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Swedish Press N Y A
S V E N S K A
www.SwedishPress.com
Swedish Humour: A Laughing Matter
P R E S S E N
E S T . 1 9 2 9
March 2020 Vol 91:02 $5.95
02 2020
Interviews with Lasse Ă…berg & Janne Westerlund The Stockholm Series
The Myth of the Serious Swede: Swedish Humor from Bellman to Instagram Lorem ipsum
H
umor isn’t the first thing that comes to mind when thinking about Sweden. In fact, Swedes are usually regarded as stern By Marcus and serious, more inclined toward noir murder mysteries or Bergmanesque dramas than sitcoms. Behind the austere Scandinavian mask, though, there’s a rich tradition of humor that has evolved significantly in the past thirty years, and continues to develop today in new social media platforms. Perhaps the most famous comedian in Swedish history, Carl Michael Bellman, created the blueprint for the Carl Michael Bellman, portrait by nation’s humor in the late Per Krafft 1779. 18th century. He was a poet and songwriter with a sharp satirical wit who wrote drinking songs that have endured the test of time, still sung today at family gatherings. Bellman wrote scandalous material about courtly life, addressing themes like sexuality, bodily functions, and the monarchy. Though Bellman was born nearly three centuries ago, Swedish humor still draws upon the same sources for much of its material. Fortunately, 21st-century Swedish comedy has found some new targets for the butt of a joke. Heavily influenced by British humor in the 1960s, Swedish writers took the cue of exalting failure and humiliation. According Jon Skolmen and Lasse Åberg in to English TV personality “The Stig-Helmer Story”. Stephen Fry, the British
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comic ethos can be characterized as follows: “We are bathed in failure but we make a glory of our failure … We love the fact that every great British comic hero is so flawed as to be an utter disaster.” The Swedes share this Andersson mentality, gravitating toward the darkness of the pathetic hero rather than the lighter American paradigm of the clown (Jim Carrey, Will Ferrell, Steve Carell, Zach Galifianakis, to name a few). Unlike American comedy, which is primarily punchlinedriven and slapstick-centered, British and Swedish humor focus on creating a painfully awkward mood, and draw attention to class differences and stifling social norms. Swedes, like their UK neighbors, take their national identity itself as a joke. Besides its indebtedness to British humor, contemporary Swedish comedy also spends a lot of time mocking other Scandinavians. The Finns are consistently made out to be knife-wielding drunks, the Danes portrayed as rustic hedonists, and the Norwegians depicted as unsophisticated farmers. This is fairly parochial local humor and not very translatable outside of its Grotesco på Scala på Turné. Photo: Scandinavian context, but Robert Eldrim it’s still extremely popular. Nearly every Swedish sketch troupe or comedian has had its Finn or Dane-bashing moment. Today, one of Sweden’s most popular comedy troupes is Grotesco. The group ridicules Swedishness with skits like “Svennen” (“The Swede”), as well as Finns by showing how a literary discussion ends in a knife fight, and Danish hedonism by portraying a gathering where the party-goers pass around a defibrillator while drinking. They also attack both social democratic and right-wing political attitudes
in a sketch in which the Swedish welfare state mentality turns people into zombies. Grotesco is irreverent and dares to be more experimental in its subject matter. Much of the humor is meta-humor, making fun of the idea of sketch troupes and television programs, often layering sketches within larger sketches. Many of Grotesco’s cast members star in one of Sweden’s most popular comedy series, Solsidan. This is a satire of Stockholm’s archipelago, which encourages the viewer to see the world from a common person’s perspective. One couple in the show, for example, lives in an all-white mansion, so glaringly bright that it Solsidan Season 5. appears surreal, taking the trend in upper-class interior design to the extreme. At the other end of the social ladder, the audience is asked to identify with Anna and Alex, a middle-class family trying to adjust to the snobbery of Saltsjöbaden – a posh town near Stockholm. Though the comedy duo is a less popular format, it still offers a winning approach to humor in Sweden. The most successful contemporary example is Filip and Fredrik, which is defined by its characters’ candid, unscripted banter. They come across as two friends exploring the world: “Alla mot alla med Filip och Fredrik” Season 3 premiered on 13 January Fredrik represents Sweden 2020 on Channel 5. Photo: Margareta Bloom Sandebäck/Kanal 5 – reserved, uptight, and anxious, which are traits that Filip, who represents the anti- Swede, often mocks. In 2014, for example, they created La Bamba, a show about the two characters pursuing their fantasies of living out exotic American lives (e.g. the cowboy, the hippie, etc.). Filip constantly pushes Fredrik’s boundaries, even drugging him at a spa retreat in California – a moment that became one of the most famous clips from the program. A less developed side of Johan Glans. Photo: Robert Eldrim Swedish humor is stand-up
