Turid Gyllenhammar: Strong women

Norwegian artist Turid Gyllenhammar tells us how she finally came to carve marble in her 50s, and what challenges she had to overcome to get here.

Show Notes

See pictures and read more on materiallyspeaking.com

A woman artist often has to juggle family matters at the same time as fulfilling her own creative dreams. The seeds for Turid finding her way to Pietrasanta came from a chance meeting with the esteemed sculptor Helaine Blumenfeld when Turid was 18. However it took nearly 40 years for her to make her way to working in marble. Her story is one of strength and determination. 

She tells us about her Nuova Vita project - a series of baptism dresses, about 50 cm high, carved from a spectacular range of beautiful stones - and what she is expressing through them. Her inspirational journey shows how  we can all make strides in the face of life’s setbacks and how she took a chance on a new life.

Turid’s interview took place in the peach gardens of Studio SEM, founded in the 1950s by Sem Ghelardini and now run by American Keara McMartin. SEM collaborate with artists and sculptors from all over the world to produce marble and granite sculptures of all sizes and you’ll be hearing more from them during the series.

turidgyllenhammar.com

instagram.com/gyllenhammarart

What is Materially Speaking?

A podcast where artists tell their stories through the materials they choose.

Sarah Monk: 00:07

Hi. This is Materially Speaking, where artists tell their stories through the materials they choose. We're currently in the area around Pietro Santa, Northern Italy, where artists have been carving marble for centuries since Michelangelo came 500 years ago to choose marble for his Pieta. Artists are attracted here not only by the marble, but also the extraordinary skills of the artisans, which have been handed down from generation to generation. Some specialize in roughing out, that is taking off the top layer of marble, and handing the piece back to the artist when the main shape of the work is uncovered.

Sarah Monk: 00:41

Others specialize in faces, or hands and feet, or clothing. Their skills are so honed that I've heard they can even differentiate between how the folds of velvet would fall if the subject was from Venice, and how it would look if the subject wore clothes from Florence. However, the days of hundreds of artisans working flat out producing saints and sarcophagi for churches has passed. Nowadays, there's more abstract than figurative work, but the skills of the remaining artisans are highly valued, especially as their numbers dwindle. Today, I have come to Studio SEM, one of the most famous studios in the area run by Keira McMartin.

Sarah Monk: 01:19

SEM have moved out of town to get more space, and are now in the nearby countryside of Kamayuri. Today, I'm sitting in the studio orchard in the blazing sunshine amongst peach trees, talking to Norwegian artist, Turid Gillenhammer.

Turid Gyllenhammar: 01:37

My name is Tore Gyllenhammar. I have a Swedish surname. I was born in Westfall in Tunsberg. I have, 4 siblings and one twin sister. And when the twin sister and I was in the 1st grade in school, my father wrote a letter to a friend in Sweden and said that the 2 sisters, they go each way.

Turid Gyllenhammar: 02:04

One is very good at writing, and the other one is very good at drawing and mathematic. In a way, it was always there for me that I should do some. I don't know why it took so long time before I'm I'm here now, 61 year, and and feel that in the right place. First time I come to Pietrasanta sometime was in 2007. We was, with my family, I was spending some holiday, down south in Italy, and then I discovered that Helen Blumenfeld was working in Pietrasanta .

Turid Gyllenhammar: 02:49

I was a Au Pair for Helen Blumenfeld in New York when I was 18 by not really planned, but I went to a boarding school in Cambridge. And I was so dyslexic, so I didn't under I didn't learn any English because I went with some Norwegian friends. And then there was a girl in the school that was au pair for the Blumenfeld, and they was going to America, and she didn't want to go with them. So one week later, I was on a plane to New York with the Blummenfelt family. And then I went home to Norway.

Turid Gyllenhammar: 03:27

And because of my bad English, I didn't have any contact, but she write me some cards and, send some names for artists that I should contact because I was already painting and had exhibition before I was 18. It took 30 years before I found her in Petra Santa, and I went there with my family. And I saw some Norwegian girls standing, working, carving at marble. One of her name was Julia Wans, and I was just amazed. I think it looks so fantastic.

