Kulturista - Cultural Experiences in West Sweden

C U LT U R E E X P E R I E N C E S I N W E S T S W E D E N 23 clouds that pass by overhead. The rocky mounds, grey and silent, and the museum’s guest studios that overhang the water’s edge. “The works we exhibit here must always harmonise with the sur- roundings. We view it as our living in symbiosis with the natural environment and we try to incorporate nature in our work as much as possible,” says Nordal in summarising the museum’s philosophy. T H E A N C I E N T P A S T M E E T S C O N T E M P O R A R Y A R T The Nordic Watercolour Museum is one of several places in West Sweden where you can experience art set against beautiful, unu- sual and fascinating backdrops. It is a place where the art takes centre stage, but also interplays with the natural surroundings – an exciting building, an innovative kitchen, or other examples of artistic expression. At the sculpture park Sculpture in Pilane, loca- ted approximately 10 kilometres north of the Nordic Watercolour Museum, the art quite literally finds itself out in nature and among the wildlife. The park’s former burial field includes “judges’ rings” used as ancient courtrooms and stone circles laid in the Iron Age, all of which is set in an ancient cultural landscape with traces of human occupancy dating back to the Stone Age. What’s more, the rolling countryside is not only home to grazing sheep, but also to annual summertime exhibitions of works by world-leading artists. Here, nature, the distant past and contem- porary art meet in an environment that undeniably provides a spe- cial backdrop for the experience.