EDITORIAL S
o we draw this year to a close with this issue that will proudly let Godartet rest for a while. A lot has been accomplished this year and we couldn’t be prouder of what we have done so far. To start making a magazine about something as abstract as “culture scene” has its risks as there is always the danger that you try to take on more than you should. And maybe this happened with us as well. On the other hand, finding yourself a bit out of your depth is how we learn and therefore I can proudly say that everything we did was for promoting our lovely Nordic culture scene, with a little bit of Poland thrown into the mix. e hope you have enjoyed reading Godartet as much as we have loved making it for you to read. We will be taking a breather for a while and would like to wish you all an exciting year 2016! If you’re looking for a new direction to take, you could start an online magazine! We can promise you that you will not be short of different ideas to pursue. Just don’t try to walk on our turf, we will come back and take you down.
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ut enough about the past and the future and let’s get back to the present. What you are about to read contains the last entry of the Sodankylä Film Festival reportage, more of Fanny Grazzo as well as some words from us at Godartet about the past year.
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njoy and see you again!
DECEMBER
EDITORIAL 2 COLUMN VILLE KOSKI & JUHA HEIKKINEN 4 COLUMN FANNY GRAZZO
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5 NIGHTS UNDER THE MIDNIGHT SUN 7
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COLUMN
VILLE KOSKI & JUHA HEIKKINEN CONSIDERATIONS AT THE END OF AN ERA VILLE KOSKI, JUHA HEIKKINEN
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or the past 12 months, we have actively plowed our way against all odds and have actually managed to bring you, the (hypothetical) reader 10 issues of Godartet, the Scandestonian culture magazine. Looking back, we probably were a bit ambitious at the starting line, but today, I think we can say we did something we can be (relatively) proud of.
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t this time and age the classic paper magazines and newspapers are dying, and to be honest, I do not see e-magazines doing so well either. The people of course have their need for up-to-date news all the time, but the urge for magazine-style, longer reads are probably fulfilled somewhere outside of magazines, in blogs and in social media. It is no more just about the quality of the content that we seek, but content itself; the picture of whatever Kim Kardashian’s butt is not wearing is probably taking more clicks than any in-depth analysis of inside trading. Which is probably right, that we the people get what we deserve and not what we may need.
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hen we started Godartet, our prime mission was to give space for new-coming artists, poets and writers to show-off their abilites. This worked for about 3 issues, after that we didn’t really get anyone to promote themselves. However, this is more our fault than anyone else’s:We really didn’t have the time and energy to actively headhunt artist who might need free marketing, because every time we asked someone, they did agree. Had we marketed our basic idea better, we probably would’ve gotten more artists and readers.
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or me, the magazine was something inspiring and fun to do, emphasizing the communal idea I have about pretty much everything I do. For the past few issues, however, writing and editing the paper has been a bit more of a chore than a hobby and at least from me, the ideas are also running low. It wouldn’t serve anyone’s purpose if Godartet would be just filler-columns from top to bottom, so I feel that a break for doing can only serve the magazine well. I also already have a few ideas for what to do with the magazine next…
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astly, I’d like to thank everyone azine, the artists, poets and V
who participated with us in readers, keep on rocking
the mageveryone!
hat a year it has been! We set out to bring the readers some insight into the Nordic culture scene and I have to say I am proud of what we achieved. We were forced to be a bit – flexible – with the countries we represented (Poland) as a result of a move that made it a bit difficult to be present in the Nordic environment. However, we were
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ambitious in what we set out to achieve and we managed to produce some quality material that I can proudly claim to have been a part of.
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s literature has always been the one art form that I feel closest to, I was most comfortable writing about everything that had to do with written language. Therefore I let Ville be our expert with the visual arts, as he actually knows what he is talking about. He has always been a sort of authority for me when it comes to visual arts, especially films. Therefore it was a fun learning experience for me to see what he had to say the field that he has studied.
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o think that the idea came from him as a joke during a coffee break at work and here we are, one year later still not finished with what started from Rufus! And yes, Rufus was the first thing to take shape even before any idea of producing any actual content even formed in the ever-so-bubbling-with-ideas head of Ville’s.
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am a bit sad that we didn’t manage to find as many people to present on our pages as we would have liked, and with this we have to look in the mirror. The ones we had we greedily used up on the first couple of magazines, leaving us scratching our heads about what to do next. But hey, that’s how it is sometimes.
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nd what about our joker card Poland? To my constant shame I have to say that I was not nearly as active as I should have been in getting to know the culture scene. The history of the previous century is strongly felt and every city we visited seemed to have the story of the Jewish experience under the Nazi occupation. And understandably so.
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ell then, what more is there to say than thank you all for at least pretending to read while accidentally stumbling on our magazine while trying to look for art about God!
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COLUMN
What the hell just happened?
FANNY GRAZZO DO NOT GO GENTLY INTO THAT GOOD NIGHT
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ell whoody-whoo dear readers! It’s Fanny Gee here again, and I’m as lusty and crusty as evah! However, it has come to my sassy attention that the boys are putting this amazing magazine on hold for a while and that old Grazzo here has to stop writing the columns. What sadness, what sadness!
