FFF #11: Ásmundarsafn and Te og kaffi at Borgartún 21A
I aaaalmost didn’t make it out of the house for an outing today…
First of all, I hadn’t formally planned anything (although I had an idea or two kicking around), and secondly, I was really tired for some reason. But, the weather outside was lovely, so after laying in bed for a bit, I rallied and kicked myself out of the house.
Today’s destination was one of those places I’d driven past thousands of times, but never actually entered.
It’s called Ásmundarsafn, or the Museum of Ásmundur Sveinsson. He was a sculptor, who built and lived in the house that currently houses the museum. Go here to check out his catalog owned by the museum.
I was duly impressed by the building itself, as well as some of his pieces. Ásmundur was probably a pretty cool cat in his day and age!
Alongside the works of Ásmundur were more recent works by other Icelandic artists. They were more hit or miss. (55 images total)
At the museum entrance. The museum sits on the edge of an outdoorsy sports and family area called Laugardalur (The valley of the hot springs – people used to wash their clothes there).
Yes, that’s where I was.
The show posters for the current show. The title was offputting enough for me that I’d put this on the backburner, but I’m pretty happy I went anyway.
Image taken from one end of the first part of the house, looking over to the other end. In the foreground is a modern installation, but at the other end is the work of Ásmundur, set up ‘workshop’ style. All the walls slant inwards, Egyptian-pyramid style.
Tools are important.
In the main house (under the dome) was a series of images explaining the construction of the house. This drawing shows the last part that Ásmundur himself had built, “The Shed” (Skemman) wich was intended to display his work, and store stuff that wouldn’t survive outside. Apparently he built a model, and then got an architect friend of his to actually draw it up!
This guy definitely knew what he was doing!
Adoration.
Cute light! The entrance free is 1300 ISK ($11) but I used my ‘Cultural Card’ for a ‘free’ entry. One more visit and it will have been worth it.
I started by entering the dome. The building was built in four stages: 1) A cube topped by a dome, 2) The front rooms with slanted outer walls, 3) the semi-circular ‘shed’ out back, and 4) a smaller semi-circle connecting the shed to the cube (posthumous).
The most intriguing bit there was this weird automatic electric/chemistry thing by Ragnar Már Nikulásson.
All the wires and logic circuits made sense when the little conveyor belt turned on, and a dripper dripped some (saltwater?) drops on the plate below before retracting.
Looking under the electrified circular plate. (Hey, it’s a mini-selfie!)
The other two works in there were by Ásmundur. They were very triangular. Apparently, this dome-room was the initial workroom, but it soon became too small (hence the front rooms). The acoustics of this room must have been maddening though, because sound does not behave in there like in your ordinary average rectangular room.
I may or may not have sat down on the floor and taken a few photos.
It certainly looks like this piece has ‘grown’ over the course of the exhibit, since it went live in January.
Anyway, on to more mundane things. Lets all enjoy some arches, triangles, and straight lines.
The view out the window.
Looking back into the cube under the dome, where Ásmundur used to actually live. Those four posters on the far wall detailed the building history.
Looking from the little coffee nook down onto the two semi-circular halls.
I was pretty meh about both of these modern works, the one on the floor was literally pieces of linoleum put together in a pattern, which would have been fine except that it used patterns that bring up bad memories.
This string-thingy on the other hand was buckets of fun to look at and contemplate. It completely changed in appearance depending on your location.
Strings and a changing perspective.
An Ásmundur-one. His work spanned the very masculine (virile?) to the very feminine (people hugging, mother and child).
The title of this work had something to do with somebody getting somebody a drink. Pretty nifty!
In the ‘shed’ proper were more works. I think these were musings on ‘brackets’ as in { }. Yup.
The { } from the other (correct?) side. Much more colorful!
Nice stapling job!
The colored fabric was significantly less interesting to me than the curved radiators! Curved! Awesome! Slightly more disturbing was the fact that the radiators kept making ticking sounds, which carried really well.
I was kinda more enamored with the different pedestals for these than the objects sitting on them. See the melting one?
That blue ex-computer-monitor part, was wrapped in an ex-curtain part, and fitted with a wheel. Yay?
Nice building is nice.
Outside the house is a pretty big garden full of sculptures.
A miniature version of a big sculpture which lives out in front of the main building of the University of Iceland. It depicts Sæmundur on the seal. Garbage bins happened to be where the sun was shining.
Ásmundur made a few huuuge sculptures of humanoids. They’re pretty impressive up close. Also, yes, can you tell the front part of the house is influenced by Egyptian structures?
Mother Earth. I was tempted to take a picture of her very ample bum, but restrained myself. Feel kinda sad about it now.
Tenderness coupled with something much more abstract in the distance.
There’s a human in there somewhere.
The back garden is big. And oh, there’s a little bit of green grass peeking through the old growth!
So, I took this picture of this big hunk of something there in the distance.
Coming closer I realized that I was looking at four hooves… and probably a horse’s head, and at least one arm.
Yes, that is the Ride in (through) Hell. Darn impressive.
Hey there 2013 Tree of the City.
Back on the other side was Móðir mín í kví, kví. It’s a sad story.
Another parting shot of Sæmundur on the seal.
One more of the house. I really like this house.
Next I went looking for a spot to get me some hot chocolate. I tried Gló, which is located behind the Museum, but they’re closed on Sundays, even though they seemed to be hosting a confirmation party.
I therefore drove a little further on, towards downtown, but decided to detour through the ‘financial district’. There I found an open coffee house, opposite this building site.
Te and kaffi (Tea and Coffee) is a chain in Iceland. This one lives in the same house as Statistics Iceland.
They live right next to this building which houses the National Registry among other government agencies.
The city of Reykjavik has recently spent a great deal of money to redo Borgartún as a more pedestrian- and bike-friendly street. Included were these swanky street-lights, which will probably be very expensive to maintain. Oh, designers.
Inside the coffee shop. It was also swanky.
I was surprised by the number of people in there, since all the surrounding businesses were closed on Sundays. I arrived some 20 minutes before closing (5 pm) but the girl taking the orders seemed to have already mentally checked out. I can’t really blame her!
More seating space in the back. Lots of cool chairs.
After walking for a while, I was back to being tiiiired, although I was happy that my heel mostly held up. The sugar was much appreciated.
They cheated by putting chocolate syrup on top, but I was low on sugar so the hot chocolate gets a 4 out of 5. The carrot cake was on the dry side, but it was tasty.
And last, but hopefully not least, a selfie!