I live in a cage, and I have lived in it for a long time. How long? I don’t know. My memory is, as you know, not much to boast about. But that doesn’t mean that I am an idiot. I understand more than you think.

But it is obvious that you like to laugh at me when you make me repeat all those ridiculous words and phrases that you say to me. And when you have finished laughing, you claim that I am stupid because you are convinced that I can’t think up anything of my own.

But all the same, I have always liked it in my cage. I have been given food, and one ought to be grateful for that. But there are also other things that I have appreciated. And in the first instance I mean the pleasure I have had of being able to hear all the conversations that have been carried out around the fancy dining table. And they weren’t just any old conversations. Because I live in the home of a learned person, somebody who knows a lot.

As I have said, there are a lot of conversations that are carried on here in the house. And there have been many people who have come to visit. They have sat for hours and talked and argued about all manner of things. And that is good. Isn’t it? Just think how much I have been able to learn. I ought to be a happy parrot. Surely I ought to be?

I readily admit that it has been a delight to listen to the conversations that have been carried out. A true delight. But no longer. You see, over time I have become all the more disturbed by these conversations. Indeed, in the end, they became really intolerable.

Perhaps you are wondering: What do you mean by that, parrot?

There are three differences between me and you. The first is that I am sitting in a cage, and you are not. I will never be able to fly outside my cage. But you, on the other hand, can go where you want, because there is no fence that shuts you in.

The second difference is that I know that I am sitting in a cage. There is no doubt about that. But you, on the other hand, remain unaware of the cage that you yourselves are sitting in, the cage inside your heads. When you read this, you will certainly give a start as if you had been insulted. Yes, insulted in the same way that you insult me every time you laugh at me when I repeat all your little witticisms. 

The third difference is that I can refrain from repeating everything you say. Instead, inside my cage, when I want to, I can think of new thoughts, thoughts that wouldn’t always please you if you got to hear them. But you, you can’t think any new thoughts. Because all day long you simply repeat what you hear and read. Even the man in whose house I live, and who knows a tremendous amount, repeats everything he reads. Yes he does, without being aware of it. He repeats and repeats so that he almost turns blue in the face. 

Now you understand why I can’t stick this. All of you just repeat yourselves. And why do you do that? I’ll tell you, it is because you can’t do anything else when you sit there in your cage. 

The post The parrot first appeared on Opulens.

Chambord is a 500-year-old castle in the Loire Valley, South of Paris. Magic operates when a contemporary artist is permitted to use its historic walls and grandiose park for his artworks!  This spring and throughout the summer, the castle is opened for visitors to come and enjoy its premises with a touch of grace: that of the French/Argentinian artist, Pablo Reinoso, with his exhibition ’Overflow’.  

The cultural life has suffered during these years of pandemic. However, it has also permitted artists to work on projects without outer disturbances. The Loire Valley is one of France’s most frequented tourist attractions, thanks to the several well-preserved castles and its closeness to the capital.  Most castles were emptied of their furniture and artworks during the French Revolution. Maybe that’s why they’re well suited for contemporary exhibitions like this one? 

Pablo Reinoso has been keen on using the existing structures and rooms. He’s an ecologically concerned artist who works with woods – recuperated or available in abundance – and steal. For the over fifty pieces shown at Chambord, he’s used chestnut trees that grow in the vicinity and fallen mulberry branches. There are also huge charcoal paintings that ornate some of the castle’s walls and even parts of its façade where repairs are being conducted, using scaffolding. 

The castle’s masterpiece is an inner circular, intricate, double staircase, inspired by Leonard da Vinci. Without obscuring its beauty, Pablo invested it by hanging inside it, black canvas ’breathing’ cushions. Ventilating devices are placed in the cushions, making them move up and down. Similar cushions have been used in some of the castle’s smaller side rooms. The artists told us to enter the space in silence and to ’listen to the breathing’. This black cushion sculpture had something spooky over it though. His coal installation inside this dark room didn’t lift the mood either. It suggested the end of an area and the manner in which we have polluted the environment. 

There was light in the tunnel in this seeming hopelessness with his humorous wood benches that stretched out like spaghetti and his likewise perched chairs. Pablo has invested what he could in this otherwise barren castle: on the walls, the floors, and in the large fireplaces, in which he had placed wooden sculptures, resembling flames. 

’Articulations’ – sculptures made as bodily articulations and hung up or placed on the floor – made me think of Leonardo da Vinci’s fascination for the human body. They might have different meanings, such as the ingenuity of our own bodies, with all their intricate functions, that we don’t even pay attention to unless of course something gets broken and our fragility. Pablo’s works reflect the human senses: be it breathing, hearing, touching, seeing (in the dark room), moving… It may also be a reminder of our eventual decaying. ’We come from dust and to dust we shall return”.

