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The mission for the day was the cliff on the road near Gjesvær. Bjørn called up his friend with the snow truck to clear our wall from the snow.This time I thought I should not do a style piece with my name, but rather a name that has something to do with the place I’m at. Even that Gjesvær is a small village it is a settlement for people since 6000! years.It is mentioned in SnorreSturlason’s Heimskringla (1225) as the first landing site from the north.In 1026, returning from a raid in Russia, a famous Norwegian Viking named Tore Hund killed fellow Viking Karle in Gjesvær. The best thing I think I could do was to paint the name of “Tore Hund” and dedicate the wall to the people of the community.
Though it was only -10° Celsius at the wall it should have felt warmer than at the factory the day before, but it wasn’t. With the weather changing every 20 minutes plus a cold and humid breeze from down the sea it made the action harder than the one the other day. We had to leave the car turned on all day since it was very dark and felt very cold, so that we could warm up from time to time.The local radio station showed up taking an interview with us. Then I found out that the lady interviewing me was the former Lotto fairy of Norway. Later the others took off for about an hour leaving me alone up there in darkness.
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“It was a strange but awesome feeling: Alone, quiet, surrounded by purest nature with northern lights above me. I had only a headlight that Bjørn gave me, so I was at least able to see what I was painting.” – Kent
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Gladly they returned a little later so I could warm up and then almost finish my work. Back at the cabin Bjørn had prepared a great meal for us: 3,5 kg of delicious king crab. We almost ate it up and went to bed stuffed.

Time passed so quickly and our last day in Gjesvær was about to begin. Björn and us went back to the cliff, so I could do a few finishing touches on my work. The piece again was covered in snow, so we had to dig it out, before I could proceed and finally sign the wall. Together we drove around the island to take more pictures especially of the first wall, while having conversations and making fun. After the ride it was about time to pack stuff and say Goodbye to Bjørn, Helene, their son and the beautiful village of Gjesvær. We promised and were sure that we would return one day. Knowing we would have almost 280 km ahead of us, we stopped in Honningsvåg to get gasoline because it is pretty dangerous running out of gas in the cold in the middle of nowhere. On the long ride back to Alta during the night we knew why: Minus 27° Celsius inside the country was the coldest temperature the thermometer told us. After almost 4 hours we arrived in Alta late at night.

Time to get to the airport, drop the carkeys and fly back home with a short stop in Oslo. During the flight back I had time to recap the whole week of adventure, fun, laughs, freezing, painting, seafood, nature, northern lights, etc. Ruedi and me both agreed that this had been one of the greatest actions we had done so far, even though that the artwork wasn’t as much the center of it as in previous actions. We were basically thrilled by experience and were really happy and thankful for being able to do what we had done and experienced.
Thanks to all the people that had helped me getting it done, especially the Jenssen family, Nina from Hordafor, the snow truck, Montana Cans, Rüdiger Glatz the brilliant camera and everyone who appreciated what i did.

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After the usual fried egg breakfast and the coffee meeting with Bjørn and Helene we soon took off to the fish factory in Honningsvåg to get our first action done. Once we got there we realized that getting to the walls was a bit of a task. The area was covered in snow and since it was partially abandoned younever know where you would step on and if the ground was stable. Slowly I wandered down to all parts of the wall until I knew where to step so that it would be safe. I got myself a big ladder from the factory workers who were busy loading a ship with tons of frozen fish next to my part of the factory. I chose only to use few colors for this action so I chose Black, Chrome, White and Red out of my Montana Black stock.

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“This was a good test for the cans: Minus 15° Celsius with the cans mostly sitting in the snow for hours. Not once I got disappointed and the cans were working like a charm.” – Kent
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This was a good test for the cans: Minus 15° Celsius with the cans mostly sitting in the snow for hours. Not once I got disappointed and the cans were working like a charm. Especially since the walls were neither whitewashed nor had any preparation: Solid concrete with some snow and moss. Also it was a good test for me, but since I was well equipped and was wearing the boots Bjørn gave me, two layers of thermal underwear and thick gloves it turned out that I gladly wasn’t freezing that much. Moving around in the deep snow with the ladder wasn’t that easy, neither was the climbing so everything took its time. It felt sort of a graffiti obstacle course to me painting this location and it got me pretty exhausted. I finished the painting by 2:00am almost not feeling anything anymore. Happy and tired we took the final shot of the wall, headed back to Gjesværand after a lite night dinner I soon fell asleep.

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“During the weeks before the trip I got pretty excited and couldn’t wait to go, because I knew this would be a new experience to me since I have never been in a polar region before. Arriving in Oslo i could tell it’s most definitely winter up here. From Oslo i was supposed to fly to Alta, a small town in northern Norway. I was circling around Alta quite some time when they said i would have to fly over to Tromsø since Alta Airport was closed due to heavy snow. Arriving in Tromsø i was not really knowing what’s gonna happen next, because the airline didn’t really pass any information how things would proceed. After some time it was clear that i had to stay in Tromsø overnight and that the airline would provide a hotel and food for all the passengers. Tromsø is a beautiful little town and i got really comfortable with the cozy winterfeeling that started to grow in myselve.

