8-15th of December at Standard building (Kopli 25), Tallinn. „Bleier Research Inc“ directors are Signa & Arthur Köstler and Thomas Bo Nilsson.

There were opened a scientific laboratory in the Standard building to create a new human race with telepathic abilities. The test subjects had spent the past six years in entire isolation. The audience played the role of possible foster parents and met the test subjects. „Bleier Research Inc“ tested the audience and actors. It was a possibility be a part of the weird fantasy world for a limited time. We went to see it and it was really interesting!

The participants were chosen in September in a public casting.
Conception SIGNA has been created by Signa Köstler from Denmark and Athur Köstler from Austria. Their work is known as most innovative and experimental theatre projects in Scandinavia.

Read more about Signa:
http://signa.dk/
http://www.facebook.com/#!/signa2011

Alice Aaviksoo, Triin Vainso©SIGNA

The annual film festival was held for the 15th time from November 16th-November 30th. Several Danish films were screened in Tallinn and Tartu. Estonian towns Kärdla, Järva and Valga screened some new Danish movies on December 1st-4th. List of films screened:

„Bora Bora“, 2011, director Hans Fabian Wullenweber
„Lost in Africa“ (Kidnappet), 2011, director Vibeke Muasya
„A Funny Man“ (Dirch), 2011, director Martin Pieter Zandvliet
„Skyscraper“ / (Skyskraber), 2011, director Rune Schjøtt
„Superclasico“ (Superclásico), 2011, director Ole Christian Madsen
 „The Great Bear“ (Den kæmpestore bjørn), 2011, director Esben Toft Jacobsen
„Out of Bounds“ (Labrador), 2011, director Frederikke Aspöck
„Volcano“, 2011, director Rúnar Rúnarsson
„Melancholia“, 2011, director Lars von Trier
„In a Better World“ (Hævnen), 2010, director Susanne Bier
„Movie Days“ (Bíódagar), 1994, director Friðrik Þór Friðriksson
„Play“, 2011, director Ruben Östlund
„Code Blue“, 2011, director Urszula Antoniak
„The Forgiveness of Blood“, 2011, director Joshua Marston

Seminar on 24th of November at the Folk Culture Development and Training Center , J. Vilmsi 55, Tallinn

The Folk Culture Development and Training Center arranged a seminar on administrative reform and its influence on sphere of culture. The seminar was based on a studytour to Finland and Denmark.

Program

10.30 – 11.00  Registration of participants, coffee

11.00 – 11.15  About program: Cultural management on county level in Estonia
Aino Arro, direktor, Estonian Folk Culture and educational Centre

11.15 – 12.00  Administrative reform and its influence on sphere of culture 
Jens Overgaard, head of department of culture, Ballerup kommune

Presentations of participants of the project:  Improved competence in the culture sector in preparation for reforms based on Finnish and Danish experience: 

12.00 – 12.30 Emforcement of the state level lawful bases and financies of cultural and free-time activities in Denmark and Finland.
Valve Heiberg, Helle-Mare Kõmmus, Merike Hallik

12.30 – 13.00 Lunch 

13.00 – 13.30 Changes in financing culture and accession to culture after the administrative reform in Denmark and Finland.
Silvi Ojamuru, Ruth Jürisalu 

13.30 – 14.00 About the cultural institutions under the local administration in Guldborgsund kommune in Denmark and Järvenpää kommune in Finland, compared to Estonia.
Tiina Tegelmann, Ülle Välimäe

14.00 – 14.15 Coffe break

14.15 – 14.45 Model of the Estonian regional cultural management – vision.
Eino Pedanik, councellor, Ministry of Culture

14.45 – 15.30 Discussion and summary

Moderator of the seminar: Jorma Sarv,leader of the development department, Ministry of Culture

The Danish Cultural Institute proposed Silvi Teesalus lecture on theme „Danes – what are they like“. The Institute was also proposing some Danish comedies for viewing: „Klovn“ (TV-series), „On Happy Day“ and „Til Døden Os Skiller“ / ”With Your Permission”.

2011 was Nordic Library Weeks 15th anniversary and the theme was “Humour in the Nordic countries”. Danish author Jakob Martin Strid´s and Finnish author Mikael Niemi´s work were chosen for the event.
Jakob Martin Strid is a Danish comic book author. He´s book “Mustafa´s Kiosk” includes 17 verses, which meaning is to teach tolerance to children.
According to the tradition the event started with a Monday morning reading. 2011 was considered record-breaking, because some pieces of writings were read aloud in more than two thousand places at the same time.