It was nice to step out of the chilly castle and into the warm spring day in the park. Pablo’s idea seems to be that his outdoor sculptures may also be useful. Children were climbing in them and two of them are like enormous rocking chairs, quite comfortable at that. However, the one I preferred was a monumental tree in steal. Peaking inside it, I discovered a perfectly adjusted spiral, apparently also inspired by Leonardo da Vinci. 

The park is lovely to stroll around in. There’s a restaurant in the vicinity and a shop selling the castle’s own wine among others. Not far away is another castle, Cheverny, with the Swedish sculptor, Gudmar Olovson’s beautiful ’Love garden’ that is also worth the detour. The Loire Valley has much to offer and is at its best when, as in this case, it mixes history with art.

Anne Edelstam

Pablo Reinoso

Débordements

Château de Chambord

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ART. Raoul Dufy’s colourful paintings of Paris open the season’s exhibition at the Musée de Montmartre in Paris.

Montmartre used to be the artists quarters during the middle of the 19th – and beginning of the twentieth century. It’s still like a village, with its hills, grapevines, parks, paved side-walks, numerous ateliers and small houses. Although one of Europe’s largest capitals, Paris resembles a conglomerate of villages, assembled during different epochs to form today’s large city eventually. However, Parisians still prefer to hang around their own ’arrondissement’ though, where they have their favourite bakery, butcher, cheese shop and tobacco store.  

I took the subway up to Montmartre. This usually so overcrowded area with loads of tourists, was quite empty this rainy morning. Paris was still in lockdown but preparing for its slow reopening on May 19. Outdoor cafés will be allowed and museums will open their doors. I was lucky to be able to see this extraordinary exhibition beforehand. The museum is in itself worth the detour with its cute little garden and lovely location, overlooking Paris. 

’Le Paris de Dufy’ exhibition is his view of Paris. It’s like being in a time machine to see Dufy’s works of art. Raoul Dufy (1877-1953) showed, at a young age, a special dexterity for drawing. He became quickly well-known within the Parisian art circles for his compositions, elegance and colouring skills. In Paris (1920-25), the Swedish Ballet hired him to do the decorations for one of their ballets at the Théâtre des Champs-Elysées.

The exhibition starts on the first floor with an oil painting of the capital seen from Montmartre. Otherwise, it’s organised in thematic- rather than in chronological order and covers most of Dufy’s skills from oils to watercolours, drawings, woodcuts, tapestries and ceramics. Raoul Dufy possessed a wide range of skills but kept a taste for colour and elegance using a light pencil line throughout them all. The splashing wasn’t his style, nor did he attempt to integrate any of his contemporaries’ ways – although he dipped both into impressionism and in cubism. His compositions are special and not classical, although figurative.

At the end of the nineteenth and beginning of the twentieth centuries, Paris Bohemians met each Sunday afternoon, at the Moulin de la Galette. Along with Von Gogh and Renoir, Dufy couldn’t resist the temptation to paint the typical scenes they observed. I could really feel being part of the gang just by looking at his paintings. I also thoroughly enjoyed going to the theatre and concerts along with Dufy and all the elegant women and men. He was born into a family of musicians, so music was part of his life which shows in his art.

From the buzz of a concert- and theatre halls, shifting to a quieter mood, I entered his colourful atelier, painted as an empty room, but with the windows wide opened on Paris. Still paying homage to music, by painting a violin on one of the tables. Dufy also illustrated numerous books, catalogues and brochures. 

One room showed his nudes that weren’t my preferences. They reminded me somewhat of Picasso and his distorted figures. What I did love was the textiles, depicting Parisian scenes, that he had designed for an entire set of furniture, as well as a large, intricate, textile screen. During the 1920s, he worked relentlessly with tapestry and some of the best known French manufacturers. 

His curiosity knew no boundaries! He also dipped into the art of frescos by doing an enormous one for the French electric company – called La Fee Electricité – or the electric fairy! His outdoor Parisian scenes go mostly in greens and are as impressive as his fashion drawings. 

Whatever preferences one might have, there can’t be any differences in view of Raoul Dufy’s dexterity in his drawing skills or when depicting Parisian scenes. We can thank painters like him and museums that show us their works to glimpse what life used to be during long forgotten times. This article is but a taste of what you’ll discover for yourselves once you’ve made your way up to this artistic and special part of Paris.  

