April greeting from the Frankfurt team
April has been an eventful month. Some of the highlights were the visit from the Frankfurt Book Fair, the press conference where the project’s new partners were presented and the jury meetings for evaluating the incoming design proposals for the Guest of Honour Pavilion. May will include visits from publishers and a press trip in connection with the Norwegian Festival of Literature in Lillehammer and further development of the literary program.
Every visit from the Frankfurt Book Fair is engaging. We very much appreciate the valuable cooperation and dialogue we have had with them since the beginning of our Guest of Honour adventure. We were visited by the book fair’s director Juergen Boos and leader of the guest country team Simone Bühler. During their visit, they met many Norwegian authors and publishers; they also visited several museums and other cultural institutions. They were also an important part of the press conference we held at Tronsmo Bookstore.
During the press conference, we also shared one of the highlights of our forthcoming culture program. For 3-4 months, Museum Angewandte Kunst (MAK) will be converted to House of Norway! Since reopening in 2013, the museum has had more than 43 exhibitions in its 4000 m2 premises, and can boast of receiving more than 1 million visitors. The exhibition curator and museum director, Matthias Wagner K, is very excited about showcasing Norway and what it has to offer, in a surprising way, for a German and international audience. Two institutions taking part as sponsors of the project are Visit Norway and furniture manufacturer Vestre. It’s great to have them in the team! The culture program will be impressive and varied, and we look forward to sharing more highlights as we approach 2019.
The most visually important part of The Frankfurt Project is the Guest of Honour Pavilion at the book fair itself in 2019. The jury has now met for two long meetings where they evaluated the incoming proposals for the concept and design in our open architectural competition. The jury consists of Halldór and Margit from NORLA, as well as Ingerid Helsing Almaas (Architect MNAL and Senior Adviser at DOGA), Espen Røyseland (Architect MNAL) and Stian Hole (Author and Illustrator). A great deal of hard work has gone into every incoming proposal; we are humbled by the proposals and impressed with the amount of effort involved.
The Norwegian Festival of Literature in Lillehammer is approaching fast. The festival is an important venue for us, and this year we are organising an international publisher’s seminar and press tour for German journalists and bloggers in connection with it. We look forward to showcasing the Norwegian literary scene to publishers, journalists and bloggers both there and in Oslo.
The literature program is the core of The Frankfurt project. Throughout the whole of 2019 there will be hundreds of Norwegian literary events in Germany. Norwegian literature will be highlighted at literature festivals, literature houses, bookstores and libraries, inspiring German readers all over Germany in 2019. By summer, the Literature program for the year will have been set, work on this is being led by Andrine Pollen, coordinator of the Literature Program in the Frankfurt team.
Spring greetings from Halldór Guðmundsson, project manager, and the Frankfurt team.
