The camera will move away, so you can see the scene from afar. The area is completely covered with grey army of ducks and the poor guy is rapidly disappearing under it. The last shot will be peaceful water of the lake again - no laughter now, just silence. What will be the title? Dark Secrets of the Lake.

Fancy that – a simple “get out of the house” turned into horror movie material.

Sleepless Rambling

I read an interesting article about Iceland in one of the last issues of “The Week”. Actually it is a fragment from Eric Weiner’s book “The Geography of Bliss: One Grump’s Search for the Happiest Places In the World”, which was published in January, 2008 and I haven’t read.

In this particular piece the author visited Iceland (in the depth of winter and flying from Florida, no less) trying to figure out why it consistently ranks as one of the happiest countries in the world. After mentioning some obvious things about Iceland – the darkness, close (often genetically) relationships between people, a comfortable compactness of Reykjavik, he chooses to concentrate on exceptional creativity of the city and explores possible reasons behind it. He notices the same phenomenon that keeps awing me – there is no creative elite here, art is produced and enjoyed by everyone. From author’s conversation with Lárus Johannnesson, an owner of a small music store and a recording label, two other things surfaced – lack of envy and lack of a stigma to failure.

If there is no envy and you don’t afraid to fail, your create impulse goes into trying. Logical, yet, so hard to achieve.

Our backyard at four in the morning. In the absence of camera I use my cell phone and the photo turned out black and white.

Öskudagur and Winter Lights Festival

As I mentioned before today is Öskudagur (Ash Wednesday), which is celebrated here by dressing up in costumes (a la Halloween) and gathering candies from the stores. It was interesting to see - monsters, princesses, young pop-stars, knights and dinosaurs were stomping the streets in small groups, getting into every store on their way. The stores were well prepared for the visitors and graciously distributed candies in exchange for songs. There were a lot of lovely little choruses today and some adults tried to get candies by singing too.

I am not sure if the schools were closed for such occasion but I spotted first dressed up youngsters at 9:30 in the morning. I regret not having my camera with me but it started to devour batteries with such greed that it is impossible to keep up with its appetite. (There is always a silver lining though - I ordered a new camera this weekend, which suppose to be one of the best in its range.) The boys dressed in costumes for the school celebration but didn't have any interest to go trick-or-treating at the stores, which agreed with me just fine.

I discovered that starting tomorrow and finishing on Sunday Reykjavik will be celebrating Winter Lights Festival, which suppose "to stimulate and enliven the city life in mid-winter." It was also said that "all the major institutions of culture and education participate in the Festival and sports clubs, galleries, artists, shops, restaurants and many more join in the fun." Now I am intrigued and determined to find "the fun". Perhaps Icelanders guard the secret of "fun” because so far all my searches and inquiries led me to only one event "The Museum Night." It will be held this Friday starting at 19:00. On "Museum Night" all the museums are opened until 1 a.m. and “conduct educational and fun activities.” (No, they didn't care to elaborate). The only way to know for sure is to attend the event and that what I will do on Friday evening.

P.S. Will you look at this link - it has a very impressive and detailed list of events for whole four days of the Festival. It will take me a while to understand it but I have to practice my Icelandic.

Icelandic Magic

Today the Reykjavik Art museum had the opening of the Sámal Joensen Mikines exhibition, the most famous artist of Faeroe Islands. (The Faeroe Islands are a group of islands in Northern Europe, between the Norwegian Sea and the North Atlantic Ocean). Since I am thinking of writing about this exhibition, I was eager to go. The notion of the President of Iceland opening the exhibit was enticing, so with my friend for moral support we took off.

We arrived at Kjarvalsstaðir about 20 minutes before the official opening and found the crowd big enough to fill the space between the East and West wings of the museum. There were ladies in furs, and elderly gentlemen in suits, there were jeans clad beauties and jeans clad, down to earth, hippie types, there were several kids weaving their ways in the sea of legs. Everybody seems to know each other and greetings and little reunions were popping up here and there.

After about 10 minutes of people watching, I decided to figure out who is who here. By now I don’t feel silly asking questions and stop worrying about what people would think of me, thus I marched straight to the receptionist desk and inquired if she knew a curator of the exhibit and if so could she, please, point him out for me. A young girl, an art student as I later found out, she didn’t know the curator but kindly pointed out the son of the artist for us. We took the opportunity to speak with him. It was his first time in Iceland and he was very proud and satisfied with his father's exhibition, but sometimes felt lost in the midst of the Icelandic language speakers. Familiar feeling. There were so many questions to ask but it was the time for the opening ceremony.

As we stood there listening to the speeches in Icelandic and guessing the general outlines by familiar names, words and geographical locations, I kept wondering how many foreigners were there in the crowd. It was only logical that the Director of the Museum and the President spoke in Icelandic, and sort of logical that there were not any translations, but the fact that the son of the artist was left all alone without anybody translating to him was odd. The funniest part came when the representative of the Faeroe Islands spoke in Faroese. I looked around and saw blank expressions on the people’s faces but the artist’s son was happily nodding in delight.

