{"id":467,"date":"2005-03-28T00:31:49","date_gmt":"2005-03-28T07:31:49","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/stefangeens.com\/?p=467"},"modified":"2005-03-28T00:31:49","modified_gmt":"2005-03-28T07:31:49","slug":"christina-olsons-hus","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/stefangeens.com\/2001-2013\/2005\/03\/christina-olsons-hus\/","title":{"rendered":"Christina Olsons hus"},"content":{"rendered":"

The translation, sort of:
 
Exactly 10 years ago this Easter Weekend, while I was at grad school in Washington DC, I was faced with a stark choice: Study for the final exams in May, or go for a road trip to Maine with a friend. The friend, Cole, had a car, and another friend needed a lift to Boston, and Cole’s girlfriend (you know who you are) was up in NYC for the weekend — so there were plenty of reasons to go, and it would certainly mean being able to avoid Clausewitz or Waltz for another 48 hours.
 
The trip began well. Four hours to NYC, where we spent the evening out on the town with friends. By 11pm it was time to drive on. We reached Boston by 5am and dropped off our passenger. By 7am, in New Hampshire, we were flagging, and decided to take a nap by the side of the Interstate, but were soon woken by state troopers, for whom old Volkswagen Jetta + Oklahoma plates + two plausible prison escapees was reason enough to check with HQ. Nothing came up so we were free to continue. (A few days later, another vehicle with Oklahoma plates would make world headlines.)
 
The goal was Acadia National Park, a beautiful peninsula halfway up the coast. As we crossed the state line, the Maine tourist center offered up something even more interesting (to me): The Olson farmhouse, past Portland, which Andrew Wyeth had painted so often. It’s the house in Christina’s World.<\/span><\/p>\n

Precis f\u00f6r 10 \u00e5r sedan p\u00e5 p\u00e5sken, n\u00e4r jag studerade i Washington DC till min magister, stod jag inf\u00f6r ett val: Studera till sluttentorna i maj, eller g\u00f6ra en roadtrip med en kompis norrut till Maine, en delstat jag aldrig hade bes\u00f6kt. Kompisen, Cole, hade bil, en annan v\u00e4n skulle beh\u00f6va lift till Boston, Cole’s flickv\u00e4n befann sig i NYC \u00f6ver helgen — s\u00e5 vi hade m\u00e5nga orsaker till att \u00e5ka dit; inte minst betydde det ju att vi inte skulle beh\u00f6va l\u00e4sa Clausewitz<\/a> eller Waltz<\/a>.<\/p>\n

Resan b\u00f6rjade bra. Fyra timmar till NYC, d\u00e4r vi gick ut p\u00e5 kv\u00e4llen med kompisar. Kl. 23 var det tid att forts\u00e4tta resan. Kl. 5 n\u00e5dde vi Boston, d\u00e4r vi l\u00e4mnade v\u00e4nnen. Kl. 7, i New Hampshire, sov vi lite i bilen vid sidan av motorv\u00e4gen, men v\u00e4cktes av polis, som misst\u00e4nkte oss f\u00f6r vem vet vad, d\u00e4rf\u00f6r att bilen var j\u00e4ttegammal och hade en registreringsskylt fr\u00e5n Oklahoma. Till slut var allt okej och vi var p\u00e5 v\u00e4g igen. (1995 var p\u00e5sken 16 april; Oklahoma City bombningen<\/a> var 19 april — polis var verkligen f\u00f6rutseende.)<\/p>\n

M\u00e5let var Acadia National Park<\/a>, som \u00e4r en mycket vacker del av Maine. Men p\u00e5 turistcentret vid delstatsgr\u00e4nsen uppt\u00e4ckte jag n\u00e5got \u00e4nnu intressantare (f\u00f6r mig, \u00e5tminstone) som jag ville bes\u00f6ka: Bondefamiljen Olsons hus<\/a> utanf\u00f6r Portland, som m\u00e5lades m\u00e5nga g\u00e5ngar av Andrew Wyeth<\/a>, en av mina absoluta favoritkonstn\u00e4rer. Huset finns till exempel i Christina’s World<\/em>, hans mest k\u00e4nda tavla.<\/p>\n

Christina’s World<\/em>, 1948.<\/span>\"christinas_worldwebsmall.jpg\"<\/p>\n

N\u00e4r jag var liten hade vi hemma hos oss en poster av en av hans tavlor, en fotorealistisk closeup av en sida av detta hus, badande i nordens ljus. Jag hade v\u00e4xt upp med detta hus, om du s\u00e5 vill, och k\u00e4nde till dess minsta detalj, som ett barn som l\u00e4ser samma barnbok f\u00f6r ofta.<\/p>\n

