Reykjavík Grapevine - 28.08.2015, Síða 12

TVEIR HRAFNAR listhús, Art Gallery
Baldursgata 12 101 Reykjavík (at the corner of Baldursgata and Nönnugata, facing Þrír Frakkar Restaurant)
Phone: +354 552 8822 +354 863 6860 +354 863 6885 art@tveirhrafnar.is www.tveirhrafnar.is
Opening hours: Thu-Fri 12pm - 5pm, Sat 1pm - 4pm and by appointment +354 863 6860
TVEIR HRAFNAR
listhús, Art Gallery
offers a range of artwork by
contemporary Icelandic artists
represented by the gallery, se-
lected works by acclaimed artists
and past Icelandic masters.
Represented artists:
GUÐBJÖRG LIND JÓNSDÓTTIR
HALLGRÍMUR HELGASON
HÚBERT NÓI JÓHANNESSON
JÓN ÓSKAR
ÓLI G. JÓHANNSSON
STEINUNN THÓRARINSDÓTTIR
Also works by:
HADDA FJÓLA REYKDAL
HULDA HÁKON
NÍNA TRYGGVADÓTTIR
KRISTJÁN DAVÍÐSSON
– among others
PLEASED TO MEAT YOU!
Keep in mind: Reykjavík Culture Night officially closed its programme with the 23:30 fireworks
display. Responsibility for the chaos described in the below article should thus rather be attributed
to "Reykjavík Drinking Culture Night," which has been ongoing every night since the late 1800s.
Culture | Night, it's kind of scary
Now, in my naiveté, I chalked this an-
swer up to some sort of ironically de-
tached attitude toward cultural prac-
tices (from native Icelanders) or based
on cultural fatigue (from the expat
crowd). I'd been in the Reykjavík party
scene for a bit by then; I'd seen what
nightlife looked like. It couldn't be any
more debauched-but-still-charming-
because-Iceland than that, right?
Very Much Not

By the time the fireworks rolled
around, things in the streets were
well on their way past a 3am Saturday
level. There was plenty of stumbling
about, screaming, breaking of bottles
on building façades and sidewalks for
no reason, gaggles of clearly freezing-
cold women in giant coats and tiny
skirts, men with chests puffed out
and dressed in their finest corporate-
slash-yachting casual.
Oh, and speaking of the fireworks—
rather than being a choreographed,
controlled display, the show was two
money-shots with a brief interlude
to recharge. But I thought to myself,
“Hey, kween—Who are you of all peo-
ple to comment on how they do things
here? And anyway, why have all the
buildup when you can just get right to
the finale? It's pretty clever, really.”
Aggressively heterosexual mat-
ing displays and ham-fisted fireworks
aside, things still seemed a bit more
out of control than usual. Maybe it
was the day's worth of accumulated
trash strewn about the streets that
had seemingly started to float in the
wind—plastic bag ghosts, styrofoam
container spirits. Maybe it was the
sheer size of the crowd, the discrete
orbitals of drunken absurdity moving
about autonomously within a larger
chaotic system.
I think it was around 1am that I saw
three grown-ass men in business suits
fighting over an umbrella in the mid-
dle of Pósthússtræti. I realized things
were going to get truly, uncondition-
ally fucked.
Now, before you say anything,
Reykjavík, you should know that I'm
not some nerd loser lame-guy dweeb
who doesn't know how to have any
fun. I'm hip. I'm with it. I'm cool. But
there's just something unsettling
about turning a corner and seeing en-
tire city blocks plugged up with what
looks like cinematically staged anar-
chy of emotional turmoil and highly
dysfunctional motor coordination.
Everyone either wept, cackled,
shrieked, fought, or grabbed desper-
ately at one another as if it were their
first time feeling. Police marched up
and down in what looked like defen-
sive formations, so I thought it would
be a good time to go dance somewhere
on Naustin, away from what appeared
to be a burgeoning riot scenario.
On the way I saw three men encir-
cling a fourth, chanting what sounded
like a sacrificial rite. There was a smell
of something caustic in the air. I saw
someone shoving a sandwich into his
face with such reckless abandon that it
was inspiring. Every successive street
corner presented a new opportunity to
see one or more people vomiting onto
objects that didn't normally have vom-
it on them.
The queues on Naustin weren't
much better than the turmoil of the
main streets. But crammed within a
buffer of others, I felt a bit safer. And
then there it was: a half-eaten hotdog
in the proverbial gutter outside Palo-
ma, bun softening in a puddle of rain-
water, beer, and saliva. That's what
Culture Night was about.
I gave up waiting and went home
soon after that. I'd seen enough. For
the most part I was entertained by
everything, but still—I just wanted
to ask, Reykjavík, in the wake of this
most recent Culture Night: Are you
feeling alright? Is there anything you
want to talk about? You've been great
to me so far, so I'm just checking in.
My dearest Reykjavíkians, This past weekend was, as
many of you don't remember all too well, the annual cel-
ebration of Culture Night. I'd asked around for a few days
before the festivities, inquiring as to what Culture Night
was all about. No one seemed to have an answer for me
that went any deeper than “It's a celebration of teenagers
getting drunk.”
12 The Reykjavík GrapevineIssue 13 — 2015
NEWS
IN
BRIEF
budget—which amounted to about 4
billion ISK last year. Meanwhile, the
bishop makes over a million ISK each
month, and regular parish priests
about half a million. Just as the Bible
commands. Nonetheless, some priests
have taken to accepting under-the-
table payments for weddings, confir-
mations and baptisms—tasks that are
actually legally classified as “extra
work” for priests. Like, when you go
to work at your office, you get paid ex-
tra for showing up, using a computer,
changing the toner in the printer and
the like.
Remember last month when a
huge swath of water in Lake Mývatn
turned white? Cynics that we are,
many Icelanders were all but certain
this was due to some kind of myste-
rious chemical pollution, or possibly
some prick dumping a whole lot of un-
wanted paint in the water. Turns out it
was due to hypoxia—a form of oxygen
depletion, in this case caused by iron
reacting with colloidal particles in the
water. Maybe not the happiest news,
but at least we know it wasn’t due to
yet more pollution.
Finally, you know when Iceland-
ers get angry with people who think
we live in a corruption-free elfin
paradise? Well, here’s yet another
reason why: there once was a mayor
of Norðurþing, Bergur Elías Ágústs-
son, who fought hard to facilitate
the company PCC Group building a
silicon metals plant in his district. He
fought so hard, in fact, that he pushed
to give this giant company all kinds of
financial concessions and tax breaks,
amounting to about a billion ISK,
while taxes from local and national
treasuries paid the company about 4
billion ISK. Then one day, he decided
to leave his job as mayor, and then—
surprise!—he scored a job working for
PCC Group. And, as he told reporters,
there was absolutely no arrangement
made ahead of time. PCC Group was
simply so grateful for all the money,
and wanted to do something nice
for dear Bergur. No corruption here,
folks!
Sooooooo Yeah. We Should
Talk, Culture Night?
A hip and with-it American
gets concerned
Words by Sam Wright Fairbanks
Photo by Ragnar Th. Sigurðsson / Arctic Images