Musée de Montmartre

Le Paris de Dufy

12 rue Cortot, Paris 18ème

19 May – Autumn 2021  

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FASHION. The nordic fashion that’s shown at Prince Eugene, Waldemarsudde, situated in Stockholm Royal Park, doesn’t have much resemblance to anything Nordic except for its name. 

What is Nordic anyways? After having been a rather homogeneous country, Sweden has become very cosmopolitan. This fashion exhibition mirrors this international development. Not only that, but the concept of fashion itself has developed from superficial utter garments to becoming more and more of a social manifestation. It’s asking questions about the relationship that we have between fashion, art, identity and sustainability. 

This exhibition, in the upstairs’ atelier at Waldemarsudde, points in that direction. Several designers are represented in this somewhat odd show that also encompasses films with catwalks and interviews. I will only concentrate on four main designers for the sake of this article. Hopefully, this little taste will make you curious to go and find out about all the others as well.

These young designers won a prize this year for their works: Elina Äärelä, Ines Kalliala, Idaliina Friman and Kristian David. They are exhibited on a podium in the large middle room. I was immediately intrigued by their unusual, quite extravagant and exciting designs.  

Elina Äärelä grew up with a Christian background very present, as her father was a pastor. Her design is centred around the Christian message, inspired by the Church’s liturgic clothes and Christly messages. Her collection is called Silent Voice and brings the thoughts to our inner voice, to a personal communication with God. However, she has transformed the formal religious uniforms into sporty versions of the former, with hoodies, sweatpants and gym shoes. By transforming the superficial into something spiritual, she’s not only modernising but also deepening our connection to fashion. 

Kristian David is Swedish with roots in Lebanon, Syria and Iraq. To Construct a Bridge is a fitting title for such a multicultural background. His hybrid collection shows this complexity. He’s using the Palestinian shawl, keffiyeh, the long caftan with over-emphasized shoulders to mark a power relation between men and women and between the East and the West. Via this hybrid collection, he provokes both worlds. 

Idaliina Friman uses her family’s past from Northern Finland to personalise her collection called Hetta. Unusual fabrics are used, such as pet bottles as padding for her almost out-of-space looking clothes. They cover the entire body and even most of the face. The design refers to the very harsh Finnish winters and gave me shivers just to look at the clothes!

Ines Kalliala’s collection is called Personal Uniform, and as the name refers to: it consists mostly of personified suits for women and men. She uses ready-mades and vintage materials. Her motto is: “to mend and repair my favourite clothes”. Sustainability is the red thread throughout her work. The fishing net used as a veil was certainly an unusual ingredient, I thought. 

None of the designers lacks imagination, that’s for sure. Even if the clothes aren’t easy to wear, they’re certainly fun to look at and pushes one’s fantasy to its limits. It’s refreshing to see fashion as a means for esthetic communication about how our lives are shaped by the social and cultural environments we’ve grown up in. 

Like any contemporary work of art, these designs make us reflect about our stereotypes and pre-conceived ideas. This trend seems to be here to stay. Sustainability, cultural variations, personal identities and new ways of re-using old materials and fabrics is the latest fashion, at least if we consider these young designers. 

This Nordic fashion might not be so rooted in Scandinavian traditions, but it’s undoubtedly stained by a new international trend, coupled with a sustainable vision for our future world. A world that is in dire need of repair, a return to nature and to God, as this exhibition has taught me. 

Future Nordic Fashion

Prins Eugene, Waldmarsudde, Stockholm.

April 24 – Octobre 3, 2021

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ART. This is a somewhat equivocal title for this spring’s exhibition of the painter Anders Zorn (1860 – 1920), showing at our National Museum in Stockholm. It’s true that he was well-known, but for some, he’s outdated. I tried to find out what such a traditional painter can offer a contemporary viewer.  

Stockholm National Museum has finally opened its doors after several months of lockdown. It wasn’t long ago that the museum closed its doors for five years of restoration. The reopening finally took place a couple of years ago, and then the museum had to close again due to the pandemic. The museum’s permanent collections are still closed, but the museum was allowed to open this exhibition under strict Corona-restrictions. 

I guess that the museum director hopes to draw many visitors to view one of Sweden’s most renowned artists. Will the public follow? Well, that remains to be seen. I was myself a bit reluctant to go and see yet another exhibition of this for a sure skilful artist but rather conservative in his way of painting.

The exhibition is huge and covers his long life exhaustively as an artist. He developed early on in his career exceptional techniques for his water-colours, oils, etchings and sculptures. Works are shown from the National museum’s own collections that I had seen before and some from the Zorn Museum in Dalecarlia. Interestingly enough, there are also paintings from private owners that have never been shown before. 

