Oslo's new modern art museum

 

 

Oslo is about to see the opening of an stunning building that will host a new contemporary art gallery.  It is stunning and the photographs above do not do justice to this exercise of grand imagination. 

This is the idea he delivered:

The building was conceived by the reknown architect Renzo Piano who of course was one of the architects of the Pompidou Center (a seminal building back in the 1970s).  No point in listing all the beauty his mind has created.  Recently, he has reshaped the London skyline with The Shard: Europe's tallest building.

This is the website: http://afmuseet.no/en/hjem

The official name is Fearnley Astrup Museum...

Let's face it: the name is not that catchy it, is it? 

I love unforgettable uber-cool names such as the "The Tate",  "The MoMa" or "The Met" even "The Shard".

Two philanthropic foundations established by descendants of the Fearnley shipping family funded the Gallery in 1993 (hence the name) and the collection's focus has been American artists from the 1980s, but more recently it has gone for a more international orientation.

This year the museum moved to the new buildings by Renzo Piano. 

One you enter and go to the end of one of the corridors (first photograph) you reach a balcony and see a relaxing urban beach.  A spot which will never be alone once the rest of the city discovers it. 

Then you walk outside and go the sculpure park where you see the sculpture by Louise Bourgeoise that I mentioned earlier.

Louise Bourgeois's Eyes in Oslo

Louise is one of the most talented and intriguing artist and sculpturist of the last century.

This is the first time I could touch her work.

"Eyes"

The rebellious spirit of my artistic heroes, Louise Bourgeois (France 1911-New York 2010) has come to Oslo in the form of her sculptures.  A pair of "Eyes" se decided. The sculpture has now been acquiered for a sculpture park outside Oslo's newest and most exciting modern art museum.  I will write a separate entry.

The eye is a recurring motif in Surrealism. It was used with a dual purpose: as a symbol for the act of perception and as an allusion to female sexual anatomy. 

Her art and her life fascinate me. She was almost 99 years old when she died.

For decades the world ignored her. But she kept working. Then one day someone discovered her. She was nearly in her seventies. And have kept working! She continued being an artist until her nineties.  The videos I have seen about her are not only exciting from an artistic standpoint (she did what?! and she said what?!) but also inspiring and appealing in terms of truth and self-belief.  She never stopped believing in her work. Others would have given up.

But in the end she prevailed.

And this new artistic venture in Oslo is the latest example: her sculpture was one of the first ones to be placed in the garden outside the magnificent Astrup Fearnley Museum that will open up on September 29th.

I winkled to Louise.

 

Discovering Cecilia Samartín in Norway

This month, Oslo has given books and writers with big hug.

The Olso book festival just finished.  And this city is such a trunk of surprises.

I found out that Cecilia Samartín (more information about her is here ) was coming to town.  I did not know her.  But I discovered she is a popular writer in Norway and was very interested in hearing her talk.

So I met her at one of her talks in  Oslo.  Her dedication to her characters and their destinies was very touching. She shared how her newest novel, Dona Maria (was inspired by the ladies in white in Cuba which are nominated for the Nobel Peace Prize). She said that taking part in the right vs left debate is not what drives her. Instead she is committed to tell the stories of courage, especially by women.  She sees herself as a humanista.

She mentioned boleros and because Norwegians did not know what they were she then sang unplugged.  That was a treat.

Cecilia Samartín is a phycologist who turn herself into a writer.  How much do I admire people who go through this scary but wonderful transformation!

When I approached her, I told her a bit about what I am writing about and she was encouraging. When I meet writers like her I confirm that the lack of formal training in literature does not have to be an obstacle.   After the conversation I left the building with a great "go-for-it-with-all-your-passion-and-everything-will-be-fine" feeling.

Writing a novel is an insane amout of work - mental and physical. She said, what I have heard other writers say: ideally one writes before dawn, that's when the characters come... I am not getting up at 5am (yet) but I am definitively getting up 2 hours earlier than usual.

Since the talk (and also in response to the American-Norwegian literature festival), I have been more convince than ever that in the grand scheme of things becoming a published writer is an art of self-belief which has a very clear daily implication: discipline and endurance - with a bit of magic.  

Oslo August 31

For those of us who are not Norwegians and are not familiar with who is who in Norway, the sesion with Joachim Trier, the Norwegian director of Reprise and Oslo August 30, was very instructive.

He seems to be not only a bit of a local hero but also a super friendly guy.

I have borrowed Reprise and will watch Oslo August 31 soon.

