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The place to visit if you love Swedish design

Is there something in the water that makes Swedes so creative? If there is, the water in Skåne must be full of it. It’s just one reason the whole county should be on every design lover’s bucket list.

Published: 22 September 2017 08:58 CEST
The place to visit if you love Swedish design
Sculptures by Jean Arp and sketches by Pierre Soulages at Skissernas museum. File photo: Johan Persson

Pinned to the southern tip of Sweden is Skåne, a continental county knitted together by vast flat fields, cream sandy beaches, and lush deciduous forests.

With a combined population of just 1.2 million, even its biggest cities —  Malmö, Helsingborg and Lund — are far from bustling. Yet Skåne is a hotbed of creativity with design gems and activities around practically every corner.

“I think it’s the underdog perspective that makes Skåne such a creative place,” says Skåne-dwelling industrial designer Terese Alstin, co-founder of Hövding helmets and head of design development at Malmö’s Form/Design Center.

The 'Hello Little Fella' table by Lovusa Hansson from an exhibition at Form/Design Center in Malmö. Photo: Fanny Hansson

“Its distance from Stockholm, and closeness to Denmark and the rest of Europe, makes the people quite rebellious. They don’t ask for permission, they don’t ask what anyone else is doing. It’s very much about pushing boundaries.”

And if there’s anyone who knows about pushing boundaries, it’s Terese. In 2005, along with Anna Haupt, she invented the world’s first airbag bicycle helmet. It’s also no coincidence that it was invented in Malmö, Sweden’s best city for cyclists. The stylish and safe accessory won the world’s most prestigious design award, The INDEX: Award, in 2011.

It’s places like the Form/Design Center that make Skåne the perfect playground for visiting creatives. Set in a 16th-century courtyard, the three-storey space is a meeting place for designers to share knowledge and inspiration. The exhibitions change often, displaying a range of design disciplines from fashion to glassmaking.
 

“We showcase design and architecture to the public, showing how design can solve a lot of problems and improve life for people in different ways,” explains Terese. “And we host many different exhibitions as well as talks and lectures, seminars and workshops.”

Plan ahead for your visit and book a spot in one of the centre’s regular seminars – you can learn a new craft, and get to know some fellow creatives. Everyone is more than ready to share and discuss ideas, something Terese says the region is becoming well-known for: “There’s a really nice sense of community in Skåne, which is great in an industry that’s so competitive.”

Malmö Moderna Museet. Photo: Miriam Preis/Imagebank Sweden

While you’re in the neighbourhood, she also recommends another Malmö must-see, just 700m from the Form/Design Center – the Moderna Museet. It’s a little sister of Stockholm’s Moderna Museet, one of Europe’s foremost museums of modern and contemporary art.

Housed in one of Sweden’s most remarkable exhibition halls, an early-20th century electricity plant formerly home to the Rooseum Center for Contemporary Art, the building has been recently redeveloped by award-winning architects Tham & Videgård.

The new annex, with its perforated orange-red sheet metal facade, is connected to the brick architecture of the historic building – it’s a beautiful way of bridging the old and the new (and very Instagrammable!). The exhibitions rotate often, showcasing a selection of modern art’s most famous artists, and a varied learning programme is offered throughout the year.

If you love modern art then Malmö’s Konsthall is one of Europe’s biggest exhibition halls and an absolute essential for your visit. Designed by architect Klas Anshelm, the light, open space – typical of Scandinavian design – displays some of the world’s finest artwork. Past exhibitions include sculptor Lars Englund, photographer Åke Hedström, and Spanish romantic painter Francisco Goya.

Photo: Malmö Konsthall/konsthall.malmo.se/

Malmö is just one of the many places in Skåne where you can get your creative fix. If you’re staying in the city but you’re willing to travel a little outside, there are design treasures to be discovered all over the county.

Hop on the train at Centralstation in Malmö and you can be in Lund in just 10 minutes, where you’ll find Skissernas, a fascinating museum about the artistic process.

From pencil drawings to plaster sculptures, explore the inner workings of the creative mind with pieces from international artists including Henri Matisse, Henry Moore, and Sonia Delaunay. The museum is also home to one of Europe’s largest collections of sketches by Mexican painter and muralist Diego Rivera.

While you’re in Lund don’t miss Kulturen, an open air and indoor museum filling two blocks in the city centre. The historic buildings are set within scenic gardens, and you can explore 20 exhibitions covering everything from folk art and modern design to textiles and glass art. You can easily spend several hours wandering around, so grab your walking shoes and put on your creative hat.

On Skåne’s southeast coast is artist’s haven Ystad, a town that has attracted creatives for decades. It’s really easy to get to, you can hop on a train at Malmö and you’ll be there in under an hour, or if you have a car, it’s 50 minutes down the E65.

It has a quaint village feel, and there’s art to be found in every nook and cranny, with galleries, studios, and artists’ homes dotted around the town.

Artwork in quaint Ystad. Photo: Jorchr/Creative Commons

You’ll also find Tjörnedala Konsthall, the shared space of East Skåne Artists’ Society (ÖSKG), a gallery that organises six to eight exhibitions a year and also arranges workshops and seminars for artists.

