Busy Spring, Part 2

OK, Part 2. Picking up where we left off, which was in Oslo or something like that...

All the while, even as we were going on these various trips, we were also working on the renovation of our workshop. As that project creeped closer to completion, we began in earnest to look for metal-working tools. At some point Christina responded to a classified ad for a good-looking belt sander, and when we drove to the seller's location, only a few minutes from our homestead, we were surprised to walk into one of the largest machine shops I've ever seen, boasting the largest lathe in Skåne! 

Kodiak next to the largest lathe in Skåne

It turned out that the proprietor, a really nice guy named Farhad who emigrated here from Afghanistan a decade ago, was selling a lot of equipment, and we ended up buying the belt sander, a plate roller, and a beautiful metal table from him. Not long after that, Christina managed to find an old USSR-built pneumatic power hammer in Lithuania which she promptly painted fuchsia and named Ludmila.

But with all these heavy tools slowly making their way to Spitfire Konstbruk och Smide (the name of our newly-formed business) we were in need of a way to move these tools into our shop. That meant two things: 1) we needed a forklift, and 2) we needed to make a big door in our shop that the forklift could get through, where there was none before. I know that it must be only a small portion of this blog's readership who gives a shit about heavy equipment, but I can tell you that I was quite excited to find this Swedish-built Stocka 3-ton forklift at an auction. 

Unloading my new plate roller

Although it's rated at 3 tons, that fact that it can move the old babushka Ludmila, who weighs in at a hefty 3.3 tons, proves it's a conservative rating. 

It was around this time, as spring started to poke through the gloom, that the waves of house-guests started to wash up onto our shores. The first to arrive - and almost the last to leave - was our dear friend Brian Malley from Canada. Brian spent almost seven weeks here with us, mostly helping us build the shop and the other spaces, but also having fun adventures like bicycling in Copenhagen and camping in Portugal (more on that in a second!)

BRIAN!

I mentioned that Brian helped us build the 'other spaces.' Immediately upon his arrival, Brian, Christina, our friend Kryzs and I transformed a crappy and mostly empty space into a cozy and comfy self-contained guest apartment in only 2 weeks! 

BEFORE

AFTER

The apartment was put to good use; over the last few months we have had the pleasure of visits from Brian, Matt and Richard from Taos, Amy Westphall from Santa Fe, Cedar from Taos, my mom from Greece, and Eileen... also from Taos. 

Once the apartment was finished, we shifted focus back to the workshop. 

The workshop, early in the renovation...

After sorting out the ceiling and walls, the final hurdle was to cut the aforementioned door into the end wall of the building, big enough to move materials and tools in and out. By this time we were joined by Cedar, and all those capable hands made the job a success. 

Brian beginning to cut through the brick wall, and...

...the (almost) finished result.

And the shop today.

Of all the spaces we have renovated in the last few months, though.. the one that excites me the most is probably my art studio. I had been working on this space, slowly and by myself, over the months as time allowed. Once the shop and the apartment were finished, however, Brian and Cedar gave a huge push of energy and helped bring it to completion. I think that, of all the spaces we've renovated here, the difference between beginning and end is perhaps the largest in my studio. 

A series of photos showing the evolution of my studio space. As I write this, I have now mostly moved in and I am so excited to start working in there.  

When the building was finally done, we found ourselves in a strange situation. You may remember that Christina's sculpture, the Flybrary, was purchased by a young entrepreneur in Portugal. The purchaser decided at some point to build a new sculpture park in eastern Portugal, and the primary purpose of Brian's and Cedar's visit to Europe was to help move move the sculpture from the private estate where it now resides to the location of the new sculpture park. My mother had also arrived here in Sweden to look after Kodiak while we were working down south. However, in the weeks leading up to our departure on this scheduled work trip, there were problems with engineering documents, building permits, and equipment rentals, and the whole plan to relocate the sculpture fell apart. Everyone had taken off time from their busy lives to make this happen, and in recognition of this fact the purchaser of the sculpture generously agreed to pay us all almost 50% of what we would have earned on the job. So here we all were, in Europe with pre-purchased plane tickets to Portugal and a little extra cash. As a sort of farewell to Brian and Cedar and a closing of this chapter, we decided to rent a camper van and take a tour of Portugal! The highlights were the beaches...

 and the charming town of Porto. 

