Stockholm - Sweden

19 - 24 October 2004

City of twilight

On Tuesday we arrived in Stockholm, the city which is bathed in twilight most of the year. From the dark blue sweet waters of Mälaren and the salty waters of the Baltic Sea we entered the realm of islands, rocks and islets that comprise the Stockholm archipelago. They say there are 24,000 of them. As for the name Stockholm it is related to an island on piles suggesting that at least some of those islands are artificial land. The first mention of the name Stockholm dates back to 1252. Thus, the capital of Sweden is a year older than the capital of Wielkopolska. Stockholm enchants with its disturbing, sombre beauty. The days there are ended before they begin and the pace and style of life conforms to the rhythm of long nights. No ghosts rule that world and there are no traces of Swedish invaders as we know them from the books of Sienkiewicz. Viking descendants have long wiped their history books clean of the seventeenth century conquests. The Swedes of today are mild and self-restrained, they like themselves and others (first of all others) and it is a result of nineteenth century self-creation. The society, which has not experienced any war atrocities for the last 200 years, has developed an exemplary model of the law-abiding citizen who docilely goes to work from Monday to Friday and respects his or her profession and other people. However, chronic lack of sunlight brings about melancholy and even bouts of depression. The Swedes often use lamps imitating the light of the sun, but even oftener resort to Prozac or alcohol. During weekends the gloomy thoughts of a Swede are taken up by Bacchus. The entire city tries to free itself from the fetters of melancholy, darkness and anxiety. The night is tolerant but not licentious. People have fun, people drink. The day is the king and the night is the queen yearning for the king. During weekends the Swedes learn how to be spontaneous and give in to long-forgotten emotions. Can our Slavonic temperament be matched with the Swedish understanding of dance?

Dansens Hus

We did it the Polish way, with a flourish: no sooner had we left the plane when we held the first rehearsal. And we did it creatively because the rehearsal took place in the very heart of Swedish dance – at the stage of Dansens Hus in Stockholm. Established in 1991 and patterned on the famous French Maison de la Danse in Lyons, it serves the same function as its 11-year-older brother and extends invitations to no less than the best (I know it sounds pretty immodest). In September it featured Nederlands Dans Theater III Tulips (with Niklas Ek and Ana Laguna in main parts), in October it will stage Gothenburg’s Operans Balett (with choreography by Jiri Kylian) and Cullbergebaletten’s premiere Home and Home (choreographed by Johan Inger) and Fluke (choreographed by Mats Ek), and on 21, 22 and 23 October it will feature the Polish Dance Theatre in The Silence of the Trembling Hands and Zefirum choreographed by Virpi Pahkinen.

Virpi Pahkinen

We met Virpi for the first time in 2002. I remember a fragile and energetic person. She was all smiles. Her rehearsals were stressing for everyone because Virpi laughed all the time. The beginnings were difficult; exposed to her unrestrained giggling we were trying to cope with her competing demands. And the closer we seemed to be to this goal, the more intense and frequent Virpi’s laughter was. Not until we took the stage did we discover the meaning of that explosion of joy. It was her original way of expressing delight for what we were doing. Since then we knew how to please her. Though the first rehearsal in Dansens Hus was for lighting we did not wait for Virpi’s approval but for her laughter. And it came and shattered the large building. And we knew we were on the right track and hurled ourselves into work reassured that we were going to take Stockholm by storm.

   

National Museum

  

Royal Opera

City in daylight

It is certainly beautiful, clean and ecological (Ikea, herring and salmon caught in the city centre). A bit snobbish and historical. Simplicity, universality and uniformism dominate on the inside and on the outside from clothing (King Carl XVI Gustaf’s daughter wears snickers) to architecture. Though it shows some traces of Renaissance and Baroque ornamentation, it is mainly classicist with royal flair and functional with modernist background. We certainly moved from one island to another to feast our eyes on the Cathedral (built in 1279), the Royal Palace (built in 1748), and the baroque- rococo Drottningholm Palace (castle, theatre, Chinese pavilion and gardens – that is, the 18th-century Swedish version of Versailles). We visited the Nobel Museum and the museum of Strindberg who shook the history of European theatre with his new drama forms and stage productions. And there is a plenitude of other museums scattered on the islands: Historical Museum, National Museum, Museum of Antiquities, Museum of Science and Technology, Royal Museum, The Vasa Museum, Toy Museum, Museum of Modern Art, Museum of Applied Arts, Museum of Biology, Ethnography Museum, Museum of Wine and many others. Something for every taste. We soon discovered that at least one museum is a must-see: The Dance Museum. I have never been to one before. It occupies two floors with a permanent exhibition in the ground floor and temporary exhibits in the first floor which are not always directly connected to dancing but always somehow related to human body. We were lucky enough to witness an exhibition by a controversial Swedish artist Elisabeth Ohlson Wallin. Her exhibition made a strong impression on me. Titled South Africa Via Dolorosa, it portrays the Aids disaster in Africa. The artist placed the Stations of the Cross on the gallery’s walls and supplied each of them with a sociological commentary filtered through the text of the Bible and depicting the tragedy of South Africa and South-African women. Each commentary is accompanied by huge photographs which become sadder and crueller with every station not perhaps by the virtue of their content but their message. We were shocked and torn by the conflicting feelings of sheer delight and utter terror and we did not want to see anything else that day. Luckily enough we started sightseeing at the ground floor. The permanent exhibit features costumes from the most famous ballets. I would recommend Vaslav Nijinsky’s from The Rite of Spring: a heavy, stiff costume made from felt, I cannot even imagine how it was possible to dance in it. The museum features several TV sets with archive ballet recordings, one projector showing famous performers, for example from Giselle, and a small cinema where we watched the original version of Nijinsky’s Le sacre du printemps.

Performances

We were staying in a hotel in the vicinity of Dansens Hus. Each of us received a key card that opened every door in Dansens Hus. We could go in any time of the day, the stage, the practice rooms and the wardrobes belonged to us. It turned out before the dress rehearsal that makeup technicians also belonged to us. We were received with full honours and each of us had his or her own makeup technician and hairdresser. Never before had we received such a huge dose of stardom. We knew that the audience loved dance, that is what the house was made for. We felt privileged for having been given a chance to perform among the best. But there is always some apprehension in front of an unknown crowd. What if they are expecting a different repertory and altogether different interpretation… How do one dance for people whose national symbol is a triple crown which Kopaliński describes as a mystical token of power over three worlds: spiritual, mental and physical? The curtain goes up and we emerge from the darkness and mist into the mathematical semidarkness (lighting design was by Jens Stehmann, artists of his rank are in short supply in Poland). We are in Swedenborg’s homeland so we stay focused and perform in the silence of the Silence. The first part is over and we can feel that we have penetrated the Northern world. The second part is over and we feel immodestly that we have seized this world. The wave of applause and the patter of feet are clear signs that this calm, not very spontaneous though educated audience surrendered to our vision. We perform to full houses the next days and the enthusiasm rises. They love us! Virpi giggles, our director smiles and Kenneth Kvarnström, the director of Dansens Hus, seems troubled. Not worried but troubled because people keep asking when The Polish Dance Theatre will return. They are begging for more. So…

Dreams continued

I have become spoilt. I dreamt that the Polish Dance Theatre would play in the House of Dance and the dream came through. Not in Lyons but in Stockholm but it still came true. So in my final words I’m challenging the fate and the authorities and I wish insolently for the Polish Dance Theatre’s own House of Dance in Poznań.

Iwona Pasińska

   

Old Town










photos: Iwona Pasińska