Stockholm, the same but still something else

Stockholm, Norrbro (North Bridge) is closed because of refurnishing jobs. You can stand here for a while looking down at the whirls of water. Like you can look at and look through a fire. The same fire but all the time new flames. The same river but other whirls of water. It's like life and body. Then you can leave the place and choose another bridge.

Krakow, hero behind glass

Krakow, around the corner I stop staring at a Working Class Hero from 1964 who also looks like that Aryan archetype from 1940. Tall and straight-backed and with a visionary glance, he regards something and still nothing beyond me, far away. At the same time an androgynous, almost feminine line – the lips and eyebrows.

Now it's 2009 and the pale hero behind glass has been reduced to display a blue, short-sleeved shirt that no one want to buy. Shit happens.

London, was anyone there?

London, I put the camera on a a small table. The evening light is weak and I have to use long shutter time for the exposure. That makes people passing appear like transparent, dissolving beings. Like some people I met and separated from long ago and now are remembered only as fragments. The time of the camera shutter and the time you live have a similar influence on people passing.

Lieuran-Cabrières, houses almost eternal

Lieuran-Cabrières, houses, I have been painting so many houses. These warm ochra yellow walls become magical around nine in the evening when the sun has just disappeared behind something, when the atmosphere gets filled with thym and rosmarin, when les cigales play their mechanical never ending tune. Houses that have not changed except a window more or less, and that will not change anymore. Never. Calming, consoling. And let me dream for a while that life is like that – always here and I'm in the middle of it.

Stockholm, in the studio

Stockholm, because the rain is still in the air and because since yesterday the evening arrives one hour earlier than before, I enter my studio looking at some almost forgotten unframed paintings on paper. Hello studio, hello paintings! When focusing at this one, some details step forward and have something to say, so I take a photo. And I publish it in the blog. That's all.

Stockholm, Autumn, Colors and Photoshop

Stockholm, dull weather, rainy. Darkness says hello in mid afternoon. And the worst of all: this is just the beginning. I enjoy the beautiful colors of nature. The splendour of summer is changed into yellow and red. The camera creates copies which can never compete with reality itself. I try some painting in Photoshop. The upper picture is the result of the filter 'dry brush' and the lower one is the original. Printed out it looks quite good. Still for one or two weeks the original is out there, so carpe diem and enjoy!

Tikitere, hot water falling the Blog Action Day

Tikitere, Hell's Gate, New Zealand, it was some years ago. Looking for a picture inspiring me to write something about Climate Change, the theme of this global Blog Action Day.

Climate Change is about rising temperature. Tikitere is a hot place – more exactly, the soil is hot. This is the hottest water fall of the world. All around here are hot, bubbling pods. The air is thick and sulfur smelling.

But this is quite natural, it's about thermal facts. So the connection to Climate Change is not logical. But it's like that. You think about something, trying to find good things to write down. Inspiring pictures is a help, but not the whole trip.

Please read this which really is about what it should be about!

Stockholm, urban peace

Stockholm, Up there in house number two I spend my days. The most urban area of Sweden. In front of the first house and close to the rotary are some park benches surrounded by a heather plantation. There people enjoy their lunch break and the maybe last sunshine for a long time. Relaxing!

Stockholm, to fly

Stockholm, At home, regarding a painting I made more than twenty years ago. It's called To Fly. It's about to become a man, the one you are intended to be. To take a step out into the big Unknown called Life. Now I notice that the flying subject has got no legs. And it strikes me that once you have to come down. With no legs and no feet, what about that?

Åmål, Sweden, on vacation

Åmål, Sweden, On vacation. Summer evening at the camping. The sun is on its way down and lake Vänern is quietly whispering. A glass of wine, maybe a coffee, that's all. Resting. Resting. Resting.

Paris and the End

Paris, For a long time it has been well known that the Earth is a globe. Still the conception of a flat Earth has resisted until the 16th century. When reaching the upper end of rue des Bernadins, close to Sorbonne in Quartier Latin, it's impossible to keep on walking. I start thinking of the flat Earth.

