this day in icelandic history — The Reykjavik Grapevine %

Obituary: News Photography

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How did you select the photos for the exhibition? What was the guiding light? I didn’t really have a guiding…

Last Call: Sirkus is Closing

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“Of course I’ll miss this place. I mean, where else can you find such a good vibe on a Sunday…

Icelanders Don’t Care About Satan

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Stulli and Gauti sit opposite me and sip their coffee. Black coffee. Stulli is in the midst of outlining the…

One Little Nigger

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“We never [were] niggers, that is a word used to describe our own wretchedness. And we perpetuate it now.”(1) Who…

The Last Days of the Labels

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The music industry is facing some troubled waters. To be precise, the business side of the music industry is in…

Elves in Cultural Vocabulary

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Terry Gunnel is a professor of Folkloristics at the Unicersity of Iceland. He recently initiated a survey to explore how…

Awakening the Couch Potatoes

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In retrospect Iceland has never lacked activism, and many prideful moments of Icelandic history are examples of social disobedience. In…

A Buffet of Quality Icelandic Designs

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The interior design exhibition and trade show ‘Home and Design’ takes place for the second time at the new Laugardalshöll…

Iceland-China

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As Iceland and China moved closer towards signing a free trade agreement, the state television news came up with a…

Five Classic Books About Moving to the North Atlantic

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You know the story already: a comfortably off writer buys an old farmhouse in France or Italy, drags their sceptical…

Belgium, an Unlikely Choice

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It is common knowledge, or, at least it should be common knowledge, that Belgium is home to the best beer…

Spreading the Love

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The Icelandic Love Corporation is celebrating its 11-year anniversary with an extensive retrospective inside the Reykjavík Art Museum on Tryggvagata….

Icelandic Art

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For centuries, Icelanders were certainly not the culturally refined and creative lot they pride themselves on being today. This is…

National Museum of Iceland

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Established in 1863, the National Museum ofIceland has been located in a spacious buildingon Suðurgata since the 1950s. The museum’scollection…

Quest for the Icelandic Wool

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I found the following assertion on one of the websites dedicated to the Icelandic wool: ‘Wool is cool.’ Unchallengeable, indeed….

It’s a Lonely Old Town

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So, you’re wandering around bustling downtown Reykjavík, dodging prams, nibbling harðfiskur, running into everyone you know and enjoying the vibrant…

An Enlightening Night

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Kristín Magnús has been running her company Travelling Theatre for over 40 years, taking shows all over the U.S. and…

Roots Tourism in Hofsós

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At the Icelandic Emigration Centre in Hofsós, Nelson Gerrard shows me a thick, heavy book that he wrote about the…

Mountain Pioneers

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When I first scheduled an interview with Icelandic Mountain Guides (IMG), my intention was simply to direct the spotlight on…

Classic Toys Return

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Back in the old days, Icelandic children couldn’t run out to the next over-stuffed toyshop to stock up on plastic…

The Einar Jónsson Museum

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The first art museum in Reykjavík, the Einar Jónsson museum, opened in 1923. The history of this beautiful building goes…