\"kuernersolsons.jpg\"
Weather Side<\/em>, 1965. Above, the actual poster in question, wrinkles and all, from the Metropolitan Museum’s retrospective in 1976.<\/span>\"weathersidewebsmall.jpg\"<\/p>\n

I motsats till en barnbok, dock, existerar huset i verkligheten, men jag hade aldrig vetat det. Det blev sj\u00e4lvklart n\u00e5got jag var tvungen att bes\u00f6ka.<\/p>\n

Och det gjorde vi. Det k\u00e4ndes verkligen som en vallfart. Jag tog n\u00e5gra foton, inklusive ett fr\u00e5n samma perspektiv som posterns. V\u00e4dret var mulet, s\u00e5 vi s\u00e5g inte ljuset som Wyeth hade m\u00e5lat s\u00e5 bra, och som jag gillar s\u00e5 mycket. (Kanske var det d\u00e4rf\u00f6r jag kom hit till Sverige? Jag s\u00e5g samma ljus p\u00e5 Sand\u00f6n i helgen, n\u00e4r det var s\u00e5 varmt i fredags, fr\u00e5n en fortfarande insn\u00f6ad strand.)<\/p>\n

When I was a child we had a poster of one of his paintings at home, a photorealistic rendition of the side of that very same house, bathed in the attenuated light of the Maine coast. I grew up with that house, aware of every detail, like a child reading the same book far too often.
 
In contrast to what’s in most children’s books, however, the house actually exists, but I hadn’t known this until that day at the tourist center. It was obviously something I had to visit.
 
And so we did. It felt a bit like a pilgrimage. I took pictures, including one from the same perspective as in the poster. The weather was overcast, so we never saw the house in the light that Wyeth had painted so well, and which I like so much. (Is that why I came to Sweden? I saw the same light on Sand\u00f6n island in the Stockholm Archipelago this weekend, on Friday when it was so warm, from a beach still covered in snow.)
 
On we went to Acadia, where we ate far too many lobsters, ran up Acadia’s tallest mountain, froze on the summit, and then started on our way back to DC. But there was one thing left to do. Christina’s World<\/em> is in NYC, so we decided to complete our pilgrimage with a visit to the painting. We drove straight to the Metropolitan, where I thought I remembered seeing the painting (it has other Wyeths) but in the end we had to head to the MoMA to find it. We took a picture, and were on our way again. In the meantime, I was coming down with something. By the time we reached DC, I had a fever. I ended up with a two-week bout of bronchitis as the price of our conquering an Acadian summit.<\/span>\"woodsidepicwebsmall.jpg\"<\/p>\n

\"housecloseup.jpg\"<\/span>\"housefar03websmall.jpg\"<\/p>\n

\"moma04websmall.jpg\"<\/span>D\u00e4refter \u00e5kte vi till Acadia, \u00e5t f\u00f6r m\u00e5nga humrar, sprang upp f\u00f6r Acadia halv\u00f6ns h\u00f6gsta berg, fr\u00f6s, och var d\u00e5 p\u00e5 v\u00e4g tillbaka till DC. Men det fanns en sak till att g\u00f6ra. Christina’s World<\/em> kan ses i NYC, s\u00e5 vi best\u00e4mde oss f\u00f6r att komplettera vallfarten med att titta p\u00e5 tavlan igen. Vi k\u00f6rde rakt till Metropolitan Museet, d\u00e4r jag trodde mig minnas att tavlan fanns, men jag hade fel. Den fanns ist\u00e4llet p\u00e5 MoMA, s\u00e5 vi k\u00f6rde dit, tog ett foto, och var p\u00e5 v\u00e4g igen. Under tiden hade jag b\u00f6rjat m\u00e5 illa. Innan vi n\u00e5dde DC hade jag en feber. Jag skulle komma att ha bronkit f\u00f6r tv\u00e5 veckor darefter, tack vare v\u00e5r expedition till toppen av Acadia.<\/p>\n

(Visste du att “Christina” i Christina’s World<\/em> inte \u00e4r en ung flicka, men en vuxen, f\u00f6rlamad kvinna<\/a>?)<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

The translation, sort of: Exactly 10 years ago this Easter Weekend, while I was at grad school in Washington DC, I was faced with a stark choice: Study for the final exams in May, or go for a road trip to … Continue reading →<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":false,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[2,3],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-467","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-culture","category-new-york"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p7eNhC-7x","jetpack-related-posts":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/stefangeens.com\/2001-2013\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/467","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/stefangeens.com\/2001-2013\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/stefangeens.com\/2001-2013\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stefangeens.com\/2001-2013\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stefangeens.com\/2001-2013\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=467"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/stefangeens.com\/2001-2013\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/467\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/stefangeens.com\/2001-2013\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=467"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stefangeens.com\/2001-2013\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=467"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stefangeens.com\/2001-2013\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=467"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}