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nyhow, what is stopping anyhow? At this point, I’d like to refer to a good friend of mine from back in the day, Ludvig Wittgenstein; “whereof one cannot speak, thereof one must be silent”. Of course, old Louie here was talking mostly about his views of philosophy as an linguistic viewpoint to being and existing, but I’d like to accompany this concept to the very idea of being as an active object/subject and as inactive object/subject and consider the concept of being as an inactive object/subject.
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t first, we naturally have to look at the subject we are considering as being, which in this case is the column and the magazine. If we can see it as a being element when we are assured of the next issue’s publishing and of our ability to read the current and the past issues, can we not think of it as a being as an objective object? If we choose to look at the situation this way, we can go on to ask the question, when the column or the magazine are not being and does the stopping of an active publishing schedule turn the magazine as not-being. As tempting as this would be, one has to note that even a slightest hint of hope of yet another issue turns into being again and that the old issues still do exist and are being. How are these explained? Well, If I may again take a quote, my old drinking buddy Carl Jung once said something like that the sole purpose of human existence is to kindle a light to mere being. Carl of course is talking about human existence, but I think it is still a relatively usable idea with Godartet as well as Godartet is a magazine trying to explain human life and culture to the people.
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ow, if we consider that the magazine is existing as you are reading it and has existed as you have read it before, we can work our way of thinking to the very point of, oh my godness, have I once again filled my word count already? Well, time flies, much love and so on, tally-ho!
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5 NIGHTS UNDER THE MIDNIGHT SUN DAY V
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he last day of this 5 day journey to the heart of coldness and light started after midnight, in a cool and fun screening of a 70s comical porno at the big tent. The film was more laughable than boner-giving, and the handful of people watching with me commented and laughed out loud. It was fun, but after the show I decided to do something that true reporters might do and check out the party at an outdoor tub, which I had heard of but never seen before in Sodankylä. For the record, the tub and the moveable sauna was brought there by YLE, the Finnish Broadcasting Company, and didn’t officially have anything to do with the Sodankylä Film Festival. As it was just a stone’s throw away from the official site, people did associate it with the festival. And it was a nightmare. When I wandered there in the middle of the night, the air was filled with a certain unmistakable aroma of a certain smokable product that was not tobacco but much more trippy and the loud sounds of screaming, laughing and music on full blast. The scenery was like a Roman orgy brought to the year 2015, replacing the Romans with “bros” and “babes”. Everyone was drunk and most people were nude, and unhappily I witnessed a young, naked lady taking a piss right next to the tub and then going back to the sauna, walking with her legs wide. She also broke the “don’t look other people in the eyes when taking a leak” -rule of life I thought everyone knew. It was a strange sight, and I can bet chlamydia flowed strong that night.
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he next morning I packed all my belongings and took them to the press room as I was bound to leave later that evening. The day was pretty much the best in the entire festival, with the gem of the day screening that day; a wide-screen
70 mm version of “Bear” at the big tent. The festival had felt a bit disappointing until that day, but little did I know it was about to turn nightmarish. When the “Bear” started, some kids around me naturally acted out a bit, which I think is relatively okay to a point, as kids tend to be more active than the average adult. Naturally, some idiots had their phones on, but that had become average at that point of the festival. However, as the film went on, something absolutely unforgivable happened: Someone took a picture. With the flash on. Three times in a row. I was absolutely furious and as that person took the fourth one, I turned back and relatively politely but loudly asked him/her to stop that. It helped for a while, until at the end of the film the flash of the camera snapped two more times. And again I yelled please stop. For a person who loves movies, shit like that is absolutely disastrous and it also destroys the immersion for everyone. As the film ended, I was utterly beaten down on a spiritual level, but the great people of Finland still managed to prove themselves as a 40-something lady walked to me complaining about how my yells disrupted her experience and that in her bitch-ass-numbnut piece of shit of a brain taking photos during a movie was completely okay. It was lucky for that whore that I was so terrified of her stupidity that I didn’t hit her face in and could barely speak. Naturally, I learned from her that it’s people like me who make up impossible rules like having to actually focus on the movie, so I guess I should thank her. Thanks. Bitch.
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s one can guess, I left immediately after that incident, not looking back. When leaving, one of the festival’s press people asked how the festival was and I, still angry about the incident be7
fore, told her about all the phones, talking people and the photographer at the screening. Another staff member came by and said in his perfect arrogant hipster voice that I should write an angry blog about that, thus proving that I have actually become the dull old man. And I am not saying they are wrong, I’m just saddened how times change. I still think films should be watched with attention and that talking, phones, social media and photography should be left outside the cinema. I’m also sad about the way Sodankylä had turned out: The last time I visited none of these side effects occurred, but now with the record-breaking audience it had turned into an average boozing festival, instead of the tribute to cinema it used to be. Like one of the hippies at the tub said; “This festival is amazing, the booze, drugs, tub, artistic people and some good movies too”.
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eah, some good movies too.
Series end. It took the author six months to go to a movie theatres after the festival experience.
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Thank you for all and have good new year 2016! -Godartet Team
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