Finally, the doors to the hall flung open and the crowd flowed inside. I am clearly spoiled by having halls of the museums all by myself during my daytime tours, so it was difficult for me to concentrate there. Plus, by now, people took advantage of free refreshments –the gestures grew wider and wilder.

There was a lot to take in there - the colours varied from somber black to gentle shades of green; the scenes went from whale hunting to a dancing frenzy. As we navigated our way through the crowd I kept wishing that we would find somebody who can explain a little more about the layout of the exhibit. The pictures were not in chronological order and the only visible logic was that one of the rooms was solely devoted to the portraits. I went for the front desk again and it started the unique Icelandic magic – the receptionist brought in the Director of the Museum; after brief introductions, the latter introduced us to the curator and in a minute ….we were having a personal tour of the exhibit.

It doesn’t cease to surprise me how approachable people are here, how open to questions, how ready to share their knowledge. And the best thing – you never know where a simple visit to the gallery or question at the reception desk will lead you.

Insomnia and Flickr

It is one of those, drained off energy days preceded by the sleepless night. Early morning evaporated in a blink of an eye and before long it was time to rush out of the door. During my Icelandic lesson, first one after two weeks break, I discovered that my basic vocabulary evaporated as well. After the lesson, with an hour or so to spare, I found myself in the midst of a lunch crowd. Groups of people were dashing about, diving into and out of the restaurants, all preoccupied with appeasing of their hunger. I sought a refugee in the city library and ended up in the Museum of Photography, which happened to be in the same building. It is truly surreal experience to visit museums in the middle of winter here. You get in and find yourself one on one with an exhibition. No distractions -just you, photos and the echo of your steps. I flew into Zen-like detachment and for a brief moment seriously considered to stretch out on the smooth inviting wooden floor and take a nap. I bet I would not have the slightest problem to fall asleep there, surrounding by colourful images. But I will never know, since the proper part of me promptly nipped the impulse in the bud and reminded me to get out my camera and make some photos. Hm, I guess my proper part isn't very sane, because I was doing photos of photos. "Flickr Era - Digital Horizons "exhibition was on display. It gathered works of Icelandic photographers who have had their photos on Flickr.

So, dear friends, please consider to use this site, your photos may end up in a museum too.

About Art, Again

I am taking revenge for two weeks being cooped at home due to the holiday season, school break and bad weather by basking in the inexhaustible art scene of Reykjavik. Today I stopped at Hafnarhús to see the exhibition of one of the Iceland’s leading conceptual artists Hreinn Friðfinnsson. The variety of the media he works with is remarkable – there are photos and notes, installations and drawings, glass and cardboard, wood and fabric. The first image meeting you at the entrance is a hand reflecting in the mirror. The label reads “So far”. My mind immediately answered “only so far you can reach”. Right next to it is a vertical raw of tear – shaped crystals, simply named “16 drops.” In the next room you are faced with a white and black photo of a man standing in a darkened room. He stands in profile to a viewer; his hands caught a splash of colours – red, green and purple. The work is untitled. On the same wall in complete contrast you see a cardboard box, brightly coloured inside and titled “Sanctuary”. There is a left shoe on the floor, mirrored to show its mate, named "Pair"; there is a “Beauty Mark” made of small black felt circle lying lonely on the windowsill, there are mirrors on the floor that make glass jars whole or doubled. All these pieces seemingly thrown together without any particular order create an enchanted universe, where objects reflecting in the mirrors, start living their own life; old legends, caught on photos and papers, inviting you for a journey; everyday objects looked delightfully odd and their unexpected placement made you smile. A catalog itself can be read like a poetry “For Light, Shadow and Dust”, “Afterthought”, “Element of Doubt”, “Lightening and Thunder”, “Seven times”. The artist seems to be playing with a notice that everything can be turned into art. His humour denies conventional thinking, opens up minds. For some it can be tough to take - as I was strolling around, admiring the author’s creativity, I saw a young man coming in, making a quick spin around, shaking his head and leaving with an expression of puzzlement on his face. I think about bringing the kids here, it would be interesting to see their reaction, to talk afterwards.

All images in this post are courtesy o f the internet.

On completely unrelated topic, I got my first rejection letter. I view it as a good sign, since I finally gathered a courage to submit some of my writing, which is a big step forward.

Now You See It, Now You Don't...*

I went today on my weekly pilgrimage to Reykjavik for a much needed breath of big city air. The initial plan was to visit my beloved sculpture garden and then go to the Museum of Photography. While the bus was passing Miklatun Park, a big sign “Free admission to Art Museum” caught my attention; on a whim I got off.