The scenery is not exceptional – rather conventional – and less interesting than the one at Petit Palais, in Paris a few years ago. However, the sober decoration at the National Museum enhances the artworks. 

The familiarity of his paintings permitted me to study his precise brush strokes; lighting inspired by Rembrandt; special body colourings and settings, as well as his exceptional rendering of water. Somebody asked me if it was photographs or paintings when I posted some exhibition pictures on the Internet. No wonder that he gained such an international renommé during his lifetime!  

The exhibition is in chronological order: starting with his watercolours. It wasn’t until 1987 that he began painting in oil as well. There are works from his many trips abroad: from Constantinople to Alhambra, St Ives, Paris, London and several portraits that he did during his no less than seven trips to the USA. 

However, it was Dalecarlia (Dalarna), his home turf, that was closest to his heart. Zorn’s paintings from everyday life there, having dressed up his muses in their traditional clothes, give us a glimpse of the lives they lived. It’s as much a delight for the eye as it gives us a very vivid historical insight into a way of living that has long passed. Hard labour, no running water, women and children washing in the lakes or basins, brewing beer or baking bread, as well as traditional dances and drunken men. I felt as if I was partaking in their daily lives. 

Stories are being told through his paintings, just as one would read in a good book. The entirety of his works makes the person behind it interesting, like a memoir in colour. The elegant portraits also tell us something about that time’s fashion, the fabrics used, the way of portraying oneself and viewing others, whether men or women.

Anders Zorn had an eye for details that indicates a man of great sensitivity. He must have been a romantic as well. His most favoured muse was his wife, Emma, that he painted in intimate and delicate scenes. They had no children, but his love for children can be sensed by his careful and tender depictions of them in several paintings – often together with their mother. The nudes are those of a sensual man’s. 

This traditional artist, who never bent for the tendencies of the moment, but continued throughout his life to paint in his own style, is still valid in our epoch. Zorn will never become boring or out-of-date, thanks to his exceptional skills and to his sensual and deep-looking eye for details. I came out of the exhibition elevated by the beauty that my eyes had been washed with during the two hours I spent with this world-renowned painter!

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SCANDAL. In France, the intellectual socialist party members are referred to as gauche caviar – meaning a privileged group of champagne socialists. However, one after another, they have, like a house of cards, started to fall from their pedestal. 

What led to this more or less untouchable intellectual elite’s downfall, that’s what we’ll explore in this article. The MeToo movement in France didn’t make much of a buzz compared to some other western countries. Famous actresses such as Catherine Deneuve even defended the right for men to ‘flirt’ with women as they wished. 

Many contemporary intellectuals stem from the 1968 sexual liberation movement. It was a veritable revolution against their parents’ strict Catholic upbringing, which led to the contraceptive pill, abortion rights and free sex. It was the time of Brigitte Bardot, Serge Gainsbourg, Simone de Beauvoir among others. Sexuality, incest and provocation were on the agenda. There were no taboos and no rules for what was allowed and even encouraged within certain circles. 

Writers such as Gabriel Matzneff wrote openly about his love for minors. He was interviewed on French television in the 1980s, where he talked and laughed about it. Nobody objected. Frédéric Mitterand, former Minister of Culture, wrote books about his relations with young boys in Thailand, and nobody flinched.

Despite being known for his sexual affairs, Dominique Strauss-Khan hoped to become President of France when he was arrested for rape in the USA. His wife, the internationally famous journalist Anne Sinclair, stood by him during his trial. Serge Gainsbourg’s song ‘lemon incest’ that he sang together with his daughter was popular despite its theme. A provocative video, with both of them laying together half-naked on a mattress, spread widely. Nobody complained. 

Incest hasn’t been forbidden, and sex with minors was allowed as long as it was ‘consensual. How can a minor not yet developed sexually or otherwise be consenting? Isn’t that rather child molestation? Or is the family best preserved by hushing down such problems?  

Something has shifted thanks to the younger generation raising their voices. The bubble finally broke with Camille Kouchner’s book ‘La familia grande’ published at the beginning of this year. In the book, she denounced the sexual abuse of her twin brother during his teens by their stepfather, the political scientist Olivier Duhamel. Her book blew the lid off an enormous social problem in France. 

There was a huge reaction with many others coming forward to say that they, too, had been sexually abused as children. A group called Face à l’inceste – facing incest – has been formed. It affirms that at least one in ten have been abused within the family structure in France. Mostly girls and often by an uncle. The hashtag Metooinceste was coined. 

At last, a new law has been voted in the French Assembly on March 16, 2021, stipulating that sexual relations between an adult and a minor under the age of 15 years old would be punishable by law and in the case of incest, it was established at the age of 18.

