The time had come to leave Sundsvall and it is with sadness that we do so.  Our visit with my lovely cousin Kent and his gorgeous family was not nearly long enough and the setting and town so picturesque that I could have stayed a long long time!

TRAVEL AND ART BLOGS

Our travels today take us to Stockholm by train and if you should want to catch up on the travel and art blogs leading up to this point in our recent Europe trip here are the links;  156. ART & FREQUENT FLYER POINTS and 157. Art & Never judge a book by it’s cover and 155 The Art of Packing Light and 164. ART, TOILETS AND TRAVEL

ACRYLIC PAINTING

This acrylic on canvas board painting is of a little red Swedish cottage during the winter months.  It was commissioned by my American Gallery and as chance would have it unbeknownst to me at the time; my cousin Bjorn and his wife Ann live in a setting almost identical to this by a lake in Huddinge.

My cousin Bjorn picked us up from the train station when we arrived and had arranged for us to stay in an apartment with his son Kalle.  I had really been looking forward to seeing Bjorn again, we knew each other as very young, playing together at family celebrations but had lost touch and reconnected through my art website and Facebook.

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MAKING SCULPTURES FOR CHARITY

Bjorn has been especially supportive with my art and my artblogs and I think we have found a few common bonds too.  Bjorn who is a whiz kid in IT with IBM commutes between Sweden and England for work, found that in his spare time he would like to give back and thought to combine that with his love of tinkering in his shed where he was originally carving wooden figures.  So to cut a long story short, Rundellhund.com was born.  Roundaboutdogs is the English translation and it is about making small dog sculptures and placing them into roundabouts across the world for the general public to enjoy.  All dogs are made from recycled materials and all money collected goes back to charity.  If you would like to participate or know a little more about this use link RONDELLHUND.  Also here is a previous art blog that I have written about this Roundaboutdogs – sculptures for charity.  The other thing we had in common was that he is a big kid just like me!  Bjorn is all grown up obviously but acts and looks decades younger than his years, full of life and fun.

Before we settled in to the apartment Bjorn took us on a tour of Huddinge which is where I grew up when I lived in Sweden.  A lot had changed of course but some things stayed the same, my high school looked completely foreign to me until I figured out that I always came to it from the opposite entrance climbing up a hill.

ROUNDABOUTDOG SCULPTURE FACTORY

After all this sightseeing we were taken to the little red cottage, home and also head office to the Roundaboutdogs Factory whereby after meeting Bjorn’s gorgeous wife Anne and afternoon tea we were promptly inducted into the Rondellhund makings ourselves.

THE ART OF FOOD

Then we were treated to a scrumptious smorgasbord of Swedish treats including more kantarell dishes (my favourite mushroom) where we were also joined by Bjorn’s mother Lillian and stepfather Hasse.  Yet again I felt as I was in the bosom of my family right at home even though it was 30 years since I was in Sweden the last time.

Here is a quote I think fits well here by John Ed Pearce;

“Home is a place you grow up wanting to leave, and grow old wanting to get back to.”

Till next time, happy painting and sculpting to you all.

Love Marie xxx

Why not come and have a look at Marie Jonsson-Harrison’s PAINTINGS FOR SALE, GICLEE PRINTS FOR SALE and SCULPTURES for sale or WALLBASED SCULPTURES.  Enjoy an original artwork on your walls or perhaps one on your bed ARTnBED.

We’ve just had Chevy Chase here to stay, all the way from California via Sweden, without a word of a lie – see for yourself down below is the picture to prove it.  Well ok then maybe just a little untrue, but you have to admit he is a dead ringer for him, my cousin’s boy Kalle.  As delightful as it has been to have Kalle and his friend Kristoffer staying with us, it is Kalle’s father, my cousin Bjorn that I would like to tell you about.

PAINTING IN SWEDEN

This acrylic painting was bought by his mother when I had an exhibition in Sweden and it pretty much depicts where Bjorn actually lives today, although when I painted it, their little red cottage in the woods by the sea did not even exists.  Perhaps I inspired him to build one, who knows.  Anyway Bjorn is in the corporate world of IBM and has pretty much traveled the world with his job, currently working mostly out of the UK.  But he calls the little red cottage and Sweden his home and goes there as much as time will allow.

ROUND ABOUT DOGS SCULPTURE

You see that is where Rondellhund.com (Roundabout-dog) was born, in the shed at the back of the cottage.  It was in 2007 that Bjorn Andersson decided to combine his love of dogs and the tinkering in his shed by making some Roundabout dogs and giving the money raised to charity.  According to all that know him – Bjorn has a heart of gold and his vision is to keep Rondellhund at Philanthropic Street Art level and give a moment of enjoyment to all people traveling by car.  His dogs have traveled the world to places in the USA, Australia, UK & Germany to name just a few.

RONDELLHUND ARTIST

The first Rondellhund was actually made by Peter Nyberg and his intention was to “mock the state-employed artists, who get so much money to make sculptures that we can do just as well ourselves”  he said.  From what I understand, that was after there had been an official roundabout installation in Lindkoping by sculptor Stina Opitz, made in concrete.  This sculpture was vandalized and got some media coverage and shortly after anonymous people started placing little wooden dogs in roundabouts. (ref. Wikipedia)

PAINTING ON WOOD

The dogs Bjorn makes are of scrap pieces of wood and then painted in every way imaginable, with spots, stripes, checked, stars  & flowers.  He even made some for the Royal weddings between Sweden’s Crown princess Victoria and Daniel as well as the English Royals, Kate and William; with the crowns on their heads of course.   The idea is to sneak out in the middle of the night and place your dog sculpture in the middle of a roundabout or in some other public place to be enjoyed by as many people as possible.  Now lots of family groups come to the shed to help build & paint the dogs, and they are also available as flat packs (like Ikea) to send across the world.  The dog sculptures all have a tags on them, as quite often they go missing, and it is asked if they are “stolen” that some money is donated to charity and this seems to be the case too – nice honest thief’s lol.

So come onboard and make a dog yourself or sponsor someone else to make one.  So far the money raised has gone to a local dog rescue center, Starlight children’s foundation UK, Guide Dogs UK & many other charities.  You will find an easy instruction on how to make your own dog and see pictures from Rondellhund across the world on this link.  You can also join Rondellhund on Face book.

The quote for today comes from my cousin Bjorn who says on his website;

A few simple situation I wish for but I will never know ………..

When the family see a rondelhund in an roundabout they smile and stop to buy ice-cream.

When Steven see a rondellhund he smiles and call his mother to say how are you, I’ll stop by for coffee.

When Rosanne see a rondellhund she smiles and stops the car and hug her kids.

When Jane see a rondellhund she smiles and start thinking of new ideas for her class.

When Peter see a rondellhund he smiles and new music ideas start developing in his mind.

When ………..

Till next time happy painting and sculpting to you all,

Love Marie xxx        (c)

If you enjoyed this you may also like this art blog about my artist brother Matt Jonsson; 91 He ain’t heavy, he’s my brother

Why not come and have a look at Marie Jonsson-Harrison’s PAINTINGS FOR SALE, GICLEE PRINTS FOR SALE and SCULPTURES for sale or WALLBASED SCULPTURES.  Enjoy an original artwork on your walls or perhaps one on your bed ARTnBED.

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