The Danish Boarding School Association organized a two-day seminar, which was held from November 8th-9th at Tallink Express Hotel, Tallinn.
Several Danish and Estonian secondary school teachers and leaders were pariticipating in the seminar. The aim was to develop international cooperation between schools and the focus was on personal meetings between participants and on using various ICT tools as communication between the schools. There were presentations about Nordplus and Comenius programs, about international dimensions at the school, cultural awareness etc.

Program

Tuesday the 8th of November

9.00 Official welcome and short introduction by participants
9.20 The international dimension at the school – how?
Presentation by Jakob Clausager Jensen, European Coordinator,
Efterskoleforeningen
10.00 Break
10.30 Cultural awareness and intercultural competences - why?
Presentation by Mari Kerde, Coordinator of International
Cooperation, Tallinn University Haapsalu College
12.00 Lunch
13.00 The different Comenius and Nordplus programs
Presentation by Made Kirtsi, Head of Unit (Comenius Regio, Language
Label, Nordplus Junior) Archimedes - Centre for Educational
Programmes in Estonia
14.30 Break
15.00 eTwinning – Twinspace 2.0
Presentation by Elo Allemann, eTwinning coordinator Estonian
eTwinning NSS
17.00 Relax and time to meet the other participants.

Wednesday the 9th of November 2011

9.00 Example of a Comenius Multilateral school partnership
Presentation by Niels Kristian Kristensen, teacher and international
coordinator at a Danish secondary school
9.45 Example of a Comenius Multilateral school partnership
Presentation by Bodil Dinesen, teacher and international coordinator
at a Danish efterskole
10.30 Break
11.00 Example of a Nordplus Junior project
Presentation by Jakob Clausager Jensen, Efterskoleforeningen
12.00 Lunch
13.00 Cooperation between the schools.
Since Tuesday the different schools have posted a note with their
hopes/ideas for a future cooperation between one or more
schools – the different projects are expanded and the afternoon is
allocated for cooperation between the schools. There will be an
option for supervision concerning international cooperation and
the different Comenius and Nordplus programs.

Danish composer Bo Holten´s composition „The Marriage of Heaven and Hell“ first performance in Estonia
On November 5th at 15 at Paide Town Hall
On November 6th at 15 at Tallinns Song Festival Grounds

Nordic a cappella choir music: Veljo Tormis, Einojuhani Rauta vaara, Tõnu Kõrvits, Bo Holten. Conductor: Kaspar Mänd.

What do you do, when four paintings, all showing the same biblical scene of Christ chasing moneylenders from the temple in Jerusalem; all apparently either made by or strongly influenced by the two famous 16th century artists Bosch and Bruegel turn up at museums in Copenhagen, Glasgow and Tallinn as well as at an auction in London?
If you are an art historian and/or expert you call your colleagues and put together an extensive research project on the four pieces. And then you exhibit the works of art as well as the findings of your research at the very same museums, using the latest in technology and story telling.

Until March 4th the four paintings as well as the results of the research process will be on display at Kadriorg Art Museum in Tallinn.

21.10.2011 – 04.03.2012
Kadriorg Art Museum
Weizenbergi 37
10127 Tallinn
Estonia
Tel: +372 6066400
greta.koppel@ekm.ee
www.ekm.ee

Attributed to Pieter Bruegel the Elder. Christ Driving the Traders from the Temple, after 1569. Photo: Statens Museum for Kunst

Danish Concert Band gave a concert on October 17th at 4 pm at Estonia Concert Hall, Estonia pst 4, Tallinn.

The Danish Concert Band was founded in 1968 in the Copenhagen suburb of Rødovre. Jørgen Misser Jensen has been conductor of the orchestra since 1970. Through all the years, the orchestra has been financially supported by the Municipality of Rødovre (Rødovre Kommune). The orchestra has developed tremendously from initially being a small, locally based orchestra to becoming an ambitious, prestigious and very busy orchestra performing in concert halls both at home and abroad.
As usual, the orchestra will be presenting an ambitious program featuring works of some of the most popular contemporary composers such as Tylman Susato and Adam Gorb.
For concert in Tallinn orchestra has invited Finnish well-known clarinet player Olli Leppäniemi.

Danish Concert Band. Photo: www.concertband.dk

September 26th was European Day of Languages. In Estonia the day was
celebrated with a translation conference and an information day about
languages and language studies both at Tallinn University. Danish was of course amongst the many languages represented at the event.
The Danish Cultural Institute was present both at the conference
and at the information day, where those interested could drop by our
stand and have a talk about how to study Danish in Estonia, try our
language quiz or  participate in our mini-course in Danish.

Prior to the European Day of Languages Klassika Raadio was playing
music in different European languages and let its listeners guess
which languages was being played. The Danish Cultural Institute provided music suggestions for the programme.

