The Icelandic Love Corporation

By Vidar Örn, 2004

Iceland is a country notorious for ice, heat and extremely mystifying underground movements. In a geographical sense these elements are facts and phenomena that can be logically explained and travellers venture to the island for the sole purpose of walking on the hot ground, feasting their eyes on magnificent glaciers and unspoiled nature, and they all return home with something new in their hearts, something extraordinary yet familiar and maybe even divine. These are the conditions and surroundings that spawned the Icelandic Love Corporation and the ILC is blessed to live and work in this environment around the clock. The ILC cannot be found on maps or charts or scientifically placed in meteorology but it does have a definite place in the hearts of those that have seen and heard its performances because it radiates undecipherable warmth and you soon become aware of very mystifying movements within the Corporation that have comforting effects on the heart and the flow of blood even seems to surge in unexpected directions to uncharted territories. For years, theosophists and rationalists have strived to find coherence in all things in order to reach some understanding of their own existence and still people are in constant disagreement on whether we are closer to finding this coherence or not and tend to dwell in their own little corners pondering the laws of the universe, engulfed by the loneliness associated with such dim, isolated places.

The Icelandic Love Corporation has however, made the whole world its home and it uses magnificent means to lure the world out of the dark corners and into the light to share in the collective feelings that it evokes with exotic yet strangely familiar affection. The defining factor in art is often the super-ego in relation to the fate of the artists and their works but the Icelandic Love Corporation has rather sought its creative force in the heart than in the brain, the heart being a smaller and more agreeable organ. More than once and more than twice have I seen people let go and cast away their masks during an ILC performance, often it is laughter that unites people that are witnessing a surreal message of love, which induces ecstasy and a burning commotion in the body. When scientists and priests seem to be right they often give long and tedious arguments to prove their point and express total certainty with sales-pitches, graphs and charts. The Icelandic Love Corporation, however, possesses a live - on air, infallible instinct, which is a direct result of the performance, because when you perform something happens immediately just as when I do the dishes at home - it seems like the dishes become clean in an instant, without exception or hostile rebuttals. The exact same thing happens when the ILC performs - it literally produces emotions, which are mainly based on love and joy and the usual result is an audience convinced of how great a celebration life is.

The solemnity is often mistaken for a dry and crisp cocktail-party atmosphere related to funeral receptions or executions, but luckily the three young women that make up the ILC are not big on dwelling on the possible afterlife - instead they choose to focus happily and humorously on the life of the present day, before the dramatic takes over. The best thing about their delight and haphazard love is the fact that we get it for free, as a gift, and so we enjoy the energy of these feelings longer than if it was just a matter of a special offer or a discount.

The ILC goes out into the world loaded with all kinds of tinsel and trinkets and original solemnity just to produce emotions in a language that cannot be misunderstood or rebutted like most of the ideas we get, I have for instance never seen it disproved that babies like warmth and pleasantness and I am pretty certain that the baby's appreciation of these feelings is completely undisputable. Engraved in the national soul of Iceland is the image of the Fjallkona - the Lady of the Mountains. She is the superwoman that has suckled the whole nation and it is said that her milk is made of things such as courage, unity and life-force. When I first got to know the members of the Icelandic Love Corporation I realized that the Lady had made a slight error in taking on such a mammoth task all on her own and it is no wonder that her services are isolated to such a small area as Iceland and that no-one outside it has experienced the warmth that she radiates. The ILC does not work alone because it contains three hearts that beat all over the world rather than keeping within the boundaries of certain northerly latitudes and longitudes. These hearts have for a long time conjured up laughter and merriment that must never die and in fact it can be said that they brandish a cool blaze and lovingly brand you in a way that cannot be extinguished or erased.

If you should ever venture into the world of art don't miss out on the chance to get new and beautiful feelings implanted, feelings you never knew before because as we often don't know - there is only one wrong conclusion and that is the conclusion you reach before the research is done.

Reykjavik, August 2004,

Vidar Örn