France has sadly been at the forefront of sexual abuses, including numerous scandals among catholic priests abusing young boys and then covering up their deeds. It was then thought of as happening only within the seclusion of a Church that isn’t transparent and tends to cover up their traces. Not among prominent intellectual families who have often criticised the same Catholic Church.

It’s a paradox in a society with supposedly high values, and it shows the importance of transparency and openness.  It’s time for such arrogant and abusive behaviours to stop! Women and children rights must be respected.  For all those who have suffered, at last, their voices are being heard: vive la justice! Long live justice! 

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Misschiefs, a feminist collective, highlights Swedish women, artists, and designers in a fun and interdisciplinary way. Unique in its form and layout. It’s opened to the public and free of charge in the centre of Stockholm.

In this former 500 square meter laundry factory, women have taken up space in different corners, creating their works during the pandemic. ”We all need each other, and this is a fabulous place for creativity, meeting and selling art” says Paola Bjäringe, who’s behind this unique project. It’s a true possibility for exchange and to show and sell now when most venues are closed.

Stockholm is one of the few capitals in the world that has kept private galleries and museums opened. Artists and cultural workers are suffering as most don’t have any cover-up or steady income. Women artists are hard hit as they usually carry the additional burden of keeping up with their family lives. 

Misschiefs is a feminist groundbreaking show of ten trailblazing Swedish contemporary artists, designers and guests. The punk nature of their work is a crossover between art, design and handicraft. These artists were chosen in order to boost the visibility of women, and part of the sales will go to an international foundation for women. All the objects exhibited have been created exclusively for Misschiefs.

You can walk home with a cool lamp, a fluorescent glass figure, a stool made from exclusive wood, an enormous painting of a pinkish woman, a handwoven carpet, a sofa, photography, the best looking ironing board I’ve ever seen, a yellow glass table, a sculpture, a broken mirror, a tapestry, a heavy and unique vase that no mischievous cat can ever spill over… Or you can just come and chat with some of the women working on their art and interact person to person.

”We started The Case for Her because we are MISSCHIEFS. We believe that women’s health is worth going all in for. We go first. We take risks. We speak the truth. We use everything we’ve got to make it count,” according to Cristina Ljungberg, who’s not afraid of provocation and stepping out of her comfort zone. 

Art shouldn’t be a luxury – culture is needed for us humans to thrive. This pandemic has at least taught us that! To live is to create, and to create is to live. Motherhood and maternity are creative but can take the form of art instead of a baby. Some of these women demand the right NOT to have children, others enhance their own mothers. Why a feminist show? What’s so different between a woman’s and a man’s creativity? Is there a difference these days when gender seems to become more and more diffuse? The only way to find out is to come and discover for yourself.     

This pop-up show is definitely worth checking out! It will lift your spirits, inspire you, and who knows, maybe you’ll come home with one of the works to decorate your home with? Punk is fun, I assure you!

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From Kino-e-no-komatsu Collection, 1826. Translation of the inscription by: James Heaton and Toyoshima Mizuho. Published in the Kyoto Journal, No. 18, 1992

STORY. Japan closed its borders to the world for 250 years, between 1603 and 1853. No one, foreign or Japanese, could enter or leave Japan under pain of death. All European foreigners were expelled from Japan.

Autarchy, or the discreet charm of autonomy, generated unity and interior stability and a time of everlasting splendour. They learned, like the anchorites or hermits, from their inner life. I have heard it said that the long confinement and the isolated life turned the Japanese into a kind of extraterrestrials.

Agriculture, technology and communications improved. A diverse and original urban culture flourished and contributed to a new artistic pluralism. The relationship between painting, poetry and calligraphy was characteristic of artistic expression in Japan. The development of polychrome woodblock prints produced cheaply and in large quantities made possible the production and consumption of art on a scale previously unknown in Japan.

One of the best-known artists of the time is the teacher Katsushika Hokusai (1760 -1849). He was born in Edo (present Tokyo). One of his most recognised woodblock prints is the explicitly erotic woodcut known as ‘The Dream of the Fisherman’s Wife’ (in Japanese ‘Tako to ama’, ‘The Octopus and the Girl Diver’ ).

The image has mistakenly been interpreted as representing a rape with a diabolical or terrifying meaning according to a folk tradition of monsters, in a country that feeds on fish and shellfish. They have not read the text included in the work.

The original Japanese text arranged by Hokusai in the space around the three interlocking bodies says something eloquently different and more blissful. The creator’s intentions had creative bases. The work is parodic and imaginative, like all great works are, almost like an erotic comic.

What is it?

