Day 25. "What Sweden needs? More art historians." This was stated in the daily paper Dagens industri August 10, 2018. Source: https://www.di.se/ledare/arvid-ahlund-vad-sverige-behover-fler-konstvetare/. Of, course, this felt wonderful. Instead of the constant nagging about humanities education being useless, in particular if you want a real...
Day 24. Reading the daily paper, deeply touched by an interview with artist Marie-Louise Ekman. Grief, and the headstone she created after her husband Gösta Ekman's (1939-2017) death. Scenographic in a heartening and hopeful way. Truly transforming space, even mediated through daily papers and new information technologies. Height: 1,72 cm, the same...
Day 23. Or rather, night 23. Going through notes from my old lectures on scenography. Found some notes on performance scholar Peggy Phelan's attempt at performative and also scenographic writing:
Day 22. TGIF: It is getting late. Admittedly, I usually have a lot of problems with Madama Butterfly, and tend to avoid performances of it. Now, this has changed: Still in my memory, the intense, critical, affective (I cried all of second section) scenographic experince from Madama Butterfly at the Gothenburg Opera...
Day 21. Late afternoon in the office. My mother got lost today, because of a fire that created chaos in the tram system. She did not have her mobile phone with her. I described her at the lovely local book shop and coffée place Lohrs and a lot of people looked out for her. Eventually she showed up. I...
Day 20. Finally, after a very long journey from the US to my office, the August Strindberg and Visual Culture (Bloomsbury 2018) anthology has arrived here, in Gothenburg. I hold it in my hands, open it by chance: chapter 4, and yes, there is Eszter Szalczer on forest imagery, bloodstained landscapes, so very ...nordic noire.... You know, Eszter...
Day 19. Technology is one of the key dimensions and concepts of scenography and the scenographic. A new potentially exciting book to read:
Day 18. In the archive (well, again). Exploring experimental dance and scenography during the 1960's. Found Harvey Cropper's ground breaking scenography for Conny Borg's experimental dance work Ritornell. Here a visual note from the theatrical commections at the Gothenburg Museum. Think expressive colour, blood plasma. Think creative light. Think...
Day 17. A few hours in the sun, by the sea, then back to the article I'm writing on The New Swedish Ballet (1970). I am interested in demonstrating the capabilities of a scenographic perspective as a way of better understanding what the dance group struggled to achieve under the six months it existed.
Day 16. This has caught my attention: "The Radical Tenderness* Manifesto is an embodied poetic exercise of resistance where we dive into this seemingly oxy-moronic term asking ourselves: 'how can radical be tender - and tenderness be radical - in our alliances, our communities, and our interpersonal relationships?" More here: ...