The next morning the hotel forgot about the wakeup call, so that i almost missed the plane over to Alta. This time the airport of Alta wasn’t closed so I finally landed at my first destination during midday. Alta felt even a little colder than Tromsø. I rented a car, bought some food and drinks and started the 250km drive to the final destination: the small village of Gjesvær. In that area it’s polar wintertime which means that the sun never really rises. There is some light before midday but after 2:00 pm it is getting completely dark. Iwas fascinated by the snow wrapped landscape and the color perception you’ve got there. Driving over the country there were hardly any cars on the road and the thermometer could tell it is getting colder and colder. By 3:00 pm I stopped in the mountains. It was unbelievable, moonshine in between the clouds in total darkness, nobody around and not the slightest sound except for the blowing wind and snowfall. It was simply beautiful. I passed icy roads, Reindeer areas(but couldn’t see any) and finally the north cape tunnel (8,2 km long), a subsea road connecting the Norwegian mainland to the island of Magerøya, the place i wanted to go to. Magerøya is an island with around 2300 inhabitants, 6km away from the mainland featuring a bleak, barren tundra-landscape devoid of any trees, with steep cliff faces on the coast and dramatic mountainscapes inside the island.
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“In that area it’s polar wintertime which means that the sun never really rises. There is some light before midday but after 2:00 pm it is getting completely dark.” – Kent
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I stopped in the beautiful little town of Honningsvåg (the main town on the south east of the island) to buy some more food for the night and to quickly check out the fish-factory of the company Hordafor, one of the locations that we have chosen to let one of our possible painting actions take place. In the meantime Bjørn messaged me and told me the road to Gjesvær was closed and that I would have to wait at a road gate for the snow truck to pick me up. Soon after he messaged again to tell us that the road had been cleared in the meantime. Back to the car I drove the last 30km through the beautiful, but almost unreal landscape of the island arriving in Gjesvær. It wasn’t hard to find Bjørn‘s house and my cabin since the village only has a few dozen houses holding only around 130 inhabitants. Meeting Bjørn and Helene was just awesome: Friendly, open minded people with a great sense of humor. We talked and laughed a lot and all of us seemed really happy that we finally made it up there. The cabin was simple, but cute and comfortable, just the way I would have expected. The view outside its main window was breathtaking: Looking straight down to the landing stage into the fjord. There we were: Happy and pretty tired after a exhausting road trip.

Waking up next day meant to slowly getting used to the fact that there is not a real day, as we from the southern hemisphere are familiar with. The day in Gjesværstarts into shady twilight with the brightest time around 11:00 am and then rapidly turning back to darkness until 2:00 pm. I really enjoyed the view outside of our cabin and a feeling of great peace was growing inside of me. Bjørn, Ruedi and me sat together with coffee discussing our options and planning the week. We thought at first we should check out all the walls that might suit our plans. But Bjørn had an even better idea for the start of the day. He said we should use the morning light and invited us to go out fishing with his boat. He gave us special suits that withstand the sea conditions and the humidity. As soon as we took off the boat landing Snowfall started along with a cold breeze. Going out fishing was great. We got us some haddock for dinner and were impressed by the numerous fjords and cliffs that we were passing. Ruedi even liked it so much he got seasick and had to “feed the crabs” as Bjørn would have said. Ruedi asked him how they would normally kill a fish once they have caught it and Bjørn just said that they would bite him in the head. I didn’t hesitate to kill the fish I had in my hand that way and we all started laughing and didn’t probably end until the end of the boat trip. I was glad Ruedi brought a bottle of Vodka to the boat, so that I was able to clean that fishy taste I had in my mouth. Back at the house it already started to get dark again. Now it was time to drive around and check out our potential painting spots. One of our favorites was a natural stone wall on the road 2km outside of Gjesvær, that Bjørn got us permission for. It was a solid straight rock cliff with lots of snow in front of it and a beautiful surrounding: All that you had to do is turn around to look down into the fjord and see the moon mirrored on the water. The wall was perfect and we chose it as to be our second action a few days later. Right then the extravaganza really started: We experienced our first polar lights up in the clear star spangled sky.
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“This area was amazing: Untouched slightly rotten walls in a very industrial looking environment covered in snow.” – Kent
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We took off to Honningsvåg and visited a garbage burning facility that we had pictures of and that we thought was an option. As soon as we got there we had to realize that the wall wasn’t what it was supposed to be and that there was way too much snow around it. Our third option was the fish factory of the company Hordafor. A few weeks back I got to speak to their manager Nina and she was pretty open to our project and furthermore liked the idea of having some artwork on either one of the old buildings or on some of their fishtanks. We met Nina and she showed us the facility. At first she thought we would do a painting similar to what the team had done in Dubai a few years back and I had to explain her that something like that size is not possible within a day and that we would love to do a total different concept. One section of the company’s location was an old and rotten part that she explained would be getting demolished in the next one or two years. This area was amazing: Untouched slightly rotten walls in a very industrial looking environment covered in snow. If you stood at a specific location outside the area you had a stunning panoramic view to the facility. This was the spot so we chose it as our first action for the upcoming day. Back to Gjesvær through the fantastic moonlike landscape across the island we had some tasty filets of haddock waiting for us…”

Watch out for the second part!

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“The first thought they had was that my mail was Spam and someone wanted to fool them but then they immediately realized that I was not kidding.”
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The first thought they had was that my mail was Spam and someone wanted to fool them but then they immediately realized that I was not kidding. With my plan in general being unusual enough it was also the time I planned doing my action: during wintertime at polar night when it is low season and hardly any tourists. Bjørn was amazed by my ideas and during the following weeks he began supporting me with sending images of possible buildings and locations to paint on, while trying to get in touch with people for commissions for these locations. Not only by the support they gave me but also through numerous fun time calls (Bjørn has a great sense of humor, so we laughed a lot) and mails my gut told me that this must most definitely be the best people to have contacted to let this happen. Plans were made, can shipment was organized and flights were booked: The “adventure” was about to begin.

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