Reykjavík Grapevine - 01.08.2014, Blaðsíða 46

46 The Reykjavík GrapevineIssue 11 — 2014ART
Creativity
For All
Music and art intersect
in the Eastfjords
The Endgame
The presentation starts off with a
mysterious team building exercise led by
the Performance/Interaction workshop
that culminates with an arm wrestling
match and then waltz. Next, we're
shuffled into the auditorium/cafeteria
to listen to the concert given by the
members of the Automata workshop, all
performed on instruments made out of
anything but actual musical instruments.
Then the dance workshop puts on a
show of choreographies cherry picked
and mashed together from YouTube
videos like Beyonce’s “Single Ladies”
and Yelle’s “A Cause Des Garcons.”
Sometimes the music blasting matches
the video it's from, and sometimes
not, overlapping to create unexpected
results. Objectively, the best part is
when the audience is invited to join in
the dance to Celine Dion’s classic, “My
Heart Will Go On.”
After the breathtaking Titanic
dance number we are led outside to
gather round a brass band and whale
puppet in the tradition of a Chinese New
Year Dragon. We're about to embark on
a tour of the work produced by eight
workshops held the prior week. The
whale that leads us through the sunny
East Fjords town is the face of the New
Year, part of a mythology created by the
Time workshop. It undulates at the front
of a mass of people while a trumpet,
xylophone and
saxophones blare
out “When The
Saints Go Marching
In.” The beat of the
drums propel the
crowd through one
of the few streets of
Seyðisfjörður on the
penultimate day of
LungA.
Our first
stop on the tour
is the RAFALVAF
workshop studio
where all sorts of
defunct technology
and household
appliances have
been dismantled and reassembled
into new machines. An electric stove
has been turned into an instrument
controlled by touching the burners, and
in another room, a complicated box with
a curtain that you crawl under houses a
simulation of a breezy, sunny summer
day.
The crowd filters in and out of the
building as the music plays, and we find
our first monster. The Beast Factory
workshop has been plastering signs all
over the town seeking a 1 million ISK
reward for any information regarding
monster sightings, and Saturday is
when they’re finally
spotted. A creature
that looks like a mix
between a barnacle
and a Dalek lumbers
into sight, and the
crowd is instructed
to shout, “Hopa!”
at it, so we do. The
whale puppet circles
the beast, everybody
dances, and then the
monster joins the
thoroughfare. This is
repeated throughout
the parade with the
four other beasts,
all marine themed,
presumably in
homage to the harbour based livelihood
of Seyðisfjörður.
The town is generally supportive
of the festival, even though the parade
stopped traffic on the one lane street.
As people danced in the street with
beasts and drums, the people waiting
in their cars seemed nonplussed while
they waited to be able to drive through
without honking or running anyone over.
The smell of herring permeates the
air as we explore the video workshop,
which for the past week has been
Set in the glacial crevasse town of Seyðisfjörður, the music and arts festival LungA is a buzz-
ing hive of creativity and pure, weird art. The weeklong festival is packed with different work-
shops held during the week and then topped off by a final presentation of the art and music
on Saturday.
Photos
Magnús Elvar Jónsson
Words
Rebecca Scott Lord
“A creature that looks
like a mix between a
barnacle and a Dalek
lumbers into sight, and
the crowd is instructed
to shout, ‘Hopa!’ at it,
so we do.”
>LVMMLY6MMLYZ
JVT
^^ ̂PJLSHUKVMMLYZJVT
www.thjodminjasafn.is
Suðurgata 41 / 101 Reykjavík
Along with the permanent exhibition
that features Iceland’s history from
settlement to present day the
museum offers a variety of exhibitions
during the year, e.g. on Icelandic
silver and photography.
The National
Museum of
Iceland
Flights to Egilsstaðir provided by Air Iceland,
book flight at www.airiceland or call +354-5703000.
www.lunga.isSeyðisfjörðurJuly 13 - 20LUNGA