What do six Icelandic artists do when they hit Calgary, Alberta, a metropolis right in the middle of Canada’s great western cow country? They find the biggest western apparel store they can find, of course, and dude themselves up cowboy-style in ten-gallon hats, tall-boots, embroidered shirts and jeans. Then it’s off to the tiny Truck Gallery, where the art opening to mark their compelling, eclectic and very Icelandic show is being held.
The show is called Sundogs, and it’s a part of the Núna (now) festival, which is headquartered in Winnipeg and is now in its second year. The Núna (now) mandate is to encourage, and if need be to forge, creative confluences between the artists of Iceland and those in North America who are merely descended from Icelanders.
The artists are a beguiling and eccentric lot. They include such talented art stars as Ásdís Sif Gunnarsdóttir and Ragnar Kjartansson (veterans of the inaugural Núna (now) event held in Winnipeg last spring), Hekla Dögg Jónsdóttir, Palli Banine, Sirra Sigrun Sigurdardóttir and that great showman Erling T. V. Klingenberg. Woe betide the Icelandic art scene if the airplane carrying this lot had dropped into the ocean on the way back home!
Fortunately, it did not. But if the Sundogs show had stood as their last, these artists would have nothing to be ashamed of. Their work was varied and fascinating, from Banine’s meticulous ink renderings to the beautiful ambient videos of Sirra Sigrun, to Hekla Dögg’s lovely, verdant installation. Ragnar Kjartansson (whose work will soon be seen in the Artists’ Corner section of this newspaper) produced a beguiling series of drawings which covered one entire wall, and Ásdís Sif’s contributions to the show included a wondrous video created in Paris.
The show-stopper of the evening had to be the performance by
Erling T.V. Klingenberg. He had hired a local country band, renamed them “The Stimulators,” and placed them atop a large wooden crate. Then he climbed inside the crate, into which a television and a lump of clay had already been placed.
The Stimulators swung into a loose, jam-style song apparently titled
“Erling T.V. Klingenberg,” as these words were the song’s only lyrics. Within the box, as he was being serenaded with his own name, Erling T.V. Klingenberg performed an act so vile that propriety, and probably some sort of obscenity law, forbids any further detailing of it here.
Klingenberg emerged from the crate to rapturous applause, and placed the results of his abominable handiwork on a nearby plinth.
From there on it was a jolly art opening indeed. According to Truck Gallery director Renato Vitic, it was one of the most popular the Truck Gallery had ever hosted.
After the opening, the assembled art fans, artists and representatives of Núna (now) (who had traveled from Winnipeg to Calgary for the event) made their way to a nearby bar for an après-opening party.
There, the drinks flowed, and there were further beguiling entertainments. Ragnar Kjartansson, for example, strummed his folk-guitar and sang about his fear of teenagers, while Ásdís Sif and Hekla Dögg dressed in angel smocks and danced a performance art through the entire bar.
Pleasing to the eye, the ear, and to sundry other senses, the Sundogs art show in Calgary was a rousing success. There was no doubting that the good people of Calgary enjoyed a genuine Icelandic treat that night!
