Reykjavík Grapevine - 05.07.2013, Blaðsíða 50

50The Reykjavík Grapevine Issue 9 — 2013
Helgi Hrafn Guðmundsson is one of the editors of an Icelandic web magazine called Lemúrinn (Icelandic for the
native primate of Madagascar). A winner of the 2012 Icelandic Web Awards, Lemurinn.is covers all things strange
and interesting! Go check it out at www.lemurinn.is.
Was Reykjavík A Shithole In The Seventies?
Words by Helgi Hrafn Guðmundsson – Photos by Christian Bickel
“This is the ugly city of my youth,” wrote the prominent
writer Guðmundur Andri Thorsson about a Facebook al-
bum of photos taken when he was a teenager in Reykja-
vík during the seventies.
It was clear after the photos had spread through the
Icelandic social media channels that the majority who
witnessed—or should we say survived—the seventies in
Reykjavík were not particularly nostalgic for the period,
which was dominated by high inflation rates and the Cod
Wars (confrontations with Britain over fishing rights in
the North Atlantic).
But why was Reykjavík “uglier” then? One reason
might be that many of the old houses in the centre were
decaying as the movement for the preservation of his-
toric buildings did not gain momentum until later. There
were also no tall trees or bushes. And Reykjavík was
definitely not a cosmopolitan city in the seventies. There
were hardly any bars or clubs, and beer was strictly for-
bidden. The winters were colder and the colours seemed
to be greyer than they are today.
US President Richard Nixon and French Presi-
dent Georges Pompidou met at Kjarvalsstaðir
art museum in the summer of 1973. His first
night in Iceland, Nixon went for a spontaneous
midnight walk from the U.S. Embassy to the
nearby pond Tjörnin. Only two bodyguards and
two Icelandic policemen accompanied Nixon,
who stopped by every person that he met and
greeted them, especially the kids. "Everybody
knew him, and the people welcomed him, ex-
cept for one man, who was quite drunk and
wanted to give Nixon a lesson," one of the po-
licemen said later in a newspaper interview.
Icelandic filmmaker Friðrik Þór Friðriksson, who
began his career in the ‘70s, tells this story about
German director Werner Herzog’s visit to Reykjavík:
“Werner Herzog came to Iceland in 1979—at
that point there was no film production in Iceland.
At a press conference he was asked whether he be-
lieved there would ever be an Icelandic Cinema. He
answered that he did not expect there to be. He had
just arrived from Peru where he had been shooting
‘Fitzcarraldo.’ There he had seen such pain in the
streets of Lima, but there was no pain on the streets
of Reykjavík, and he believed pain was necessary
for cinema.” At that point I stood up and told him
‘we have pain on the brain, Mr. Herzog.’”
Frakkastígur in January 1974. Soviet satellite tracking ship
Kosmonaut Vladimir Komarov is in the background. It was
often seen in the Reykjavík harbour during the seventies.
The shoreline at Skúlagata, 1973. Lækjargata and the pond, September 1975.
Vitastígur, close to Hallgrímskirkja, 1973. Grettisgata, January 1974.
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Werner Herzog in Iceland, 1979Richard Nixon in Iceland, 1973
Credit: Tíminn newspaper
Credit: Oliver F. Atkins