For those outside Norway, it might be worth watching the clips as it does give you a sense of Oslo.
He is in love with his city. And there is nothing greater than people who are passionate about what they do.  It was contagious both in artistic terms but also as a new Oslo citizen.

The conversation between Lori Stein from the Paris Review and him at the Oslo Literature House (See previous entry) uncovered many similarities between writing for the page and writing for the silver screen.

I am on the right track: Every week I am devouring not only novels but also films (studying plots, watching characters, building momentum, and understanding the emotional content of the story).

All these cinematic expeditions are thanks to the Oslo Public Library.  I must be their biggest fan.

Here are the clips. Now you can put yourselves in my shoes (in terms of how foreign the Norwegian language still feels).

Oslo August 31

Reprise

Happy accidents at Oslo's Literature house

Yes, it sounds like a cliché but there is no better way way of putting it:

Things happen for a reason.

I could not fly to Bangkok - everything conspired against the trip and I was dissapointed - but the stars rewarded me with something even better. 

A festival took place at the Literature House with a focus on Contemporary American Literature and the organizer managed to attract an impressive set of panelists.

- Lori Stein, the editor of the Paris Review (a publication I treasure), James Wood, the writer and literary critic at The New Yorker who wrote How Fiction Works (which I had just finished reading and found very thoughtful and helpful), John Jeremiah Sullivan, novelist and now writer with the Paris Review and the New York Times (see a recent piece on the Williams Sisters here) Donald Antrim, who wrote one of America's strangest novels according to Johathan Franzen (He wrote "The Hundred Brothers" whose first paragraph is brilliant. Chapter 1 is here), Lucas Witmann, the editor of Newsweek's The Daily Beast, Elif Batuman, a brilliant American-Turkish writer and essayist, also independent but also writing for The New Yorker, and the publisher Fiona McCrae.  They invited Joachim Trier, the Norwegian filmmaker, director of Reprise and Oslo August 30. (See separate entry).

I don't even want to imagine what I would have missed if I had not gone to this festival.  Everyone was approachable and very generous with their time. 

It did wonders not only to my imagination but also allowed me to experience a breakthrough in my novel.

Below is a photo of  Litteraturehuset  as it is called in Norwegian.  A glorious park sits in front of the House.  I discovered a perfect place for reading.

Clearly, the not so sweet side of the talks is the business of publishing novel, what they expect (at least in the US).   Fortunately, I am not writting because I want to "make it in America" (which was one of the themes of the sessions).

 

Pretty (Fake) Girl

He does look like a girl, if you don't pay attention...

..but upon closer examination...

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

..you realize they are playing with our eyes.... (the real photo is more feminine, here I am emphasizing his male side).

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

I noticed an odd marketing campaign in the streets of Oslo.  You see this pretty girl.  Beatiful face.  Her blouse is half open and you can see her nipple.  But I thought something was weird. I asked for a male opinion.  Is it really a girl?  Yes, of course it is.  (and she is pretty).  But I had my doubts and I bet a bottle of wine that the pretty girl was a boy that was prettified (I just made up this word) so it would look like a girl.

From the tram, she looks like a she. True. But I went to observe the big posters more carefully.  And here is the evidence that it is a boy. Look at the hands!  Look at the chest! 

I think it is a silly thing to point out (there is nothing wrong with having a boy looking like a girl).  But at the same time there is some hidden meaning in this add:  it is so easy for advertisements to fool us arond. And, worse, it is so easy to fabricate female duty. (So easy that even a man couldn't tell the difference).  It is so easy that even a boy can look like the pretty girl that twenty-something year olds want to imitate.

Not much new and not much can be done about the young obsession with models. But the good thing is that thanks to the silly add I did get a nice bottle of wine.

 

Always the beauty

I went to the Oslo's National Gallery the other afternoon. I had not been able to fly the night before (from Helsiki to Bangkok) and as a result of my failed trip I was not feeling too happy about the world with its airports and evil airlines.

So when faced with such afternoons, the only medicine that could help me was beauty: quietness: silence : therefore: a museum. I visited one and the images did cleaned my mood.

There is such honest Beauty in front of you. The colors. The textures. Such peculiar silence in the galleries. At airports I see the ugly (and aggresive) side of people. In museums I see the opposite. I enjoy their quietness and order. My inner world too stands quieter and more orderly.

I spent a lot of time in the Edvard Munch Room. That was the only loud room: tourists everywhere! No photographs are not allowed in there. But still. I sat and watch people's faces as they saw Munch's paintings. Tanta Melancolía!

Here are some precious paintings (by a sloppy photographer) I saw one more time and hope to see again.