It’s open year round, and one of the essential stops on the ÖSKG’s annual Konstrundan, an art circuit that takes place over Easter around Ystad and the surrounding Österlen region. Nearly 100 members participated in 2017, so the biggest problem you’ll have is deciding which of the many galleries and studios to visit.

Wanås Konst in Vanås. Photo: TS Eriksson/Creative Commons

If you want to get even further off the beaten path, Terese recommends travelling north of Malmö to the Wanås Konst Center in Vanås, a foundation that works to transform our view of society through innovative art, learning, and a focus on equality.

“You can see art and nature come together in an amazing way, and there’s an outdoor exhibition in the forest close to the castle,” she explains.

The scenic centre consists of an art gallery, medieval castle, organic farm, and sculpture park that’s open all year round. Its permanent collection features around 70 world-class artworks that have been created specifically for the centre by international artists including Yoko Ono, Ann Hamilton, Jenny Holzer, and Ann-Sofi Sidén.

With all this creativity on her doorstep, it’s no wonder Terese says proudly that “the design scene in Skåne is very special”. We’re inclined to agree, and with all this on offer have no doubt you will too.

Read also: The Stockholm design hot-spots you have to see

This article was produced by The Local Client Studio and sponsored by Visit Sweden.

ART

African-born director’s new vision for Berlin cultural magnet

One of the rare African-born figures to head a German cultural institution, Bonaventure Ndikung is aiming to highlight post-colonial multiculturalism at a Berlin arts centre with its roots in Western hegemony.

Published: 8 July 2023 10:13 CEST
African-born director's new vision for Berlin cultural magnet

The “Haus der Kulturen der Welt” (House of World Cultures), or HKW, was built by the Americans in 1956 during the Cold War for propaganda purposes, at a time when Germany was still divided.

New director Ndikung said it had been located “strategically” so that people on the other side of the Berlin Wall, in the then-communist East, could see it.

This was “representing freedom” but “from the Western perspective”, the 46-year-old told AFP.

Now Ndikung, born in Cameroon before coming to study in Germany 26 years ago, wants to transform it into a place filled with “different cultures of the world”.

The centre, by the river Spree, is known locally as the “pregnant oyster” due to its sweeping, curved roof. It does not have its own collections but is home to exhibition rooms and a 1,000-seat auditorium.

It reopened in June after renovations, and Ndikung’s first project “Quilombismo” fits in with his aims of expanding the centre’s offerings.

The exhibition takes its name from the Brazilian term “Quilombo”, referring to the communities formed in the 17th century by African slaves, who fled to remote parts of the South American country.

Throughout the summer, there will also be performances, concerts, films, discussions and an exhibition of contemporary art from post-colonial societies across Africa, the Americas, Asia and Oceania.

‘Rethink the space’

“We have been trying to… rethink the space. We invited artists to paint walls… even the floor,” Ndikung said.

And part of the “Quilombismo” exhibition can be found glued to the floor -African braids laced together, a symbol of liberation for black people, which was created by Zimbabwean artist Nontsikelelo Mutiti.

According to Ndikung, African slaves on plantations sometimes plaited their hair in certain ways as a kind of coded message to those seeking to escape, showing them which direction to head.

READ ALSO: Germany hands back looted artefacts to Nigeria

His quest for aestheticism is reflected in his appearance: with a colourful suit and headgear, as well as huge rings on his fingers, he rarely goes unnoticed.

During his interview with AFP, Ndikung was wearing a green scarf and cap, a blue-ish jacket and big, sky-blue shoes.

With a doctorate in medical biology, he used to work as an engineer before devoting himself to art.

In 2010, he founded the Savvy Gallery in Berlin, bringing together art from the West and elsewhere, and in 2017 was one of the curators of Documenta, a prestigious contemporary art event in the German city of Kassel.

Convinced of the belief that history “has been written by a particular type of people, mostly white and men,” Ndikung has had all the rooms in the HKW renamed after women.

These are figures who have “done something important in the advancement of the world” but were “erased” from history, he added. Among them is Frenchwoman Paulette Nardal, born in Martinique in 1896.

She helped inspire the creation of the “negritude” movement, which aimed to develop black literary consciousness, and was the first black woman to study at the Sorbonne in Paris.

Reassessing history

Ndikung’s appointment at the HKW comes as awareness grows in Germany about its colonial past, which has long been overshadowed by the atrocities committed during the era of Adolf Hitler’s Nazis.

Berlin has in recent years started returning looted objects to African countries which it occupied in the early 20th century — Burundi, Rwanda, Tanzania, Namibia and Cameroon.

“It’s long overdue,” said Ndikung.

He was born in Cameroon’s capital, Yaounde, into an anglophone family.

The country is majority francophone but also home to an anglophone minority and has faced deadly unrest in English-speaking areas, where armed insurgents are fighting to establish an independent homeland.

One of his dreams is to open a museum in Cameroon “bringing together historical and contemporary objects” from different countries, he said.

He would love to locate it in Bamenda, the capital of Cameroon’s restive Northwest region.

“But there is a war in Bamenda, so I can’t,” he says.

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