Scandinavia 2008 - Day 165
This morning has been great. After a semi-lousy “English Breakfast” at the café below the hostel I walked to the historical museum and waited for it to open. It was a quite and peaceful morning, the sun was turning the day bright and cheerful but it was still early enough that there were long cool shadows to walk in. I sat on the stone balustrade in front of the heavy wooden doors of the museums listening to the birds in the park trees across the street. When the museum opened I had it to myself, and I was able to enjoy its small collection in peace. It took all of an hour to see the entire museum, so I moved onto the National Gallery next door.
Words from Room 17, the National Gallery, Oslo, Norway:
"I am currently sitting on a comfy couch in room 17 of the National Gallery. All around this long rectangular room are wonderful landscapes paintings. I have just viewed the room full of Edward Munch paintings including “The Scream.” I have to say, this style of art is not me, I am for now, an eternal optimist. I can't help it, and just don't identify with these kind of people who are depressed and sad. In the painting, there are two men in the distance who are ignoring the existential lament of the screaming man and are staring at the sunset. I am those men. Everyday alive f@#king rocks and I don't have time to waste on pity and depression.
Now I am sitting in front of Hans Gude's painting “Fresh Breeze on the Norwegian Coast,” and the subject matter and mood of this work makes me feel very happy. The sun on the water glows. I have noticed that the skylight in the room has a very profound affect on this work. When its cloudy outside the painting almost seems like an evening storm is moving in. But when the sun comes out of the clouds, the painting comes alive and becomes a golden sunset with a fresh warm breeze blowing away the winters chill. I do enjoy the paintings in this room (if I were king of the world, this would be my mausoleum)."
End
From the National Gallery I crossed the street to the park which began the approach to the Royal Palace at the top of the park. I arrived to the palace in time to see the elaborate changing of the guard, which was the longest such event of its type I had ever seen. Like a good song, it took a while to get started before the band joined in for the big finish (literally).
After the Royal display I went around to the left of the Palace and down the hill past several small duck ponds. From the corner entrance of the park I walked up a block in a regal but aged neighborhood where I visited a lovely bakery hidden away on a side street. Apent bakery has a delicious and fresh array of baked goods that one can enjoy outside in the sun on a small terrace on a flower and tree lined street aptly named “inkognito terrace.” Apent bakery is the quintessential tucked away quite neighborhood coffee café. I wish I had one at home to walk to.
From the café I walked down to the harbor to where I now sit, high on a hill alongside a row of canons at Akershus Slot (castle) overlooking the west harbor where I've just taken a nap in the daffodils under a shady oak. Below, boats and people mill about in and around the water.
In the evening, after a wonderfully cheap, tasty, and filling Kebab meal, I checked all my camera gear and walked the few short blocks down to the harbor to see one of the most beautiful buildings in Scandinavia. I arrived at the newly built, all white Oslo Opera House just before sunset. The sky was just starting to get tinges of Navy on its horizons and it was the perfect time to arrive and start composing my shots. As sunset neared the white stone began to wash pink and red, and like fish hitting the water at the first ray of sunlight in the rivers inlet, so do the people of Oslo arrive at the opera house at the first flashes of pink in the evening sky. Soon it was shoulder to shoulder at the front of the roof deck overlooking the city, water, mountains, and of course, the sunset. I spent about three hours photographing the Opera house, which was a perfect opportunity for me to practice with my new filters. Soon after sunset the moon, brilliant white, rose up over the mountains from the east and made its way across the sky.
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