Conference:
11:00 – 18:00
Senate Hall, Tallinn University

Information Day:
10:30 – 16:00
Tallinn University Atrium
Uus-Sadama 5

The Danish Cultural Institute supported the Danish-Malaysian art and design group Art4Soul and their exhibition, Man&God, which was open in Tallinn’s Rotermanni Kvartal from September 15 to October 8. The exhibition, which includes works by the two Danes Jesper von Wieding and Morten Brudholm, has been on a world tour since it was first shown in Kuala Lumpur in 2003. Since then art lovers in Germany, Indonesia, Malaysia, Taiwan, Korea, Singapore, Denmark, USA and now Estonia have had the pleasure of the exhibition. In Tallinn the exhibition was part of the Tallinn 2011 Design Night Festival.

The exhibition had contributions from artists and designers from Africa, Austria, Brazil, China, Denmark, France, Germany, Hong Kong, Iran, Israel, Italy, Japan, Korea, Malaysia, New Zealand, Singapore, Taiwan, Thailand, The Netherlands, Turkey, the United Kingdom and the United States.

Photo: Benjamin Thomas Christensen / The Danish Cultural Institute

The University of Copenhagen Jazz Big Band gave four concerts in Estonia:

Concert on September 13th at 6 pm
at Tallinn Technical University big hall,  Ehitajate tee 5, Tallinn

Concert on September 14th at 10pm
at Von Krahl bar, Rataskaevu 10/12, Tallinn

Concert in Haapsalu, September 15th at 8pm
Haapsalu´s Kuursaal
Promenaadi 1, Haapsalu

Concert in Haapsalu, September 16th at 6 pm
Balcony Room, Haapsalu’s House of Culture
Posti tee 3, Haapsalu

MIBB – The University of Copenhagen Jazz Big Band has provided the world with swinging jazz tunes since 1995. The big band is inspired by artists such as Glenn Millier and Count Basie and plays old classics as well as their own compositions. In recent years funk and latin music has been incorporated into the bands repertoire.

MIBB plays together with TTÜ Bigband at the Tallinn Techincal University.

TTÜ Bigband. Foto: http://www.ttu.ee/bigband

Amandus Adamson Studio Museum in Paldiski presented an international land art exhibition "Sounds of Land and Sea". Represented was art created by Danish, British, French, Finnish, Swedish and Estonian sculptors. Exhibition was opened until the end of December 2011.

Here are some pictures of workshop:

Karen Havskov Jensen; photo: Amandus Adamson Studio Museum

Klavs Weiss; photo: Amandus Adamson Studio Museum

Tallinn Old Town Days 2011 were held from May 28th until June 5th. It is an intercultural event and includes concert performances, theatre festival, sport events and much more. Every day of the event had its own theme.
Danish Cultural Institute, Tammsaare Theatre and ceramic studio Asuurkeraamika arranged an event on Children´s Day, June 1st.

Students from different schools took part in the Legends Tour arranged by Tammsaare theatre actors. Thereafter students continued with the ceramic workshop in the Masters`Yard of  the Danish King`s Garden, molding clay into figures of medieval citizens or depicting buildings of medieval Tallinn. All the works were exhibited on Dannebrog Day June 15th at the Danish King´s Garden.

HeadRead Festival presents Estonian literature and opens world literature up to you. Festival Centre is the Estonian Writers Union on Harju Street 1. Poet Claus Ankersen and writer Ida Jessen participated from Denmark.
Claus Ankersen, May 26th at 9pm on Harju Street 1
Idan Jessen, moderated by Kätlin Kaldmaa, May 27th at 3pm on Harju Street 1.

Claus Ankersen (1967) is an internationally recognized poet from Denmark and he is also one of the central persons of the Danish Poetry Slam. He has published two books and a CD of poems. Ankersen has also directed and produced a documentary about spoken Danish. He has performed all over the world in different places like rock festivals and bonfires.

Photo: Claus Ankersen http://www.clausankersen.dk/

Ida Jessen (1964) is a Danish writer and a translator. She became famous with her collection of short stories “Under Sten” (1998). Jessen has received numerous awards, among them the prestigious Søren Gyldendal award. Her recent novel “Children” (2010) is nominated for the Nordic Council´s Literature Prize.

Photo: Forfætternet

Haapsalu held its annual fairytale festival. This festival was first held in 2009 and the previous success of the festival had encouraged the organisers to continue with the literary meetings in Haapsalu.
Henrik Broue Jensen, Lise Bidstrup and Birde Poulsen participated from Denmark.
20th of May: at 10am Henrik Broue Jensen talked about the evil as the creative force in fairytales.
12pm Lise Bidstrup and Birde Poulsen talked about illustrating a children`s book.
Place: Haapsalu Cultural Centre

Institute was involved in the Nordic Look Design Month initiated by the Nordic Council of Ministers representation to celebrate 20 years of activities in Estonia.