Thinking of a long, distant walk straight forward in any direction. At a certain moment the walk would come to an end. What does the end look like? An unimaginable Nothing? Or a wall like this one? Okay, here the world has its end, just to turn around and walk back. Or what about breaking the wall?

Krakow, no, no, no, no

Krakow, Passing a playground with a prohibition sign on the wire fence: No biking, no football playing, no climbing on the swing, no climbing on the goal, not four kids on the seesaw, not two kids in the swing, not walk around with body bent over, no dogs. One single thing is allowed and recommended: throw trash in the bin.

All are floored.

No one is here.

Hardangervidda, Norway, outside, inside

Hardangervidda, Norway, Mile by mile, a desolate, magnificent and wide landscape. After a whole day's running across the highlands, and my ears still filled up with the sounds of wind and speed, I put up the tent and lay down inside. It's small, cosy and protecting.

Maybe the contrast outside/inside makes me love to lay down on my back, while listening to the sounds of nature from outside, looking at the movements and changes of light of the canvas. And maybe because it's like this we have been laying down for thousands of years. On the ground, in the middle of nature. When the night arrives. It's a good feeling.

Västervik, walls and colors

Västervik, Sweden, I visit the city where I lived when I was young. Walking the streets giving life to memories.  Find the house where I rented a garret. And the former printing works which became my studio for some years. Now the backyard is an open-air café. And my old studio is a family home, neatly wrapped in reddish-brown wood panelling with black corners. Then it was yellowish and the old plaster was cracked.

Childhood, youth and getting older. I am more than a grown-up person and all houses in this little city are decorated with light opaque paints: yellow, blue, green, rose. People have a better life, are healthier and earn more money. That is good.

Still I am happy to find the maybe very last house that has not yet got choked by plastic paint, but is breathing and telling a story.

Children like things inspiring imagination. I recognize the child within me, and that's a good feeling.

Lac Retba, salt and sand

Lac Retba, sixty kilometers northwest of Dakar, 800 meters from seaside is Lac Retba, or Lac Rose. The pink colored lake. Just today it's not like that, the color is blue like the sky. Some hundred years ago growing and moving sand dunes separated this part of the sea from the big one and the small lake was created. It's ten times salter than the Dead Sea. 

People collect the salt from the bottom and fill the boats. Women carry the salt on their heads on and off. Hard job, hot sun and salt biting the skin. This can bring eight, nine dollars a day. During summer there is no activity here because of the rain.

Dakar, a place for pray

Dakar, outside Le Méridien, the conference center. When you need it there is always a place for pray.

Dakar, a place for a sculpture

Dakar, Placing an art object in public space is usually a matter of longterm discussion. There are arguments about this and that. I walk along the road in the western outskirts of the city when this smiling sculpture appears. The environment is far from being a park, on the contrary: sand, stones, trash all around. Still the female sculpture is quietly sitting here. And still she smiles.

Dakar, while time is passing

Dakar, sometimes you can't see the picture in what you see. You are not really regarding things around you that you see everyday – they just are there. At a foreign place uniqueness appears. There is no consistency, no logic. On the roof is a man sitting, as if waiting. Below on the ground is a uniformed man walking off and on. Beside the man on the roof is a winch with a thick rope. At the end of the rope is a bucket.

In my newly arrived brain it all becomes a unique installation. Where a guard is carefully watching a bucket while a yougalike man meditates on a roof. While time is passing.

Stockholm, protesting, too much nature?

Stockholm, the month of May is hysteric. Bird cherries, lilacs, elder bushes, horse chestnuts all around and when looking downwards every tuft of grass is transformed into a bunch of multicolored flowers. The scents of nature are drugs, you get drunk. Also, more jobs to do in professional life than at other times of the year, and more in private life you want to experience. And people are like crazy heifers let out in the green for the first time ever.

There is a cherry tree covered with thousands of flowers making my camera hand like paralysed. Just around the corner a display window, discreetely decorated with some electrified plastic tulips. A quiet protest against the time being?

New York, media bird

New York, When being a tourist equipped with a camera you make choices. If you don't want to think, there are road maps with camera symbols marking big views where you are recommended to stop the car, jump out and snap a shot. I think that is really stupid and imagine myself creative and artistic enough to find my own unique views. 

