Reykjavík Grapevine - 31.07.2009, Qupperneq 38

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The Reykjavík Grapevine
Issue 11 — 2009 Flight provided by Air Iceland.
Book flight at www.airiceland.is
Travel | Festivals
Seyðisfjörður Reveals Its Private Parts
Art Riot LungA takes place for the tenth time
After the Króna reached a new low –
vamping up a settlement-style quar-
antine that imprisoned penniless and
puzzled Icelanders in the process – it
has proven to be an unavoidable activity
during the summer to attend some of the
heaps of hyped-up festivals going on in
rural villages in Iceland. It doesn’t really
matter if it’s a music feast, an artsy carni-
val or raunchy nastiness disguised with
euphemistic façade; it’s simply a must. If
you fail to attend, your Facebook will be
mocked for the lack of f lipped out-pics,
you won’t be able to contribute to bar
conversations and may even face social
excommunication. In that spirit, I visited
the infamous LungA festival in Seyðis-
fjörður. It was a blast.
BERLIN OF THE NORTH?
Seyðisfjörður has obtained a status as
a haven for artists who assert that the
town possesses inspiring muses of some
sort. Since Dieter Roth started hanging
around the spot many years back, f locks
of artists have taken residence in the
small town. Some go as far as claiming
its culture status so high these days that
it deems comparison to Berlin rather
than Reykjavik. Because of my photogra-
pher’s somewhat romantic nature, I had
some alone time to shed a light on these
claims by myself.
The workshops the LungA council
operates every year were in full motion
when I started snooping around, and if
you crept up against the right walls you
could hear stomp symphonies led by
Gísli Galdur and Davíð Þór and enthu-
siastic sketching sounds from the pupils
of Grapevine’s very own Hugleikur. Even
more apparent were the drama kids with
red noses running all around, or the
Henrik Vibskov herd that he led behind
him in a religious manner boasting dif-
ferent and more absurd outfits every day,
getting up to more and more ludicrous
activities every moment.
This culture filled town could eas-
ily live up to the hype, at least during
their week of havoc. But it wasn’t only
the workshops that made the tiny town
seem metropolitan. On the contrary,
with a population just over 700 they
manage to operate four pubs, a dozen
galleries, a breakfast diner, an artsy café/
cinema (something that cannot be found
in Reykjavík at all), plus some hilarious
artwork, like the neon lit “Hollywood”
sign on the mountainside (courtesy of
Goddur, the town’s patron).
After looking around, I could conclude
two things: while “Berlin of the North”
is maybe somewhat (ludicrously) boast-
ful, Seyðisfjörður sure is something. Sec-
ondly, I’d had enough playing the lonely
tourist: partying down was the order of
the day. Thus, the Kimi tour couldn’t
have arrived at a better time.
DINGY CROWD AND DROWSY
COPS
This peaceful village I’d grown fond of
over the last two days – so nurturing to
the arts and wonderfully calm – under-
went a makeover that Friday night. 5.000
hooligans, raising tents and filling up
moonshine containers, joined the 400
festival attendees that had been there for
the week. The local Kaffibarinn, Láran,
had borrowed every single drop of liquor
from other fjords in the vicinity; every-
thing headed towards drunken oblivion.
After having boiled out the previous
day’s rather minimal sins in the town’s
excellent sauna, buried in a dungeon-like
basement with the hot tubs, there was
nothing left but getting some buzzes
on. Reykjavik! kicked of the Kimi line-up
after warm-ups from several non-Kimi
touring acts. Grapevine’s editor along
with his Reykjavik! comrades fired up
the dancehall with bulletproof ravers
that set the bar high for the subsequent
bands: Sudden Weather Change and
Swords of Chaos. Nevertheless, they kept
on delivering in the same manner, so it
was hard to exit the concert without be-
ing soaked in beer and a pesky static in
your ears.
Outside the venue, it seemed like the
buzz hadn’t prompted the same eupho-
ria in everyone, ‘cause some of the locals
had begun acting aggressively. An at-
tendant from Reykjavík had apparently
infuriated one of Seyðisfjörður’s dames.
In turn, the debutante had gathered a
flock of valkyries around him that stood
yelling obscene words at him and hitting
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