WEAVING OUR WAY THROUGH TRONDHEIM

Once upon a time there was a young Viking named Olav.
He was sailing around the known world doing what Vikings did, when all of a sudden he arrived in France & heard about a new religion; Christianity.  He liked the sound of it, so became one.  The ethics of Christianity didn't seem to comply with his career as a Viking, so he wondered what he could do. "I know," thought Olav," I'll become King & convert Norway from the Norse gods to the Christian God".
So that's what he aimed to do & with a great deal of wealth from his Viking adventures, he was a very powerful 20 year old & soon became King.
Alas, the people of Norway did not all want to become Christian & even when he threatened them with an effective, but decidedly non-peaceful execution.... they still weren't enthusiastic.  This led to a war, during which poor young Olav died.
But the story didn't end there! Nearby Olav's burial site, a spring mysteriously appeared & it was said that the water from this spring had healing powers.  Pilgrims came from far & wide to touch the water of the spring & honour Saint Olav!
It is over his grave that this cathedral has been built, burnt down & been rebuilt again!

We had a wonderful tour inside this morning, but weren't allowed to take photographs, which is why this statue of King Olav starts today's blog.
Inside we saw the remains of the spring , an incredibly beautiful rose window & two organs.  One of which was made by a friend of Johan Sebastian Bach & was specifically made to play his music!!

Jeff braved the narrow spiral staircase to the upper towers, where he had a wonderful view over the cathedral rooftop & the city of Trondheim beyond.

Whilst he was on the roof, I was in the shop & I finally found something I really REALLY wanted to buy!  But alas, it was too heavy , too big & too costly to fit into our suitcases.  As you can imagine, I was deeply disappointed. Boohoo. (I still want it soooooo badly!)

The next stop was the Decorative Arts Museum.  I had this on my list of 'must do's because there is a Gallery space showcasing the work of Tapestry artist Hannah Ryggen here.  Before seeing her work though, we had SUCH a treat in store.
The Decorative arts Museum is celebrating it's 125th birthday. Part of their celebration is the exhibition '125', where 125 people randomly selected from outside the Gallery staff, and of varying ages & professions, were allowed to each choose one item from among the 40,000 pieces of design crafts owned by the museum.  Their choices would be exhibited in '125' along with a catalogue describing why each person chose what they did.

This was an exciting exhibition, both in the variety of works, but even more so by the reasons the individuals gave for choosing what they chose. Astoundingly not one person chose what someone else had chosen!

Jeff's favourite was a set of two tapestries, named autumn & spring, by artist Britta Erixon. This is autumn, when it is time to harvest.  The selector was a Fireman & he chose this set because he knew the land well & he felt that the weaver had got the light & the colours perfectly.

My favourite (well, one of them!) was this tapestry ' The Flaxen hair' designed by Gerhard Menthe & woven by Anna Bergin . I chose this because a picture of it is on the cover of the book I'm reading at the moment & I love the style & colours.  This image has been a visual companion to my Norway trip.  The selector, who describes herself as a 'weaving nerd', chose it for a few reasons; in recognition that this museum  once ran a weaving school  (1898-1909) & because of Gerhard Menthe's commitment to the weaving arts & his employment of women to weave his designs.

It was purely coincidence that we both chose tapestries.

Upstairs we had more tapestries to enjoy.
Hannah Ryggen was a Swedish born Norwegian born in the 1890's.  She lived on a farm along one of the fjords with her artist husband & wove her tapestries in response to world events.
I admire the fact that she was self taught,  dyed the wool from local plants herself and wasn't afraid to work big.  Limited colour options might explain her limited colour palette in each tapestry, but she makes that work so well because of the tonal range in each colour that she uses.

She was a pacifist & her subjects were political.  This one 'Ethiopia' was in response to Benito Mussolini's invasion of Ethiopia in 1935.  What I found particularly interesting was that this tapestry was hung alongside Picasso's 'Guernica' in the Paris World fair in 1937.

I had loved seeing the beautiful work in the Museum, but was very frustrated that the one book about Hannah Ryggen in English was a heavy hardback.  I hoped that Bookdepository might come to my rescue, but alas... not today!  Hopefully a museum in Oslo has one I can slip into the luggage before flying back to Australia!

It was time for lunch & where better to head than the Fish Market!
We were expecting lots of fishy stalls, loud fishmongers, wafting smells & crowds of hungry people like we'd seen in Bergen.
Nope, not here!
Trondheim's fish market is considerably smaller, cleaner & brighter!  It is very civilised & had the most wonderful array of fish & the biggest range of fish cakes we'd seen yet! It even sold whale fish cakes!

Adjoining it is a café with a small menu, from which I watched the chef make me a fish burger with one of those lovely fish cakes.  Apparently it was haddock.... I'll never know for sure, but it was DELICIOUS!  Jeff had fish soup, which he enjoyed, but would have liked more chunks of fish in it!!

Stomachs full, we went for another wander along the Bryggan, on the other side this time, where we admired the painted warehouses & the wooden pillars sunk into the water.  This is like the Norwegian variation of Venice I think!!

The warehouses weren't the only colourful buildings we soon found out, as we wandered around the 'old' part of Trondheim. It was a very pleasant way to finish our day.