Last Sunday when looking through a Swedish newspaper there was something about visiting New York. Above the text a huge photo from the top of the Empire State Building I met an old friend from my own visit there last summer: A pigeon in focus, strolling around up there close to the tourists. And at once I realize that this pigeon is a movie star and an exceptional media bird, in focus of thousands of cameras every single day. Time to put a pigeon symbol just here on the NY map? The pigeon star is waiting for you, and only for you.

Åland, short trips may be great

Åland, between Sweden and Finland is Åland. Its archipelago is spread out from side to side across the Baltic Sea. Especially on the eastern side. This was an important communication link within the former Swedish empire. Nowadays big ferry ships appear during night time like huge, enlighted buildings. 

We try the link, first ferry ship a couple of hours to the Åland main land, then some nice cruising in great nature. And now we are ready to let the bikes free for twenty kilometers winding roads before entering next little ferry boat still closer to Finland. Rain doesn't matter. Short trips may be great!

Serekunda and Nong Khai, decorated cars

Serekunda in the Gambia and Nong Khai in Thailand, it could be at thousands of places, but not anywhere. Taxi and bus drivers decorate window and dashboard with toys, plastic flowers and lots of other small things. In Africa, in Asia, but seldom in Europe. Why? To make the working place more personal, more like at home? Do the things protect against accidents? Actually I don't know. If you do, please tell me.

New York, The Great Bridge

New York, When The Great Bridge was finished in 1883 it was the longest bridge all over the world. It was also the first hanging bridge using steel wire. Brooklyn Bridge connects Manhattan and Brooklyn with the East River in between. I start walking from the Manhattan side and soon there are six lanes of freeway under my feet. In the middle of the traffic mess, iron, rust and noise. A light night breeze from the river fills my nose.

Stockholm, moments beyond time

Stockholm, The same things happens every Spring time. Lots of flowers suddenly paint the soil in new colours. Amazed I walk around, just regarding. Sometimes without camera. But regarding and composing like with a camera. Feel like disappearing into what I am regarding. At that moments there is no time. They are moments beyond time. This is gagea, or yellow star-of-Bethlehem, my favourite.

Kumasi, soon the no-street will become a street

Kumasi, I'm sitting at the door outside the barber. In the shadow. Children running by, dogs. A woman passing after shopping. And a car slowly bumping forward. And I am thinking of these streets that are no streets. Stones, holes after heavy rains. Longliving pools of water, malaria mosquitos. And I think this is my problem as well. Knowledge is connected around the whole world, net communities between people, institutions, science and companies will put us closer to each other. National frontiers become less important. There are thousands of solutions how to make a street out of a no-street. How to get rid of malaria mosquitos. Soon, very soon here will be a street.

Istanbul, mobile

Istanbul, in this mobile time of ours he has found the right place. The man with the mobile enterprise offers digital prints, photo copies, phone calls and whatever you want, all charged by his own power plant. The only disturbing detail is the gaz consuming machine. Maybe tomorrow superseded by solar cells. You find it close to you – if you are in Istanbul.

Stockholm, you don't need a castle

Stockholm, allotments make the green finger people happy. Like here in Tanto in southern Stockholm. In front of the area is the water of Årstaviken and behind are the buildings of Högalid. It's a nice place for walking. Now the soil is black covered with dead vegetation from last year. Most people cultivate vegetables, herbs and flowers. But there are exceptions. If you haven't got a castle you can still construct a park. Compact gardening...

Asmara, Dawit Isaak and driving license

Asmara, the day begins with a caffè macchiato at the main street café where all know each other. The sun softly brings its Good Morning in the fresh rarefied air, we are quite high – 2 874 ft above sea level. Nowhere else I have met such genuinely kind people as here. In no other capital I have felt totally safe while walking home to the hotel, late evenings in narrow, dark streets.

Today there is an appeal in the four leading Swedish newpapers: Free Dawit Isaak now! He is a journalist and Swedish citizen who has been in Eritrean jail for more than seven years with no trial.

