4 months 3 bags 2 chances: Louisiana and Sweden

Itinerary

Louisiana
Kronborg

Louisiana

Not it turns out, the American state, but rather the Danish Museum of Modern Art.

Is it possible Ulla has sensed my distaste of "modern art" and decided to show another of my Philistine like sensibilities to the world?

"The kids will love it" she said, and they did.

Louisiana is about 40 minutes by Car out of Copenhagen. I don't know what it was before or if it was built specifically as a Museum but its very beautiful and feels like you are in a Frank Lloyd Wright house. THere are lovely gardens that overlook the ocean and rooms with art (surprise).

The current exhibition is the works of Yoko Ono which was drawing in the crowds for reasons that remain mysterious to me. There was a lot of stuff about her and her life and a large exhibit of maybe 5 rooms of her work - I could find zero (well actually one - the wish tree) pieces that I would have paid for, except maybe to make her go away.

Nice font

Being living modern art before we went in

In the Louisiana Garden. The museum is in the background.

Garden Panorama

looking out from the garden

Now far be it for me to define what is good art and what is, how would you call it, oh yeah, "claptrap" so interspersed below are some pieces from the museum and perhaps a comment from the supercoach if one was felt forthcoming.

First work you see as you turn the corner after entering

The wish tree was just outside an early corridoor. Next to the tree was a box with white luggage tag like tags and pens for you to write with. The task was to write down a wish and then hang it on the wish tree. Every now and again, when the tree was "full of wishes", they would be collected and sent to the wish central station which is in Iceland in case you should wonder.

Then the kids went off to the kids area. A room for making cutouts, a room for painting, yellow lego section, and a room for sculpting. FIrst, on with the art smocks.

Ready for action

The yellow Lego world

Zozo sculpture

Outdoor Frog sculpture

A turtle (baying to the moon?)

OK, I can't do it. This piece should speak for itself as Premier League self indulgent rubbish of the highest order. I believe I could rant on but let me leave with a 15ish second vignette. Its a video that goes on for 23 minutes (really) and then repeats. Except for the fact that I am not, I am without speech.

Next - what is clearly an ode to the Oral-B electric toothbrush. I like them too but not sure I would express my love in this (or really any) way.

Oral B? Maybe this is Oral A?

Then there is this pink self embroidered pillow. Sigh.

A blue sponge shape thing - made in the late 1960s

A quick stop back to the Yoko Ono exhibition for this masterpiece of video. It is 45 minutes long and as per the previous video, repeats as soon as it is finished.

Yups, your eyes do not decieve you, one is blue and one is red. Now that may not be artistic talent, but imagine the salesmanship required to sell them to an art museum. Ice to Eskimos would be a breeze.

Theres a blue one and a red one and a .....

I made a montage of the next one, not because the art was less than stellar (I quite liked looking at it really), but rather for the caption beside it which struck me as the kind of pseudo philosophical nonsense that propels from the mouth of an acute schizophrenic.

So saying, it was right, in that I did feel agitation, but only at how I couldn't possibly see how this stuff could get written and published in a big museum as I would not have published it in a book of work of the children of Kindergarten. Oops, did I give away my opinion?

Large plastic corn

Drew in 10 years

Like going to a paint shop to decide what colour to paint your walls

This one is from 1963 and is called "ink on paper"

So there was lots to see and the kids loved it. I haven't let truth completely escape and have picked a "selection of art" to make a point. There was lots, including some of the above that I liked to look at and we all enjoyed our time at Louisiana. It was a relaxing environment with a kind of serenity I imagine exists in Japanese zen gardens. Lots of very well behaved, cool Danes of all ages strolling through but without the affect of the artiste at large.

This from the Louisiana shop.

Who knew you could get impure organic cotton OR come to think of it, non-organic cotton.

So onward as the day approached 2pm. Drives to drive and castles to visit.

Denmark is flat. I had thought it would be all Norway Fjordy but it turns out, thats how Norway is and Denmark has not a hill to be seen. Lots of cyclists must be happy and there are LOTS of cyclists. THe roads all have cycling lanes at least as wide as half a car lane and usually separated from the cares by a small (few cms high) barrier. Cyclists are afforded great respect from the cars and buses and both are very aware of pedestrians. You would never see the road rage of Perth drivers toward cyclists who dare to ride on their roads nor the Mad Max driving technique of slowly coming up beside a cyclist and giving them the choice of a whack with a side mirror or a jump onto the curb.

Its easy to walk into the path of a bicycle as you watch out for cars before crossing the road. BIkes are silent and it turns out that a lot of "looking left and looking right" before you cross the road is also listening left and listening right. Talking to the Danes, they say its a similar problem with electric cars which tend to be fitted with little noise makers now so as not to increase the pedestrian fatality rate while decreasing the carbon emissions rate.

Back to the bikes. Most are cross bar free and flat handled. They mostly have a cool locking system that I haven't seen in Australia and now cant remember the name of - will do some research. Most are ridden at relatively lolling pace as opposed to the great Aussie bike race that occurs along the paths of Perth every morning as those who ride to work do the next time trial stage of the Tour de Perth. It's part of the culture

There is also very little in the way of lycra. Or bike helmets for that matter. It was hot while we were in Copenhagen but the Danes ride along in work clothes or going out clothes and Federer like, don't seem to sweat. Weird, even their physiology is cool.

Lots of water, lots of sailing ships and if you look closely, in the distance is Sweden

Old house with thatched roof

Ok, so these things are typically Danish. Every car has one on their front windshield. Any clues?

Front right, car windshield

They are used for any place where there is a parking limit. When you leave your car you put the clock in your window to the time you parked. No getting a ticket from a machine. I asked a few Danes why they wouldn't just "cheat a bit". Firstly it doesn't really enter their minds - it wouldn't be fair. Also, there is a big fine for getting caught cheating. So maybe it's the Danish social culture with just a lil bit of stick in the background?

The parking lot just around the corner from our next stop had lots of little streets around it and "shared space" according to the sign. That means shared between bikes, pedestrians, stalls and cars. Works well.

Its unbelievably close to Sweden from here. You look across the narrow expanse of water and see the Swedish coastline dotted with buildings. It's so close in fact that my mobile phone with rapidly diminishing UK credit, beeped to thank me for using Vodafone Sweden. The closest tower was in another country!

Many Danes now live in Sweden and commute to Denmark. The taxation in Denmark is very high and the cost of living similarly high. Its as expensive as Switzerland is and thats saying something.

The two countries are also separate though. There is a definite us and them thing happening with a tad of Danish pride in evidence. Wars and ownership change of hundreds of years has led to a little us and them thing.

There are also differences in local laws and product availability so the markets we saw here are pretty much set up for Swedes to come across and ge what they need. Turns out that what they need are flowers and cheap alcohol - and their are plenty of both. Kinda like preparing for prom night I spose.

Flowers (mostly) for Swedes.

Second hand Beret anyone? What about you Andy Capp?

seems to have grown quite a bit in the last few months

And finally, in the distance, Kronborg Castle, known to all as Elsinore, the castle Shakespeare used as the backdrop for hamlet. The area in Denmark where the castle is located is called Helsingor which got changed by Billy the Elizabethan propagandist to Elsinor for his most famous of tragedies.