It is an octopus performing cunnilingus on a beautiful woman while another sea creature kisses her while introducing its beak into her mouth and caressing her nipple. The play is a frenzy of imagination and eroticism between a woman and her slimy lovers as they talk joyously.

What do they say?

Listen to the lust:

OCTOPUS MAXIMUS: My wish comes true at last, this day of days; finally I have you in my grasp! Your ‘bobo’ is ripe and full, how wonderful! Superior to all others! To suck and suck and suck some more. After we do it masterfully, I’ll guide you to the Dragon Palace of the Sea God and envelope you. “Zuu sufu sufu chyu chyu chyu tsu zuu fufufuuu…”

MAIDEN: You hateful octopus! Your sucking at the mouth of my womb makes me gasp for breath! Aah! yes… it’s… there!!! With the sucker, the
sucker!! Inside, squiggle, squiggle, oooh! Oooh, good, oooh good! There,
there! Theeeeere! Goood! Whew! Aah! Good, good, aaaaaaaaaah! Not yet! Until now, it was I that men called an octopus! An octopus! Ooh! Whew! How are you able…!? Ooh! ‘yoyoyooh, saa… hicha hicha gucha gucha, yuchyuu chyu guzu guzu suu suuu….’

OCTOPUS MAXIMUS: All eight limbs to intertwine with!! How do you like it this way? Ah, look! The inside has swollen, moistened by the warm waters of lust. “Nura nura doku doku doku…”

MAIDEN: Yes, it tingles now; soon, there will be no sensation at all left in my hips. Ooooooh! Boundaries and borders gone! I ‘ve vanished….!!!!!!

OCTOPUS MINIMUM: After daddy finishes, I too want to rub and rub my suckers at the ridge of your furry place until you disappear. Then I’ll suck some more, “chyu chyu…”

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ART. L’Exibition(niste) – is a play of words with the English word ‘exhibition’ and the word ‘exhibitionist’. This famous French shoe creator is showing his art in the Palais de la Porte Dorée, Paris, for the first time.

There’s a reason for France’s leading role as the handicraft’s Eldorado. Fashion and especially its haute couture have helped preserve these artisans that are so skilled at their professions. But what would they be without the creators and designers?

This February 26, 2020, I took the long subway drive to the other side of Paris to this Arts Deco palace, built-in 1931. It’s an imposing building that used to host African and Oceanic works of art (now in Quai Branly) as well as an enormous aquarium – that’s still there in the basement – but has lately been renamed the Museum of Immigration. So what do shoes have to do with immigration? I pondered the question.

I was soon to find out that Christian Louboutin loves to travel, and different cultures have inspired his creations, as displayed in this fascinating exhibition. Shoes are, of course, made for walking in, but his creations looked more like pieces to be exhibited rather than to be worn. They’re so intrinsically well embroidered, designed, assembled, coloured…

An imitation of a craftsman’s room is part of the exhibition, and the layperson can follow the creation from it’s beginning, as a drawing on a piece of paper, to its final stage. Using unusual materials, such as fish skin or tree barks for example, and working closely together with other artists from the pop culture, dance, theatre or literature and even from the cinema. Just to mention a few of his collaborators: the photographer and filmmaker, David Lynch; Lisa Reihana video artist from New Zealand; the English designers Whitaker and Malem; the Spanish choreographer, Bianca Li.

Of course, there can’t be a shoe exhibition without a blink towards the fondness of certain people towards fetishism. Finally the “imaginary museum” illustrates works of his most cherished artists.

In the first room, the visitor is introduced to the architecture of the place through colourful and fun glass windows, not depicting the usual Biblical scenes as found in churches, but shoes and boots. These are mixed with an array of shoes as well as drawings and designs.

In the middle of the “treasury” room, an enormous crystal sculpture made in India is surrounded by shoes inspired by his travels. Then comes the “nudes” where Louboutin shows his inspiration for human skin to make shoes or boots looking like “a prolongation of one’s body”.

In the atelier, I learned, through video clips and utensils, about the shoemaking skills. A Bhutanese theatre showing a spectacle pointed to his Asian inspiration.

After viewing a large video from New Zealand, I arrived in the “pop corridor” – covered in bright red and entirely mirrored – where, apart from pictures of movie stars wearing his shoes, his first men’s collection is displayed.

Of course, there can’t be a shoe exhibition without a blink towards the fondness of certain people towards fetishism. Finally the “imaginary museum” illustrates works of his most cherished artists.

An unforgettable image is one of the singer Aretha Franklin’s all dressed in red, wearing the famous fire-red Louboutins, which have become his fans favourite brand. “I was sitting in my atelier and saw my assistant’s red nail- polish and decided to try it under a black high heel shoe, added some varnish to it and that was it. I never thought that it would make a world-wide hit!” he admitted. But there you are, creativity and boldness can lead to unexpected results.