The small, shabby Fiat 500 cars of the Driving School chug around or stand still being repaired. You need a driving license before driving. Driving license, ruling license, governing license. Free elections. Democracy.

Hannäs, we feel like birds

Hannäs, Sweden, 10 degrees Celsius plus, light winds. Something happens to the Swede. I feel like the lapwing looping and calling up there above my head, like the couple of cranes curiously scratching the field over there, like the chaffinch who has something to tell us from inside the bushes. And like the white-tailed eagle, cool and relaxed, circling around up there in nice thermals.

Sweden is in shape like a huge north-south pointing banana. In the north people still climb around in deep snow, in the south the banana mildly smiles. The soil plowed last autumn now twinkles, humid and dazed, towards the infinitely blue sky. Tomorrow winter might be back – so Carpe Diem!

Barcelona, the art of walking

Barcelona, Fundació Joan Miró, high up on Montjuïc is this huge museum with white walls, big windows and spacy openings. Everywhere are groups of children, sitting close to each other on the floor in front of a painting, silent with big eyes, while the teacher whispering tells the story of a painting. Or walking. The art of Group Walking is exercised on the terrace. Like a centipede the children coil around. A living piece of art. One of the best.

Istanbul, the dream, is it still there?

Istanbul, here it is. A project, a dream that not really comes true. An idea. And while the material slowly gets composted, breaks down into atoms, the dream may continue to live inside the head of somebody – as beautiful as ever.

Tokyo, clean precision

Tokyo, we enter one of the big department stores in Ginza at opening time in the morning. We are the very first customers. At the end of every counter a welldressed seller in service stands in strict attention welcoming us with eye contact, a pleasant smile and a gentle bow. Good morning Mr President, my imagination sings, and I gently smile back.

Underground they sell luxury chocolates and prepare for lunch. The face mask and green light announce about surgery. Here the cooks don't lick their fingers like at home. In Tokyo precision and disinfection is the mother of good and healthy food.

Stockholm, painters and photographers

Stockholm, the oldest photo still preserved is from 1826. During the second part of the 19th century there was a lot of experimenting within photography aiming to find materials for reproducing positive pictures. They tried salt paper, albumin paper and carbon prints. And lots more, before silver chloride and silver bromide were developed as more persistent materials.

Newspapers by that time, and earlier, were illustrated with drawings. War and dispair, accidents and catastrophes were drawn by hand. Good drawings were rich of details and engaging to look at. Many artists were active as newspaper illustrators, for example Goya, the great Spanish painter.

When walking around at the National Museum I think of this. Just now here is a great exhibition with works by the so called Prerafael Brotherhood, PRB, a British school of this time. A photographic way of detailed painting, often inspired of classic themes as jealousy, illness and dramatic death. The paintings are rich of symbols like a broken window, flowers thrown away in the gutter, beautiful red apples...

This connection in time will not alone explain the manner of painting. But part of it, I am sure. Free thoughts and values individually expressed are woven like threads together with other threads composing the web of the time being. Things are connected, reciprocally explained.

 

Stockholm, the sky is not a roof

Stockholm, like two friends walking together for a while before separating, the moon and the big planet whose name I really should know. Not so long ago many people beleived that the sky was kind of a roof spread out, and that stars and planets were small gaps making light from Heaven visible for us human beings. When my daughter was five she asked "how can the sky keep in balance?".

Now we know better. There is no flat ceiling up there, and the sky cannot tip and fall down.

Knowledge theory is about human logics as a tool to understand the world by perception, with our senses. The properties of the smallest phsyiological particles as well as the creation and development of universe. And whatever will be beyond the smallest particle, known today, and beyond the universe, still further away in space and time.

But beyond logics, science is not able to act. It's prisoned by what is measurable and by our brains working with logics built on language. For thousands of years people have put their faces upwards, regarding the great picture of sky by night, wondering why we live and why everything is there. And we will keep on wondering.

Beirut, waiting for children

Beirut, early Spring, before Israel's latest bombardments. This suffering city, destroyed, rebuilt, destroyed and rebuilt again.