comedy which only started to flourish in the 1980s. Swedish standup comedies tend to be less vulgar than their American or British counterparts, playing on themes like city versus country life, personal inadequacy, and SwedishÖzz Nujen. Photo: Robert Eldrim ness. Comedians like Johan Glans and Janne Westerlund are national favourites and cater their material to a broad public, keeping their content safe. Since the 1990s, immigrant-centered standup has also found a place in the scene, with comics like Özz Nujen creating a space for addressing ethnic differences, a subject that is otherwise ignored in the Swedish media. The future of Swedish comedy takes the tradition of the sketch troupe to new social media platforms. Tom Ljungqvist, an up-andcoming Swedish comedian, Photo: Tom Ljungqvist has used Instagram and its filters to create several characters, morphing his face digitally and altering the pitch of his voice. He films himself from a selfie angle in his apartment or on the streets of Stockholm while in character, using absurdist comedy instead of parodying anything uniquely Swedish. Some of his work, however, does satirize life in Stockholm, particularly the sketches he makes with his troupe Inte Helt Hundra. Their comedic sense has landed them sponsorships and appearances on television, where they continue their brand Tom Ljungqvist, Alfred Svensson of comedy but incorporate and Petter Egnefors in “Inte Helt products into their pieces. Hundra”. Comedians like Ljungvist show the opportunities available to future generations on social media for creating a brand and evolving the country’s comic tradition. Despite the stereotype of the serious Swede, Swedish humor has an unexpectedly broad range and is constantly evolving as it interacts with new social perspectives and media platforms.
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Hemma hos
3D Artist Captivates with Mesmerizing Animations
[Design]
By Kristi Robinson
T
he online world of Instagram is a virtual sea of ideas, but not often are they compelling and original. Stockholm-based motion graphics artist Andreas Wannerstedt has captured an audience with his mesmerizing 3D animations. Whether it’s metal marbles rolling synchronistically over an undulating surface, or candy-colored gel swirling into a soft serve melt of pure satisfaction, there’s something undeniably captivating about the movement and rhythms of Andreas’ looping animations.
Grid Slicer
At 38 years of age, Andreas has been working in the field for almost half his lifetime. His career first started out in 2D animation. After attending Sweden’s leading digital creative university, Hyper Island, and doing an internship with a digital design agency in Los Angeles he found his calling in 3D animation. Andreas’ first video sharing was done on Vimeo and on his website with 2–3 minute animations that took him about eight months to make. When Instagram came on the scene his foray into the ever-popular social
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Colorful, animated art in a digital series called “Oddly Satisfying”
networking service began by posting clips from commercial projects he had done. He did gain some attention, but when he narrowed his focus to create content specifically for Instagram with 3–5 second looping videos, that’s when things really took off. He admits it’s relatively easy to produce the videos since he is able to go from concept to completion in just one day. For him the hardest part is coming up with the ideas, but clearly this is something Andreas shines at having done looping animations for clients including Google, Swarovski, Gucci, and Omega. Andreas reveals that the most important aspects of these 3D videos are to make them realistic through texture and lighting. Most of his inspiration comes from things he’s surrounded by in daily life. He looks for small details, like how light bounces off objects. He says it’s fun to observe the real world and try to mimic it in the 3D world. He loves the possibilities of adding an abstract touch, because he can adjust real world behaviors of gravity and friction without the need to make it physically correct.
