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Gallery vandalised ahead of Dan Park display

As Swedish artist Dan Park's artwork continues to create controversy in Denmark, the Copenhagen gallery preparing to display his banned works was attacked by vandals.

Published: 17 October 2014 10:11 CEST
Gallery vandalised ahead of Dan Park display
Police currently don't have any leads but say they are aware that the vandalism could be related to the Dan Park exhibition: Photo: Thomas Lekfeldt/Scanpix
The Copenhagen gallery that will display works from controversial Swedish artist Dan Park later this month was vandalized in the early morning hours of Friday. 
 
On Friday morning, police were not yet ready to say if the vandalism of Hornsleth & Friends Gallery, which consisted of paint bombs and a smashed window, was related to the upcoming exhibition. 
 
“We are right now trying to find out who is behind this. No one has taken responsibility for it and we don’t have any witnesses at this point to help us along,” a Copenhagen Police spokesperson told BT.
 
The spokesperson added that police were “aware of the fact that there could be a connection” to the upcoming exhibition. 
 
 
Earlier this month, Danish artist Kristian von Hornsleth announced that he would display nine artworks that landed Park in jail and were ordered destroyed by a Swedish court. The display is being organized by the Danish Free Press Society (Trykkefrihedsselskabet).
 
Hornsleth’s plans came after a Danish radio station gave up on its efforts to display Park’s works. 
 
The nine disputed Park pieces are also being sold online from Denmark by the Free Speech Library, whose CEO, Lars Hedegaard, told The Local in an interview that he felt there was an “international obligation to defend artists, journalists and authors”.
 
 
Park’s artwork and the decision of a Malmö court to jail him on racism charges has created plenty of controversy in Denmark. 
 
Copenhagen’s deputy mayor for cultural affairs, Carl Christian Ebbesen of the Danish People’s Party, wanted to display Park’s banned works in Copenhagen’s City Hall building. Ebbesen, however, was recently voted down by his colleagues on the city council. 
 
Park was convicted by a Malmö court in August on charges of inciting racial agitation and defamation and was sentenced to six months in jail. However, he was recently released from jail on appeal. 
 
Park’s works include an image that depicts three Swedish residents with African backgrounds portrayed with nooses around their necks, a Catholic bishop receiving fellatio from a young boy and Jesus having sex with Muhammad. 
 
The public display of ‘Sweden’s most dangerous art’ will be held at the Hornsleth & Friends Gallery in Copenhagen from October 23-31. 

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TOURISM

Danes flout travel advice to visit Swedish summer houses

Kirsten, a Dane from Copenhagen, has been spending her weekends at her wooden holiday house in the Skåne countryside throughout Denmark's lockdown -- and to the irritation of Swedes barred from travelling in the other direction, she is far from unusual.

Published: 7 July 2020 14:44 CEST
Danes flout travel advice to visit Swedish summer houses
Kirsten enjoying coffee on her terrace in Skåne. Photo: Richard Orange
“We chose not to follow the government's recommendation because we thought we have important things to do here and we don't socialize with our neighbours at this moment,” she explains when The Local visits her at her house near the village or Rörum in the Swedish holiday district of Österlen. 
 
“So we get out of Copenhagen and we stay at our own house and in our garden and don't talk to anyone. So we're even safer here than in Copenhagen.”
 
She points out that the head of the Danish Health Authority, Søren Brostrøm, had said from the start that closing borders had been a “political” decision, which had not been recommended by health experts.  
 
Since Denmark closed its borders on March 14th, Danish residents  have officially been advised not to cross the border into Sweden unless it is “strictly necessary”, even if the latest advice from the foreign ministry is that they do not need to quarantine. 
 
When Denmark opened the border to tourists from the Nordic countries on June 18th, it left every county in Sweden apart from Västerbotten off its list of “open regions”, meaning the travel advisory for Danes still applies to Skåne. 
 
The updated guidelines on July 4th expanded the list of Swedish “open regions” to Blekinge and Kronoberg. 
 
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But crossing the Øresund Bridge and driving out to southeastern Skåne been part of Kirsten and her husband's weekly ritual since they bought the house 15 years ago, and it's easy to see why they would be reluctant to leave the house and its beautiful garden untended. 
 
“I have to take care of my kitchen garden and my greenhouse,” she says pointing to an area — fenced in to keep out deer and wild boar — which is brimming with strawberries, rocket and unusual varieties of cabbage. 
 
“It would be two or three times as expensive to buy a home in Denmark,” she adds. “We come here all year round, so it's not just a summer house for us.”
 
For most of the lockdown period, no one really seemed to mind that Danes were visiting their holiday houses in Skåne and Småland. It was only when the lockdown was being slowly lifted that the sentiment suddenly changed. 
 
“They changed the rhetoric when one Sunday it took two hours to pass the bridge. And we were in that queue. And suddenly all hell broke loose in Denmark and everything was on the news and in the newspapers and companies had to send out new regulation warnings to their employees,” she says. 
 
“But before that, there was no problem. And we still see a lot of Danish cars on the streets and we know other Danes who also have chosen not to follow the regulations.” 
 
 
The couple nonetheless mostly kept their weekly trips secret. 
 
“I didn't tell anyone in the beginning,” she explains. “We have a doctor in the family that that could lose their job if they do not follow the recommendations.” 
 
She doesn't think that the flurry of newspaper article about Danes flouting the government's advice has had any impact on the number of Danes she sees crossing the bridge and back over the weekend. 
 
But some people have clearly stopped. At the nearby port of Ystad, Mia and Rune are taking the ferry to holiday in Bornholm rather than visiting their summer house near the Swedish city of Kalmar, as they have decided to follow the Danish government's recommendations.
 
“I have to follow the orders from Denmark, of course, but I think it's kind of funny that I can go to Bornholm, but I cannot go to my summer house in Sweden which is out in the countryside,” she said. 
 
“It's a little silly,” her husband adds. “If we can go the other way, they should be able to go our way as well.”
 
But Kerstin suspects that many of the cars she sees leaving Copenhagen on Fridays are not simply using Sweden as a bridge to cross over into Bornholm. 
 
“And if they are all going to Bornholm, some of them are taking a big detour because they head straight off on the road to Stockholm!” she laughs. 
 
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