But yet we know nothing about the war to come. The April sun is kindly ligthning the playground, and the disney inspired figures, in boats and cars and with funny lamps on their heads, look welcoming and full of expectation. Still the boats and cars and wagons stand quiet, but soon the kids arrive, laughters, joy and sparkling life. Before the bombs. And after the bombs. That keeps hope alive.

Stockholm, small things on the ground

Stockholm, in the middle of a park, with a great view of the city I look down at my feet, where a collection of scraps has been spread out on the ground. The Swedish name is translated to bookmarks, but I think they say 'scraps' in English. As a child I had a period collecting and exchanging them, for example collecting only wild animals and giving all flower scraps away. I guess it's the same thing now among small children.

So, what has happened here on the top of a mountain in the centre of a park? A thief with a stolen bag hiding in the bushes, who in disappointment has thrown these pieces of paper around himself? Or herself? Or only traces of a bad tempered kid? Shit the same, here they are for some time, fragments from something that happened. Things among other small and big things around us proving that after all there is a history.

Stockholm, in grayscale

Stockholm, sitting at the thirteenth floor, pointing the camera through the window, zooming in a more distant area of the city. It's 17 PM, the grey sky is getting darker, snow from yesterday makes contrast to the black chimneys and roofings.

Now, a couple of hours later when looking at the photo I see only old houses. Incidently the zoom cut out out a view without new buildings.

Stockholm is not filled with only old houses. It's not a static, dirty city. People don't look like and behave like in the fifties. And a photo never tells the whole story.

Serrekunda and Stockholm, women at work

Serrekunda and Stockholm, the picture above is in the hut in Serrekunda, the Gambia. I look at it every morning and evening the few days I stay there. Women preparing food, women caring for their children and if the painting had been a bit wider, we would have seen women working with the dry soil, cultivating. In a still wider painting, a bit more far away, there would be women at the marketplace selling eggs and vegetables. And what about the men? Reading, occupied with abstract matters in the refreshing shadow of a tree. Or taking a walk, enjoying a good pipe. 

Winter in Stockholm, last year. In the very centre of the city, Sergels Torg, the Modern Dance Theatre has some kind of performance. Women chopping wood in full action. Arms waving, axes blowing. We also hear the song of power saws, and they are handled by men. And, actually, a power saw is much more fun than an axe!

Across Africa, the one and only Coke

Across Africa, a colleague of mine with origins in Syria, today said that his father experienced the introduction of Pepsi, the first imported soft drink in the country. Still today for him all soft drinks are Pepsi. What a success for a trademark to replace all the others!

And the soft drink Coca Cola is around the globe, everybody knows. So why talk about that? Well, still I get surprised to see the coke bottle with the trademark in tgrinja language on a café table in Asmara, Eritrea, eastern Africa. This relatively closed country when it comes to imports from abroad.

Also surprised when I see the familiar logotype on a tree, in the middle of nowhere, outside the small village of Khouboni in the Gambia, western Africa.

Hmm, I guess it tastes good that thing, I will try one this weekend!

Stockholm, to see or not to see

Stockholm, today on the bicycle on the way home. Afternoon, 16:40 PM, and I stop to take a photo. You know, this is my ordinary way to the job and home again. I see the same houses, same streets, almost the same people, every day, but without really seeing them. I note their existence, without regarding, not thinking of colors, what windows look like, how doors are designed.

Sometimes, during summer, I go to places in Stockholm crowded with tourists to play a tourist myself, and it's like looking with other glasses.

The same thing now, when I stop the bike and pick up the camera – I see the beauty of these nice houses in the Old City and the frozen water in front of them. Dear camera, old friend, you really help me to see and to explore.

Valdemarsvik, time for dreaming

Valdemarsvik, Sweden, early morning, fast breakfast, luggage is on the bike since yesterday. Sidebags, rollbag, tankbag. Chilly morning, misty, wet. Helmet on, motor starting, nice music, and away. Rolling ahead, curving, narrow road, feels promising. Sun appears, begins its slow climbing behind trees. Dazzling light straight in my eyes. Stops after an hour, stretching the legs, checking the luggage, all seems okay. On and away again. Smile. It will be a long day on the road. Southwards to somewhere. Waiting for spring is daydreaming...