I wandered into Kjavrvalsstaðir and glanced into a big exhibition hall. “How strange," I thought, "There is nothing there besides white canvases”. A small exhibit of “Meditation on furniture” was on display in the corridor, so I started there. It was ok but not grabbing. I stepped into the big hall again. Suddenly, I noticed faces emerging from the white fog of the paintings. I was surrounded by smiling, blue-eyed blondes, most of them crowned with tiaras. All the portraits were exactly the same size; all had the white background; all used only the palest shades of grey, yellow and white. Standing alone in the midst of the fading faces, I felt utterly, completely fascinated, and a bit disturbed by their piercing stares. It was the “Blonde Miss World 1951“ exhibition featuring the portraits of all the winners of Miss World beauty pageants since the competition was launched in 1951. The artist, Birgir Snæbjörn Birgisson, is known for his style of painting on the white canvas with transparent colours and also for painting only blondes. His other work include a “Blonde Nurses Series” and “Blond Heads – Nordic Race”. I don’t know what is behind his “absence of colour” and loyalty to blondes – spiritual or racial pureness- but it is an interesting exhibition.

This is how the exhibition looks from the first glance, you can see the mystery unfold here.


*This is a quote from Mika Hannula, the curator of the exhibit.

Amazing Fireworks

I am still dazzled by the firework display of previous night. Our balcony was a perfect spot to view it in fully glory since we could see what was going on in Hafnarfjöður and further away in Reykjavik. It looked like people bought all available types of firework and was determined to use them up. Considering that original purpose of fireworks on the New Year Eve was to scare the bad forces from entering the New Year, I think we are pretty safe now, not even a miniscule evil shadow could have sneak in. There were colourful rockets, slicing the air with threatening sounds; mines, throwing stars and flaming balls high with hissing noise; cascading walls of sparks and flames. The sky was painted with dazzling showers of silver and gold stars, green, red, yellow flowers blossomed up high; and the air was filled with humming, screeching, banging sounds and smoke. It was brilliant.
Unfortunately all our attempts to catch it on camera were futile, so for visual effect I found are some nice photos of firework display here.

Everything for the Best

About a month ago I picked up a brochure from National Museum of Iceland. It described December events there, all closely connected with Christmas of course. Right after “The Yule Lads Coming Visiting” program in Icelandic the similar, as I thought, event was listed but in English. Today I took the kids to the museum and what did I find? It was a lecture of a university professor on Icelandic Yule, which is a winter festival, not Yule Lads. A lesson for me – READ THINGS CAREFULLY!

The boys were upset until I lured them into the museum’s café for hot coco and croissants. Since the weather was very mild today, no rain showers or wicked gusts of wind, we decided to stroll towards downtown. We went around Tjörnin Lake and found out that part of the path that circled it was pure ice. There was nobody there besides us, so we started to skate to our heart content. I forget how much fun it is – run to gain a momentum, slide … and enjoy the essence of movement. Pure joy!

Here is my treasure for today – beautiful colours of sky and water.

Cats

Here is something that I haven’t mentioned before despite it was being one of the first thing that we encountered in Iceland. Cats, cats, cats. Black cats, and orange cats, white cats and multi-coloured cats, they all wonder freely around town – all with collars adorned with little bells, never going too far away from their neighborhoods. They have some complicated divisions of their territories, if one enters the domain of another cat too frivolously; it is bound to be a fight.

For the first 5 weeks we lived in Reykjavik near Miklatun Park. On the first day getting out of our apartment we were greeted by a friendly orange cat. It readily came close and openly enjoyed out attention. It strolled with us for a while but then went its own way. This cat, the kids called it “our cat” and gave it a name “Kokomojok” (their interpretation of kokomjolk, chocolate milk), always met us near the house and often escorted us for a short distance.

We haven’t yet acquired any cat that we consider “ours” in Hafnarfjöður. We have a variety of them here unexpectedly appearing out of the rocks and playfully joining us on our walks.

I found out that most of the cats live in homes but some of them made their residence in the libraries. Also, though such widespread superstition as “a black cat crossing the road brings bad luck” doesn’t seem to be a concern here, the Icelanders have a legend of a Christmas Cat. It reminds everybody to buy new clothes for Christmas.

Start Art

These words “Start Art” can be a motto of Reykjavik or Iceland in general. Art in every form is welcome here – be it a little gnome placed in the rocks near the house, graffiti on the wall of the building, paintings, sculptures or unusual design of the house. My impression is that the artist’s goal here is self-expression, sharing of the free flowing ideas while gaining recognition and commercial success being secondary, sort of a nice bonus.
Since Iceland is a relatively young country, you will encounter mostly contemporary art here. What I find most appealing about it – is its openness to interpretation.
You are not led to conclusion, told what to think but left to make your own thinking. Since there aren’t any canons, rigid rules in contemporary art, there is no comparison just free falling, liking or disliking. Through this the art serves the most authentic of its purposes – to open a person’s mind to something new, to stretch its limits.
The most enchanting quality of most galleries here and Start Art in particular, is that there isn’t any attempt on being grand; it is simple, humble and inviting. One hall is devoted to experiment with different textures (fur, wax, metal); the works in the other room draw on popularity of “hidden” people and enchanted stones, the clothes designs are on display in the third one. This gallery is a collaboration of seven artists, whose styles are different from each other but it is very heartwarming when one of them greet you at the door with: “You have to see the works on the second floor; I would never have thought to come up with such idea”.

Ability to wonder, acceptance of new – the start of art.