Riverbed

We went to the Louisiana Museum of Modern Art, north of Copenhagen, today, as it was opening day for Ólafur Elíasson's Riverbed exhibition. The papers had said that this exhibition literally turned Louisiana inside out, which of course is one of his major themes.

Inside-out indeed.

We were given a map at the model room, and after lunch in the cafeteria with the breathtaking view we tried to get to the Riverbed. We first thought it was outside, but there was just a tent there for the literature days. The doors we normally use to get into that wing of the museum were strangely locked. So we went back to the gift shop to enter what is normally the wrong way.

You walk down a wooden pathway, the walls painted a spotless white (okay, it's opening day), with people coming towards you. Then you step out into a large room, painted white, with a lot of rocks in it. And - natch - a river running through it.

 A river running through the sacred, polished wood halls of Louisiana! And the river bed is not just any bunch of stones scraped together. These are lava stones, carted over from Iceland.

Tons and tons of stones!  The guard said the workers had been carting the stones in for six weeks, wheelbarrow by wheelbarrow. And that they put down some heavy-duty plastic before the stones started being brought in. The rooms that normally partition off portions of an artists life or themes the artist dealt with have doors, some low, some wide, that drive upwards, ever upwards towards this waterfall:

There are steps up over the waterfall, and then more lava in more rooms, until you finally get to the source (there are two): 

Another few steps up and you are in the library, a breathtakingly beautiful room overlooking the Öresund. I normally like to go sit in the library when I am at Louisiana, as it is usually deserted and I can enjoy the quiet and the view. The library is now a dead-end, so it is filled with people flipping through books about the artist and his works. A man, end of 40, comes in at one point, looks around, smiles, leaves.

I always assumed that Ólafur was an oldish guy, because he has done so many (crazy) things. Looking at his picture online I wonder if the man I saw was the artist on opening day, seeing how people react to his monumental work.

The exhibition is on until January 2015: If you are near Copenhagen, this is a must-see!