Probably the best thing we saw in Porto...

And the series of ridiculous 'band photos' we took! 

After 5 days in the van together we said bittersweet farewells and went our separate ways.

After Portugal, with no more house-guests, Sweden suddenly felt lonely. But there is never a shortage of things to do around here. And even after almost 2 years, we are in some ways still in the process of arriving. I have recently applied for the extension of my residency permit (which is a cumbersome process involving a period of time after the expiration of my first permit but before the approval of my second permit in which I am therefor quasi-illegal here). And, as of yesterday, I am finally the proud holder of a Swedish motorcycle license! It's actually kind of a big deal because, while the test for the car license is offered in Swedish, English, and Arabic, the motorcycle test is only offered in Swedish. I had to learn a lot of new Swedish, but about 10 days ago, I passed it!  My actual driving test was yesterday, which was also not exactly easy, but I passed that too and so now I can ride here!

This entire winter and spring, with all the building and visits, has felt a lot like a chapter in this story of moving to Sweden that we are writing. To mark the end of this chapter, and hopefully the beginning of a new one, we decided to have a party! We invited pretty much everyone we knew, and even with 10 or 15 of our friends not showing up, we still had a little over 40 people come see our new setup. Technically it was a 'shop-warming' party, but really it was a bit more than that. The shop was clean and well-organized, the tools were all out and on display, and the party functioned - or at least I hoped it would function - as a sort of flashing billboard, advertising to our nascent community that we are here, ready to start working, hoping to do cool stuff and integrate. (Or to put it another way, as our friend Benjamin recently did... Now that we've finished the hard work of building the spaces, now comes the even harder work of working IN the spaces.)

Party!

If you find yourself reading this blog and thinking that we must be running out of money by this point, you would be correct. Everything we have done up to this point has been fantastically expensive, and the resources we amassed by selling sculptures, cars, and even our house have now been more-or-less depleted. So yes, it's time for us to work. I have submitted proposals to a few opportunities for building new sculpture; so far none have been approved but I will continue submitting. With the skills and resources at our disposal, there must certainly be many ways that Christina and I can make an income from our own shop, and we are hoping to find those channels before we are forced to take hourly jobs. Speaking personally, I would like nothing more than to make paintings and sculptures and be able to earn a living doing that. Fingers crossed.

Speaking of which, here's some more art...

A pencil drawing done with no visual reference... harder than it sounds!

Another drawing. I continue to be inspired by the structural and conceptual overlap between tree branches and the female body. I recently proposed another sculpture on this theme to a sculpture park in Oslo. Here's the proposal image:

If the people in Oslo reject this proposal, I think I will just build it anyway. This whole construct of waiting and hoping for some curator or another to say YES to your idea is totally fucked. It kills the spirit of the artist, and the art-making. I've made some of my best work just because I wanted to.

And here's a sculpture that I'm close to finishing, which I will likely cast in bronze...

Kodiak and I will be going back to the States on Monday. We will spend a week in New Hampshire with my brother Trevor, and about three weeks in Taos, where we will be joined by Christina. As with my previous trips to Taos, I am not too excited about this one because it feels like a disruption to the flow of things here. But I imagine that, just as I did on my previous trips, I will find being in Taos unexpectedly enjoyable. It's always fun to see old friends and visit old familiar places, and Taos is a magically beautiful place after all. 

If you made it all the way through to the end of Part 2, thanks! I hope to see all of you soon.

Hugs,

Christian