Skeddie Sauce and other Delights: September 2013

In the late 1800's, Copenhagen's green market moved to Israels Plads until 1958. From there it went to Valby, a suburb of the city. Israels Plads in the following years had become a number of things including a huge parking lot, a flea market on weekends and so on. But there has always been a strip of canvas tents selling flowers and fresh produce. At anytime of year here - what was and still is called grønt torv or green square - you could hear the sellers screaming out their special 2 for 1 prices. Rain, snow or sunshine, there was always a fresh deal to be found.

This is a picture of the green square market just a few years ago. It's about twice as long as what you can see here and almost never more than 2 rows deep.

Here are 2 up close pix of what you could expect to find every day of the year.

In early 2000's, the city decided to spiff up the place and make it a little more fancy and up to date. The square is just 10 steps away from the metro, train and bus of the busiest public transportation station in Copenhagen and probably all of Scandinavia.

Here you can see the construction of the 2 new halls. The stairs are a side entrance to the metro and the train.

The outdoor flower and produce market became an indoor market. It opened in late 2011. And though I have been by it a number of times, I finally went in today and was pleasantly surprised. I want to go back and I want you - yes, you - to come with me to sit and enjoy the food.

Entrance to one of the green halls.

The halls have become more of an eatery and the actual amout of flowers that I saw for sale were less than minimum. In the old green market there was never any sea food for sale.

Now you can buy cheese.....

and meats....

and specialty foods...

and items like cupcake formed hand soap....

and candy like this hand made liqurish.....

and taffies....

and delicious Danish danish and cakes and so much more.

This is the back side of the 2 halls which is just as well the front side from a different street. You can enter each hall from each side of either hall. But good luck trying to find a parking space. The double row of bikes go way beyond what you can see here and around the corner. This is a very happening spot and I hope to see you here soon.

I'm off today, well, actually I am off all this week and I need some culture. Not the kind of culture that you get from the dairy box at your local supermarket but the kind of culture that warms the heart and stimulates the mind. There are these 2 museum that I have been wanting to go to for the last 20 years but have never done so. And it's only due to laziness that I keep putting it off. So today I decided to finally get up and go but I had to choose between one of the two museums.

One is the Charlottenborg Museum and the other is the Hirchsprung Collection Museum.

My desire for going to a museum actually started in the early spring when - in the neighborhood there was a big sign that announced there is a photo competition. The subject was Life on Islands Brygge (my neighborhood).

One of the things that they have been talking about is extending the swimming area to include a sauna and to open the swimming area during winter to those who like to swim in the ice. As a test or as a "warm up" to the construction of the sauna, they rolled in 2 huge truck-trailers which have been converted into saunas. On the sides of the saunas-trailers were huge pictures of an early spring time setting which looked exactly like the setting I was in right at that moment. So I snapped a picture of one of the trailers and sent it in via instagram to the photo competition. The deal was that all of the pictures sent in would be exhibited in The Danish Design Center in April. So we waited until April but when we got to the door of the museum there was a sign saying it was closed for 3 weeks for setting up a new exhibition. We couldn't understand it and we went home disappointed. This is the picture I sent in.

Now, months later, I decide again to go to a museum. And of the 2 museums that I mentioned earlier, I chose the one that was closest to our home. By bike I am at Charlottenborg in less than 15 minutes. It's a beautiful place and I'm kicking myself for not coming sooner.

Here I have just passed the first set of entrance arches and now approaching the 2nd set.

Getting closer to the museum entrance.

The courtyard café at the museum entrance.

It only took me a few seconds to get upset with the 4 women behind the counter talking to another woman on the other side of the counter. The 4 women looked at the man in front of me - he was ready to buy an entrance ticket and I was behind him waiting to buy my entrance ticket too. The 4 women had their backs to us - the ticket buyers. Finally one woman turned around but just looked me straight in the eyes and then looked down and went about her business. "Is this the place to buy tickets", I asked in a demanding tone. "Yes it is", replied one of the 4, "But today it's free to come in:" "Oh... and why is that", I asked. "Because we are in the middle of changing exhibitions and we have only 1 exhibition open today", the woman reported to me. She then precoded to hand me a piece of paper explaining the exhibition. She also handed me a post card of the "up and coming" exhibitions and said, "You'll have to come back again if you want to see these exhibitions." I jokingly replyed, "And I guess I'll have to pay then".

So up the stairs I went but on the way to the exhibition hall, on the first landing, I snapped a picture of the colorful lamps hanging over the foyer - we need new lamps and maybe one of these will do.

Now I am at the top of the stairs and take a look out the window to admire the view of the back side of the entrance to the museum.

Now I walk into - not only the first exhibition hall but the ONLY exhibition hall which is the size of our living room-kitchen. There are 2 tables with glass tops to see prints of what was supposed to be there.

Yes! Artwork that was "supposed" to be there but according to the paper that they handed me at the time of when I inquired about the entrance ticket, the artwork was not there because the US post office would not send it even though it has the correct amount of postage on it.

What?

Yes, that's right - the postage stamps were licked and placed directly onto the artwork but the post office would not send it. It was just blocks of wood with stamps.

I just couldn't believe this. I went back down to the woman that I had been talking with and asked her, "So is that the only thing there is to see here; artwork that is "supposed" to be here but isn't?" "Yes, that's right", she said in a hushed tone and then asked me with shock and surprise, "did you read the paper? - isn't it believable that the post office wouldn't send the artwork!?"

And I'm like - no, that's stupid to send artwork with the post office, That's what shipping companies are for and that's why the post office is slowly dying out. It's the most ridiculous thing I have ever

heard of.... until I read what the artwork is. Some guy was cutting 2X4's into 2 even pieces and a 3rd shorter piece. He cut several 2X4's this way and stacked the wood pieces on top of each other. He was trying to make some sort of framing support and not art. But when he was stacking the wood, the way he had cut the wood and they way he had laid the wood pieces on top of each other, to him, it looked like "a piece of art work without any type of description".

But if you ask me, a lot of artwork DOES fall into that exact description; a 4 letter word that starts with S. I think his artwork would easily fall into that so called non-description category.

The paper about the exhibition says: "unfortunately the exhibition is still in NY until it can find a new home." And I'm thinking - unfortunate for whom?

I was in and out of there in less than 10 minutes. So I hopped on my bike and rode to the 2nd museum that I've been wanting to see. I get to the very cute and little Hirchsprung Collection Museum and in front of the museum is this sign. Read it carfully.

What am I going to do? I need my culture - My heart warming inspiration. My light.

So back onto the bike again and I ride to Statens Museum for Kunst.

I don't really wanna go there as I have been there a number of times but there was a huge sign out front saying to come on in and that they were open during construction of which they are in the middle of a big re-do and much needed fixing out in front.

It's a great museum and this guy even rode his bike here all the way from Japan.

And why not, I rode my bike all the way from LA.

Here is just a bit of artwork from the inside.

This is the first installation I see and something looks very family about it but I can't quite put my finger on it. Then I notice there is a video interview with the artist and he explains:

"It's a copy - though in several loose pieces - of the Statue of Liberty."
It was a lot of fun to see all of this.

Next I decided to snap lots of naked male figures. Everywhere you go around the world, the men are always hot and muscular (but always with a small pee pee)