Four food-themed films will be screened at the Design Thing.
Admission is free, and guests should enter through the main entrance of the Húsavík Whale Museum.
Exhibition schedule
Time
10:30
13:00
14:30
15:15
17:30
Film
The Bountiful Land
Gróa
Kolmuni – Fish without place
Gósenlandið (re-screening)
Grásleppan
Length
97 min
75 min
31 min + Q&A
97 min
18 min
Language / Text
Icelandic / English subtitles
Icelandic / English subtitles
English / English subtitles
Icelandic / English subtitles
Íslenska
The Bountiful Land - Icelandic Food Tradition and Culinary History
The documentary The Bountiful Land is about the Icelandic food tradition and the changes that have taken place. The story of Icelandic food is told with the help of late Elín Methúsalemsdóttir and her family. Elín sat as a child at the stonehearth of her mother in an old turf farm, Bustarfell, where she later took over as the woman of the house herself. In the sixties she moved into a modern house beside the old one. Later her daughter, Björg, took her place at the stove and her grandson is preparing to become the next farmer.
Foodmaking in Iceland is charachterized by scarcity; there was no salt, no firewood, no cereals, something to which the neighbouring peoples had easy access. Nevertheless, the inhabitants showed ingenuity in making food out of their livestock and what nature provided. That is why the name, The Bountiful Land, is not given only in irony. One can rather say that the food Icelanders ate in the old farmers society was healthy, although there was a lack of vitamins C and D in the last months of winter. Import of rye and other cereals started in the beginning of the 19. century and consumption of protein decreased accordingly. This development continued with the addition of sugar, so much that by the middle of the XNUMX. century Icelanders where among the greatest sugar consumers per capita in the world. Denmark's rule influenced the local tastes and following the WWII the United States also served as a model. Now the Icelanders are truly a part of the global world with everything that goes with it; immigrants and their cultural influences, food tourism, bio culture and gastronomy.
Gróa
In the documentary, Gróa we’ll get to know the ideals and passion of Icelandic organic farmers and the story behind the food.
The documentary tells the story of a mother of three who moves from Iceland to Denmark to study music, and returns ten years later with her husband Jesper, who grew up on an organic farm in Denmark.
Driven by motherhood, Anna María explores organic farming in Iceland, focusing on its impact on the environment, nature, and the health of our children.
We get to know the ideals and passion of the organic farmers and the story behind the food.
- Only 1% of agriculture in Iceland is organically certified.
- Only 4 out of 500 dairy farmers in Iceland have organic certification.
- Today, organic certification costs Icelandic farmers money, while it is free in many other countries.
Three Icelandic organic farms across the country are visited, each doing things in their own way: One vegetable farmer, two dairy farmers, and two grain growers.
The film GRÓA is by Öndar Máríu Björnsdóttir and Tuma Bjart Valdimarsson. In the film, Anna María introduces organic farming in Iceland from the perspective of its impact on the environment, nature, and the health of our children.
Kolmunni – Fish without place
Janek Beau and Max Greiner, two master students from the LHI present an examination of Iceland’s fishing industry, where Blue Whiting—abundant in local waters—is processed into fishmeal rather than consumed. Through a site-specific intervention in Vopnafjörður, this project reintroduces the fish as street food, questioning industrial hierarchies and exploring how to reshape food culture.
Despite its abundance in local waters, the fish is almost exclusively processed into fishmeal for export, bypassing local food culture.
This project questions the economic and ecological rationale behind this system and proposes an alternative: reintroducing Blue Whiting as a local food source.
At its core is a site-specific intervention, a pop-up eatery serving Blue Whiting-based street food to the community and factory workers at Brim.
By presenting the fish in a familiar, accessible form, the project bridges the gap between industry and everyday consumption, challenging value perceptions shapedby infrastructure and regulation.
Grásleppan
"Grásleppan" is a beautiful documentary by Rut Sigurðardóttir about lumpfish fishing, featuring the fishermen Birgir and Eiríkur from Bakkafjörður at their finest.