Art can be seen in everything, it’s a question of having the eye and the imagination. Then it takes the skill, of course. Christian Louboutin has revealed that he masters them all. Craftsmanship has been disappearing in the Western world since the beginning of the industrial area, but it’s not too late to retrieve it, as haute couture shows.

Many women would die for just one pair of his shoes, and so would I, for sure! However, as long as my valet doesn’t permit me such extravaganza, I enjoyed admiring them in the Palais de la Porte Dorée.

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LIFE. The legend says that Gregorio Fuentes is the alter ego of the old Santiago, from the novel “The Old Man and The Sea”, that he has delivered version-myths: once they were navigating through Pinar del Río and they saw an old boat with an elder and a boy.

The elder was fighting with a swordfish bigger than his boat. They approached to help him. As they approached, the old man started yelling: “American, son of a bitch, get out here”. Hemingway told him:” don’t mind him”. When they were away, he said: “I am going to write a book about this story”.

Everything could be doubted. But, what we cannot doubt in is that there in Cojimar, between fishers, was spawned “The Old Man and The Sea”. We must also believe in the legend, that he wrote it, as usual, standing up and in his portable Royal typewriter.

The last time Gregorio saw Hemingway in 1960, he told him: “take care of Pilar as you have been doing.” Then he came back to his country and the next year he committed suicide. That it was a case of suicide, for respect to the dead, we cannot doubt. Neither I hesitate to believe that the writer left the yacht El Pilar to Gregorio in his will. I think it was an act of brotherhood.

Gregorio Fuentes has said too that he named the novel. Hemingway would have asked him: “What title should I give it, Gregorio?” And he answered: “haven’t we met an elder? And wasn’t he in the middle of the sea? So, there you have the name”.

Everything could be doubted, but I don’t have any doubt that the old Gregorio knew Hemingway better than his 4 wives. In the 1950s,  Hemingway was a star. But his works were suffering the sourness of the critic. His editor returned him some manuscript because it was not publishable. But he liked the story about an old Cuban man and his dramatic story, 84 days in the sea obsessed with catching a swordfish.

In 1952 in Life magazine, The Old Man and The Sea was published. It was a success. Critics were talking about a classic then. The Old Man and The Sea won Pulitzer Prize. In 1954, Hemingway won Nobel Prize. That distinction was dedicated to the fishers, and he deposited the medal before the Virgin of Charity of The Copper, Catholic Patron of Cuba.

The last time Gregorio saw Hemingway in 1960, he told him: “take care of Pilar as you have been doing.” Then he came back to his country and the next year he committed suicide. That it was a case of suicide, for respect to the dead, we cannot doubt. Neither I hesitate to believe that the writer left the yacht El Pilar to Gregorio in his will. I think it was an act of brotherhood.

But Gregorio could not guarantee the yacht security. He says that he talked to Fidel Castro when he went to visit it. The truth is that shortly the Comandante sent a crane and a van, took it away. The ship where he caught needlefish and “hunted” German submarines along with Gregorio Fuentes sits now at the Vigia Ranch, in its yard, between ferns, mango trees, and the sons of his cats.

That is the truth.

(Translated by: Fernanda Manzano and Claudia Pérez)

The post Hemingway, The Old Man and The Sea – part 2 first appeared on Opulens.

Photograph: Anne Edelstam. Edited by Opulens 

TEA CULTURE. Just a short drive from the heart of Nairobi, Kenya, I had the pleasure of getting an insight into life on a settler’s tea plantation. Nairobi isn’t a pretty city but it has the advantage of being close to nature and wildlife delights.

This cloudy but pleasantly warm morning, we drove up the hills to Kiambethu farm in Limuru province at an elevation of some 2000 meters. Fiona Vernon – whose grandfather planted tea there in 1918 – came out to welcome us to her spot of paradise, situated in a particularly lush and green part of Kenya.

We were a bit early, so I had ample time to stroll around in her marvellous garden, with flowers that we in Europe can only buy expensively in a few exclusive shops. The colourful birds were rejoicing at collecting their sweet nectar. The gardener was busy cleaning away the weeds but happy to take a break and tell me about all the different plants they were growing.

When the rest of the group had all arrived, Fiona started the tour around her nowadays much smaller tea plantation. She explained how her grandfather, A.B. McDonell, had bought the farm and was the first person to grow, make and sell tea commercially in Kenya – now one of the country’s biggest exports.

