On the surface, life is normal here. We are still our same American family of five. Here in this different place. Here in Denmark. On the surface, it looks nice. It seems that we can see things and do things that we haven’t seen or done before and share them here with you. On the surface, it looks like sunshine and roses. Sometimes it is. Sometimes below the surface, we’re just sleepwalking. Moving through the motions of a day from sun up to sun down whilst the world works and does and becomes. Sometimes I feel like I have to scratch off the surface to reveal the winning code, the lottery winner. Maybe we didn’t buy the ticket today though. What did we do? I sometimes wonder at the end of the day. But you can’t win if you don’t buy the ticket.
Yesterday – I bought the ticket. And I definitely won. My personal lottery that is. Those who know me know that art, especially public art, is something very important to me. Public art in the form of outdoor sculpture galleries, murals, architecture, street art and even well executed colorful graffiti. The earth without ART is just… eh. Yesterday, I attended the closing afternoon of Danish photographer Søren Solkær‘s excellent exhibition Surface. An enormous, in scale and presentation, portrait series pointed at street artists all over the world and in every iteration – from street “taggers” to muralists to installation artists to graffiti kings. Yesterday Søren himself led a public tour through the Oksnehallen culture center‘s display of his works. Hearing how and where and why and who from the artist himself made the images come to life and engendered a respect for the work required to undertake such a project.
