The Bartolotti is perhaps one of the most beautiful Museum Houses Amsterdam has, built by someone who once was the richest man in the city, but it's a bit hidden in plain sight. These days, it is run by a group of lovely old ladies, who can't wait to offer you tea or juice. You can walk around the house like you live there.
You have to ring the doorbell to get in.
(picture from Google, by Arjan Bronkhorst)
This store is filled floor to ceiling with vintage glass- and tableware from France and other countries surrounding the Netherlands. It is a gem for finding birthday or housewarming gifts.
If you are looking for a reason to visit Kivik, Ulla & Folke are that reason. Their food is great. Their natural wine is great. Their traditionally Swedish interior is great. Their hospitality is great and their logo is strangely Copenhagen hip, in the middle of the South Sweden countryside.
I'm sorry I have no better picture, but do check their Instagram account. It is lovely.
There's a Sol LeWitt pavilion in the middle of a wheat field in Skåne, and it is part of the Kivik Art Centre. This centre sounds like a crafty old ladies thing, but it is not. It a lovely surprise of modern art with a sea view.
Go there, look at art, pet the sheep and then go swim in the coldest sea of Europe - the Baltic.
Simon Wald-Lasowski (Paris, 1980) is a freelance photographer and art director. He makes colorful, fun, twisted work by use of bricolage, word play and 'cliché bending'. Lighthearted at first sight, his images often reveal a certain depth on second inspection. His approach is always very personal, which blur the boundaries between autonomous and commissioned work.
He lives in Amsterdam and graduated from the Gerrit Rietveld Academie in 2004 as a graphic designer. Occasionally he also works as a Wedding MC.
Elisabeth is a Dutch photographer based in Amsterdam. She has been fascinated with photography and aesthetics as well as searching for perfection and imperfection for as long as she can remember. Outdoors or on the information highway, she is always looking for images that impress or inspire her.
In her own work she seeks to inject places and objects with serenity and timelessness infecting them with mystery. For Elisabeth a photo doesn’t have to be explained in detail but can be smashed of its plans. Thereby providing space to the plan -in theory- to transform itself, dependent on its surrounding. She likes to capture the unconscious by following her own sense of beauty. Her goal is to capture life in silence, to hold a moment that remains present, captivating and accessible, but diametrically vague and elusive.
Chinese visual artist and photographer, whose works often speak of personal and collective memory, cultural identity, symbols and language.
Currently based between Amsterdam, the Netherlands and Shanghai, China.
The work of Amsterdam based visual artist Martijn Sandberg, constantly explores border areas, such as the tension between text and image, legibility and illegibility, the private and the public domain. “I make Image Messages, image is message is image.” The image hides the message. In the cut paintings „Sorry No Image Yet‟ and „Too Busy To Paint‟ there is a subtle play between the language of the image and the significance of the image, and this gives rise to questions.
Here, the lack of image seems to be elevated to an image by the artist. The direct relationship between the image, the material bearing the image and the environment is also expressed in his site-specific works in public space and architecture. As in „If These Walls Could Speak‟ that can be viewed in the lifts at the OBA Public Library Amsterdam, and the artwork „I Will Survive' located at the border of a burial ground in Hardenberg, The Netherlands. In 2010 „My Last Penny‟ by Martijn Sandberg is released as jaarpenning/ art medal 2010, issued by the Vereniging voor Penningkunst/ Dutch Art Medal Society in a multiple edition of 450 pieces.