That was approximately at the same time as Karen Blixen and her husband, the Swedish Baron Bror Blixen, started their coffee farm not far away. Their life story is told in Karen’s autobiography “Out of Africa”, later turned into a movie, starring Meryl Streep and Robert Redford.

Tea was easier to grow than coffee in these hills, though. It grew so well that a factory was built on the farm. It was in use until the 1960s. Finally, parts of the farm were sold to a neighbouring Kenyan tea farmer and only a small portion left for the family.

However, it still provides enough tea leaves for the farm to survive. Fiona showed us the tea plants and how the leaves are delicately picked daily by hand. The leaves are put in baskets that the pickers carry on their backs before spreading them out on blankets on the floor. Each day they have to be taken to a tea factory for immediate processing.

Each farm’s tealeaves are mixed according to quality determined by specialized tea-tasters and then sent to the auctions at the Mombasa docks. The tea brokers know the areas and their different flavours, and can thus craft the blend that suits their brand. It’s seldom that a tea is made from only one plantation. Mombasa is the port for most of the African tea-growing countries, and from there the tea is then shipped off to faraway lands.

So whenever you take a sip of Lipton tea, you also have a taste of Kenya. Your warming cup of tea has made it through many hands and has travelled far to reach your taste buds. There are many miseries in this world of ours but equally many miracles. Let’s not forget that and treasure what we do have, giving all tea farmers around the world a thankful thought and, as far as I am concerned, especially Fiona and her pickers. I will definitely never take my morning tea for granted any more!

The post Discovering a genuine tea farm first appeared on Opulens.

SATIRE. Peter Johansson, a controversial contemporary artist, together with Ewa Kumlin, the Swedish Institute’s director, presented this winter’s exhibition, called ‘National Therapy’, to an amazed French public.

The Swedish Institute (that was saved in extremis, a few years ago, from being closed down due to lack of funds) is situated in the hub of Paris’ art scene, in the Marais. It has become of the most frequented art arenas of this cultural capital. Parisians flock to the ancestral palace, with its exhibitions, café and lush garden.

The opening was held on a chilly November evening with the artist and the SI-director explaining his works in the institute’s garden. A tent had been put up serving beer and sausages. Furthermore, sausages are definitely a recurrent theme in Peter’s art, as is he himself, dressed or undressed (more often than not).

An enormous stuga (cottage on Swedish) painted in the typical red colour of most Swedish country-houses, rotated in mid-air above our heads. The sculpture, named ‘Family Therapy’, invites the audience to raise questions about what the family stands for in our contemporary world. Like the rest of Peter’s works which show no boundary when it comes to mocking and making fun of anything that has to do with nationalism, patriotism, traditions or conventional family life.

The institute’s ground floor was buzzing with fans blowing air on a sculpture with Swedish flags, next to a homemade canon piercing embroidered paintings of a house and Beatbox, a sound sculpture, shouting out the unofficial national hymn of the Swedish Nazi movement. Next to which was one of the artist’s several auto-portraits, depicting Hitler with bacon as hair and moustache.

An entire wall is dedicated to photographs of Peter naked; painted in the colours of the typical Dalacarian wooden horse; dressed up like the famous 19^th-century artist, Anders Zorn; or enveloped as a sausage. His imagination shows no limits in depicting and making fun of every typical Swedish stereotype.

On the upper floor, usually devoted to among others, Alexander Roslin, an ancient royal painter, the walls had been covered by wooden panels, pierced with holes for the audience to catch a glimpse of diverse more or less explicit and fun mockeries of the aristocracy of the time, but not without expressing some self-irony, as well as more or less explicit sexual connotations. I was wondering what he might have experienced in his life, to show such contempt for his own body and sexuality in general?

Sausages were sticking out in most of the works, making it, at least for me, impossible to go out and eat one afterwards in the kiosk that served them in the garden.  The entire exhibition might be analysed as a derision of the Swedish National Right party or SD (Sverigedemokraterna) that seems to be taking the country by storm, but equally as a surrealist sense of humour, making fun at anything conventional.

Peter’s humanity transpires by showing our vulnerability and shortcomings as mere humans thrown into the violence of the world.  He does not seem to take the discussion further, into a spiritual or godly possibility; there is no offer of redemption. That is maybe why the exhibition left me with a sense of unease and hopelessness.

Undoubtedly, the exposition will raise more questions than it will answer. The question is whether it will draw the French public to want to explore Sweden further or on the contrary, to get as far away from it as possible?

However, it is not the artist’s job to attract tourists but rather to raise uncomfortable questions. Moreover, in that respect, we must admit that Peter Johansson has succeeded over expectations!

The post Satiric artist shown at the Swedish Institute in Paris first appeared on Opulens.