 It occurred to me the other day that most people coming to Iceland this time of year are trying to make fantastic photos of the northern lights while I am just photographing clouds in the daytime. I might just go out for a moment now when it is pitch black outside and try to get a proper aurora borealis image. Or not.
 The weather has been rather spring like during the previous days. Good and bad. The Volcanic activity continues in the centre of N-E Iceland and we are reminded of that when there are easterly winds that bring toxic fumes and gases from the eruption. On such days the sunset is spectacular, more than usually. But I like the ordinary grey of the sky, as you might have noticed. This was taken in the morning from my doorstep.
My throat is sore after having spoken to around 1147 people in the craft and design fair in Reykjavík town hall this weekend. Still one day to go. Guðlaugur Bjarnason artist was kind enough to take a few pics of me in action. He also took one of me and my cousin Soffia who has been kind to come to the fair every day to take care of the show while I have eaten my lunch and gone out in the cold northern wind. After that hour I have been ready to relate about my rag carpets again! Ég er hás eftir að hafa spjallað við um 1147 manns á handverks og hönnunarsýningunni í Ráðhúsi Reykjavíkur þessa helgi. Enn er einn dagur til stefnu. Guðlaugur Bjarnason myndlistarmaður tók myndirnar af mér að störfum. Einnnig tók hana eina af mér og Soffíu frænku minni en hún hefur komið alla dagana og leyst mig af í hádeginu. Þá hef ég etið og farið út í norðanáttina og verið meira en til í að koma aftur á svæðið til að segja frá teppunum mínum. Ég er með bás á stóru handverkssýninguni í Ráðhús Reykjavíkur sem er við bakka Tjarnarinnnar, 6. 10. nóvember. Opið er kl. 10 - 18 alla dagana. Í tilefni sýningarinnar er 20% afsláttur af stóru teppunum. Sjón er sögu ríkari! it was fantastic. I took 1/3 of the Gálgaknit nature protection scarf with me to the demonstration on Austurvöllur, the square in front of Alþingishús, the parliament of Iceland in Reykjavík. I stood with some friends and I pulled it out of the bag and we held it on our shoulders. Then I decided to hand it over to the people around us and guess what happened, people read it, they read it: They passed it around and it slithered around from hand to hand, through thousands of hands, as a sign of solidarity and our wish to protect our nature. I tried to follow it in its slither but it was hard because it traveled fast and there were thousands of people expressing their frustration with the present governments fascistic ways of running the country. A government that belittles people who open their mouths to criticize or end up lying down in front of bulldozers when their opinions and good advice is neglected by the governing forces. Governing forces that have been elected by the people to work for their benefit but choose nepotism and to take care of their own arses. If you are dumbstruck when thinking of how the governing forces are behaving take knitting needles nr 9, green Álafoss lopi nr 1231 and 9983 (or other similar) Cast on 21 stitches and knit stripes as long as you can, then it will be added to the nature protection scarf called Gálgaknit. The green scarf. Þetta var frábært. Ég tók með mér 1/3 af Gálgaprjóninu með á Austurvöll í dag. Fyrst vorum við nokkrir vinir sem að héldum honum en síðan ákvað ég að koma honum í hendur fleiri. Og vitið hvað? Án orða þá skildi fólkið hvað hann er, fólkið LAS trefillinn beinlínis í orði og á borði og létu hann ganga frá hendi til hendi, þúsundir handa. Hring eftir hring hlykkjaðist hann um hendur fólksins á Austurvelli. Sameiningartákn. Ef þú ert orðlaus yfir framkomu stjórnvalda þá skaltu taka þér í hendi prjóna nr. 9 , fitja upp 21 lykkju með grænum Álafoss lopa nr 1231 og 9983 ( eða einhverjum líkum) og svo skaltu prjóna röndóttann refil eins lengi og lopinn endist. Prjón getur sagt meira en mörg orð. Gálgaprjón, græni trefillinn. I remember sitting on the bus from London to Winchester on my way back home after a busy day sucking up art exhibitions in various museums and galleries around London. It was part of the studies for my MA in art. It was late in the evening usually I would had taken the train back home, but this time it was the bus. I was sitting up front and a woman older than I sat beside me. We started talking. She was a part of a gang. A ringer gangs. Us ringers. I had never encountered anybody who was a real living RINGER. But she was. She rang church bells in various churches in some gangs. Depending on the church the number in a gang varied as each church had different numbers of bells. She had just been ringing somewhere in London where they had been short of a member and she had stood in to help them ring this day. Usually she had a certain number of churches that she rang with her ringer gangs in Hampshire and in other counties nearby. I find this fascinating. To be a ringer. My lonely work in the loom doesn't include a gang. Only when I am warping, which happens once or twice a year, I summon a gang. Some of them are experienced others are novices but they have to do the work properly and they always do. Their task is to hold to the warp, with an even tension while I warp the loom. They sit on the floor, and of course I allow pillows under their sensitive bums, and they have to keep an even tension in spite of being of different build and strength. The are like the gang of ringers. They have to be in tune. When I was studying weaving in Finland decades ago, we the students at the weaving school had to help each other with the warping. The person who owned the warp had to provide cake or biscuits with that day's coffee brakes. We drank a lot of coffee and being in Finland that was a serious matter the coffee drinking. I have continued the custom of paying my gang with coffee, tea and cakes of various kinds. Not beer as somebody suggested to me yesterday. I like this custom of mine. It reminds me of some of the best times in my life when I lived in a small Swedish speaking town in Finland and studied weaving. I experienced one of the coldest winters for decades, drank a lot of beer and knitted in the disco because it was warmer there than in the little apartment I rented. |
AuthorAnna María Lind, MA Textile Art Winchester School of Art. Archives
July 2024
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