Nordic Design House was opened from May 2nd for the whole month in Old Tallinn. Exhibition of fashion from Nordic countries promoted Nordic sustainable and economical field of fashion and design, characterized by the use of ecological materials and evironmentally friendly production process. Ivana Helsinki from Finland, Noir and Katvig from Denmark and other well-known Nordic design brands were introduced. The event was on the Tallinn 2011 Cultural Capital of Europe program.

See: http://katvig.dk/ and http://www.noir.dk/

All Estonian-speaking and -writing people were invited by Nordic office in Estonia, to contribute articles to Vikipeedia (Estonian language net-encyclopedia) on various Nordic topics.

Participants were asked to write articles becore April 30th. Thereafter jury, consisting of five people, among those leader of the Danish Cultural Institute, chose best. Main prize being 1000 euro, for a trip to one of the Nordic countries.

This event was to commemorate 20 years of Nordic cooperation in Estonia. Estonian language Vikipeedia is a new net-area, with only about 88 thousand articles and in need of new input. We also encouraged articles about Denmark.

Danish fashion brands S´NOB, Noa Noa and InWear/Matinique arranged a promotion festivity to present Danish fashion and lifestyle on April 14th in a renovated former factory F-Hoone. Institute and the Danish Embassy were supporting the event with the promotion of Denmark and Danish values via speeches and photo-collage.

To celebrate International Children´s Book Day (on Hans Christian Andersen´s birthday) the award ceremony of the Sten Roos Fairy-tale contest was held at Tallinn Town Hall.

This traditionl contest has brought this time over two hundred works from all over Estonia. Institute has been participating in this event for the last six years.

Two exhibitions were opened at the Estonian Children´s Literature Centre on 2nd of April - book illustrations "Fairy-tales of the Sea" by artists from around the Baltic Sea (open until 14th of May) and international puppet art exhibition "Little Mermaid" (open until 28th of May). The Centre, a long-time cooperation partner of the Institute, is very active in promoting literature and art for children.

Institute has made agreement with the Estonian production firm „Exit-film“ who has, already from 1993, working relations with the Danish filmcompany Zentropa.
Institute promoted Danish films throughout the year, while Exit-film with its partners brought for screening the best on the market – new films, prize-winners. Royal Danish Embassy supported the screenings.

Susanne Bier Oscar-prized film „In A Better World“ opened the Danish Film 2011 program at Coca-Cola Plaza cinema on March 11.

Films to be shown in 2011:

"Family"
Premiere in Denmark Feb 24, 2011.
By Pernille Fischer Christiansen

"The Woman who dreamt of a Man"
By Per Fly

"Truth about men"
By Nikolaj Arcels

"Rebounce"
Nominated: Generation 14 Berlina
By Heidi Maria Faisst

"Beautiful people"
By Mikkel Munch-Fals

The fourth Jõhvi Ballet festival last week of February this year concentrated on Scandinavian ballet – contemporary and traditional. Festival invited Swedish Royal Ballet and Norwegian Royal Ballet, who presented solo-pieces from their original ballets. Audiense could visit festival club, where most known Danish coreographer Auguste Bournonville was presented by dvd-version of ballet  „Napoli“.  In addition to that had Institute acquired dvd with a children ballet „Kom Bamse“.  Both being performances by the Royal Danish Ballet. Festival club was also showing a demo-video, introducing Danish conpemporary dance companies, of which many have participated in different dance performances in Estonia.
Danish ballet traditions are not completely unknown here. Danish ballet have estonians enjoyed through August Bournonville ballet „Sylphide“, which was staged in theatre „Estonia“ three years ago under Danish directing. Traditional and unique  Bournonville ballet-style was taught to estonian ballet-dansers by coreographers Eva Kloborg, Frank Andersen and Anne Marie Vessel Schlüter. Decoration, costume design and light-design was made by well-known theatre artist Mikael Melbye. 

Opening of the graphic exhibition ”Man binder et bånd” took place on January 11th at 16 at the foyer gallery of the National Library of Estonia, Tõnismägi 2.

The author of the exhibition, Danish artist Jens Damkjær Nielsen, was present at the opening.

Exhibition was depicting relations and ties between the two overseas capitals – Tallinn and Helsinki, and is dedicated to Tallinn2011 European Capital of Culture. Black-white colour type was inspired by Japanese art, supported by artist`s Nordic experience and aesthetics.

Jens Damkjær Nielsen has been participating in numerous international exhibitions and is member of Danish Graphic Artists Union.

Dual exhibition, which was presented in Tallinn and Helsinki, had been built up for those concrete exhibition rooms – in National Library of Estonia and Nordic House in Helsinki.

It was collaboration between Danish Embassy in Helsinki, Danish Cultural Institute and National Library of Estonia.