Color plays an important part. He prefers pastels because they work well with the soothing nature of his animations. In his earlier looping videos he created the animations without music, but feedback from viewers requested that he add it in. He teamed up with sound designers and immediately found that his animations became much more popular. Jump to present day, and he has reached out to some of the biggest sound agencies in the world, all of whom have been eager to collaborate with Andreas. A fascinating and unforeseen side effect of putting his videos on such a public platform is that people suffering from OCD have told him his animations help them calm down.
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Andreas explains that this may be so because the repetitiveness and motion patterns fire up neurotransmitters in our brains, like dopamine and serotonin – chemicals that are responsible for our feelings of relaxation and happiness. So if there’s one thing you do for yourself today, check out Andreas’ wonderfully hypnotic loop animations. They’re candy for the eyes and R&R for the soul. Go to instagram. com/wannerstedt. All photos © Andreas Wannerstedt
Hemma hos
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grew up in Gothenburg, Sweden where I graduated from high school. I then moved to the United States to continue my studies at Wellesley College. I returned to live in Gothenburg for a while with my American husband Jeff. A little over 10 years ago we moved to Philadelphia. I got my medical degree in Sweden but trained to be a licensed registered
dietitian in Philadelphia. I currently provide nutrition counseling for patients at Penn Medicine, consult for restaurants (helping with healthy menu development and analysis) and work as a nutritionist for a Swedish online nutrition and exercise business (Mamma Fitness). Cooking and recipe creation have always been passions of mine. I have been able to combine work and pleasure by writing four cookbooks in Sweden in collaboration with my sister who is a lifestyle journalist and TV personality. Our most recent cookbook, “Around the table with the von Sydow Sisters,” was created together with my sister as well as my mother. It gives you all the recipes
[Treats]
à la Amy von Sydow Green
you need for eating well all summer. When I’m not busy working on a million projects, I love spending time with my husband and three kids, and of course we enjoy cooking together! By Amy von Sydow Green MD, MS, RD
Red Currant Cardamom Cake Ingredients: (10-12 pieces) • 1 softened stick of butter • 1⅓ cup sugar • 1 egg • 2/3 cup milk • 1/2 cup Greek yogurt • 1 tsp vanilla extract • 2 cup flour • 2 tsp baking powder • 1 tbsp ground cardamom • 1 pinch salt • 1 banana • 1/2 cup red currants (or raspberries) • 1 tbsp of raw sugar
This heavenly cake is medicine for the soul! A delicious combination of sweetness and acidity from the berries, with spicy cardamom as a final touch. Preparation: Heat oven to 350 F. Grease a pan (approximately 10 inches in diameter) and then add 1 – 2 tablespoons of sugar to the pan. Shake and turn pan until sugar coats the butter, and pour out any excess. Place softened butter and sugar in a bowl. Using an electric beater, whisk until light and fluffy. Stir in the egg, milk, yoghurt and vanilla extract. In a different bowl, mix all dry ingredients and pour them into the wet mixture. Stir together. Add half of the batter to the pan, then slice the banana and spread it out on top of the batter together with berries. Cover with remaining batter (so that it covers banana slices and berries). Sprinkle raw sugar on top. Bake in the lower half of the oven for about 45 minutes, until a test stick comes out dry. Decorate with berries and powdered sugar before serving.
Yogurt Cream with Berries Ingredients: • 31/2 oz white chocolate • 1 cup 2% (or more) Greek yogurt • Seasonal mixed berries (or whatever you have in your freezer!)
This recipe could not be any simpler! It makes for a fun and different dessert that you can literally throw together in 3 minutes. Preparation: Melt white chocolate in a pot or in the microwave. Immediately stir in yogurt. Serve right away with berries.
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