Reykjavík Grapevine - 19.06.2015, Page 22

I have to put it in. So, even if I try to
hide this side of myself, it just comes
through. The colours, they always
come back.”
The same is true of Steinunn’s day-
to-day life. “I once met a friend that
hadn’t been very good to me,” she
frowns. “I decided for a
week that if I met that
friend, I was not going
to smile. But I met the
friend, and of course,
straight away I was
smiling. And I thought,
‘Ugh! I hate myself!
Why couldn’t I stop
smiling, just once in my
life!’”
DJ flugvél og geim-
skip’s visual universe
also includes a lot of
fractals: repeating pat-
terns of shapes that
can be zoomed into
infinitely. “Fractals
are just. So. Beauti-
ful,” says Steinunn, emphatically. “I
don’t know what they do really, but
I’ve heard they’re used to make com-
puter games and special effects, and
people say they appear everywhere in
nature. And now, I can make them in
my computer, with a fractal genera-
tor, where I just put in numbers, and
then it comes out very beautiful. And
also really pointless. I make them for
hours and hours, and then just watch
this one-minute clip that came from
it. It doesn’t serve any purpose. It’s
totally meaningless. And that is my
goal in my life. I want to do pointless
things or things that you can’t tell are
important. I don’t enjoy these eating,
working, sleeping things.”
Everything is dark and
pointless and terrible
Whilst her approach seems to shine
with playful, carefree creativity, a
shadow passes over Steinunn’s face
as she explains that
there’s more to both
her work and her
personality than
that. “People often
say to me, ‘I wish I
had your life! You are
always so happy!’”
she says. “But that’s
really not how it is.
I am sometimes re-
ally, really sad. I get
melancholy. Dark-
ness does come into
my work. It’s part of
the drive behind it…
the drive to get away
from the dark. Be-
cause everything is
dark and pointless and terrible. Then
you try to find a way to make it fun to
keep living.”
“Often I feel like life is a really
terrible thing, and evil, and so I get
attracted to evil things,” she contin-
ues. “Then I think, how can I live in
this world? How can I possibly keep
on living? And should I? And I’ll
think, no, I shouldn’t, it’s all too bad,
I’m not good, the world is evil. Then
I’ll be walking around and thinking
about all this, and I’ll see something
beautiful. Maybe it’s some song com-
ing from a window. And it makes you
want to hear more… that’s one of the
things that makes you want to con-
tinue living. Beautiful songs from the
radio.”
Whilst such existential questions
are something many push to the back
of their mind, or ignore completely,
Steinunn seems to wrestle with them
on a day-to-day basis. “The most im-
portant question in my life,” she says,
“and in everyone’s life, I think, is,
‘Why should I keep living? Why don’t
I just die?’ And for me, it’s about living
for more than the things we HAVE
to do—the eating, sleeping, working.
It’s not like we’re farmers—we’re not
growing the crops and tending the
animals, just to stay alive. Well, many
of us aren’t, at least. So now, people
get really sad and think, ‘Why am I
living?’”
Steinunn posits that it’s ‘non-
essential’ activities, like music and
the arts, that can offer a route out of
the mundane. “People can find some-
thing else they like to do,” she says.
“Some hobby, maybe. And other peo-
ple say, ‘Why do you spend your time
in this pointless thing?’ But the point-
less thing is actually what keeps them
going! For me it’s these things I like—
the beautiful colours and lights, mu-
sic and art, books… especially books
where I don’t really learn anything,
just books about something.”
First band on the moon
Being DJ flugvél og geimskip has giv-
en Steinunn the chance to maintain
a creativity-focussed life. She travels
more and more, whether representing
Iceland at the music industry festival
Eurosonic, or flying out to Japan late
last year to take part in J-pop and K-
pop music workshops.
“This was always my dream,” she
smiles, “to be a musician and an art-
ist, and to have my picture in the pa-
per and say, ‘Yep, that’s me!’, and to
travel the world and play my music for
people. Because I like the music I do,
so maybe my music can find its way to
other people, and make them happy
and want to continue living too! So
my dream has become reality. Some-
one asked me, ‘What are you going to
do when you grow up?’ and I said, ‘Be
a musician and an artist!’ And then I
realised, ‘Oh! That’s actually what I
do!’ and I was really happy.”
But she has greater ambitions still.
“I want to play my music for all the
people who would like to listen to it,”
she says. “When I hear new music at
a festival, I feel so happy and excited,
and I think, ‘Wow, what more does
the world have to offer?’ So I want to
do the same, for as many people as I
can. First, everyone on Earth. And
then, of course, to play in space. I
can’t go yet though, because it’s still
very expensive, and I’m not a scientist
doing some experiments...”
In the meantime, Steinunn’s imag-
ination contains more than enough to
keep her busy here on Earth. At the
same time, the philosophy underly-
ing her work shows that playfulness
and lightness are, sometimes, things
to be taken very seriously. “So, yes,”
she finishes, “it’s all about getting
towards the light. Sometimes I meet
people in the street, and I’m wearing
black clothes, and they say, ‘Oh no,
Steinunn... you are wearing all black,
what’s wrong?’ And I say, ‘Nothing at
all! I’m finally happy!’ So, if you see
me wearing black clothes, don’t wor-
ry. It’s a very GOOD sign!”
PLEASED TO MEAT YOU!
22 The Reykjavík GrapevineIssue 8 — 2015
“I am sometimes
really, really sad.
Darkness does come
into my work. It’s
part of the drive
behind it… to get
away from the dark.
Because everything
is dark and pointless
and terrible. Then
you try to find a way
to make it fun to
keep living.”