Turid Gyllenhammar: 04:10

And I went home, and in the newspaper, it was a school in the university not far from me that had course in making sculpture in granite. So I went into that course and make my first piece in granite. And then I come home down to Petra Santa in 2011 to see a big show of Herr und Blummenfelt. And because of a delay in planes, I had to stay one week instead of the weekend. And in that week, I get to know studio Sam and Kiera and the others so well.

Turid Gyllenhammar: 04:49

So I was welcomed the year after to come and work there.

Sarah Monk: 04:53

You said you work more mostly on more than one piece at a time. But I think at the moment, this series is the whole of what you're thinking about? They're all yes.

Turid Gyllenhammar: 05:03

Yeah. Yes. I like to go into different concept. Like, I make the breast cancer exhibition in Norway because it was not in the system to get a new breast after surgery. So they got after women stand in front of the government and took off their clothes, they got, I think, 200,000,000 for getting

Sarah Monk: 05:32

What what was the exhibition, ?

Turid Gyllenhammar: 05:34

No. I get I that at that time, I got 50 women together with me to take picture of their their surgery in black and white, 50 50 centimeters, together with a professional photographer in black and white. And somebody have their faces, and somebody have, like, a torsio, and somebody and then I make some embroideries about their stories, about their lives. So I had to gather this, and this had been shown a lot of places. And in the first place, my my husband said to me, you are not going to get picture.

Turid Gyllenhammar: 06:13

And I said, no. No. No. But, of course, I was getting picture of you. But now he's so used to that picture.

Turid Gyllenhammar: 06:20

They now it's it's it's so many years ago. So now he he likes to see the picture. He said that that one breast was his, so he didn't want me to show it to anyone.

Sarah Monk: 06:30

Oh, so you have breast cancer too?

Turid Gyllenhammar: 06:32

I had when I was 37. So so I think a lot of this project, by the kids is also because I was sick when I had small kids, and I wanted to be there for them. That was the but I thought I could just take a telephone and said, I want to have a new breast. So when I discovered that, I made this project about that.

Sarah Monk: 06:59

That's really interesting. It's fantastic. So there's there's definitely, a lot of energy behind your work. It's not just visual. It's also No.

Sarah Monk: 07:10

It's not. Something you're passionate about.

Turid Gyllenhammar: 07:12

I think I because when I was painting, it was more people looked at it at at I items to put in their homes around their coach. So when I was I was selling a lot of pictures, and then I went back to school for 4 years. When was that? When I,

Sarah Monk: 07:34

How old were you then?

Turid Gyllenhammar: 07:35

I think it's 15 years ago, so I was 45. Yeah. 43, 45. And I took some art history 3 years on a almost and then art history, and then this sculpturing course in the University of Westfall. And then I come out making very different things than I did before in the school.

Turid Gyllenhammar: 08:02

That you can think when you are 50, that you you it's not too late. I think that's a very important thing to to tell people in our age, because a lot of people in my age in Norway, they've been together with the kids and take care of the homes, and they don't understand that they could take a new their life could take new Directions. Directions.

Sarah Monk: 08:29

Yeah. Well, yours is fantastic. It's a fantastic direction. Yeah. And I'm loving the work.

Sarah Monk: 08:35

Yeah. I'm really loving the work. Her first project here was to enlarge and carve in marble 5000 from her home in Westvold. But to her surprise, her work soon took a new turn.

Turid Gyllenhammar: 08:50

I had this model that I had made in the school some years before of an of an, historical stone axe that I've we find in the garden who are maybe 5000 years that I liked form so much. So then I discovered that I could take that form here and larchen it and make it into so I my first project was all items from my my, home place in Westfall that is, 5000 years old. So I have this concept with old tools that I like to make more abstract because I when I started with marble, I was thinking of making abstract sculpturing, not items. So when I did the first dress, it was a little bit scary. I had an an, exhibition of baptized dresses in the church in Norway and collected 35 baptize dresses, was 100 years old up to a new design dress.

Turid Gyllenhammar: 10:02

And when I come down, I made maybe 20 more abstract sculpturing, and then I wanted to make a dress.

Sarah Monk: 10:11

So this project is the Nuova Vita. Can you describe in words what what what I saw in there? What what we're seeing?

Turid Gyllenhammar: 10:20

Yeah. I think the the the first thing is that when I make my axes, I come down here for 7 years ago and make the axes. So I I and the the men around me, they make this woman with boobs and breasts. And I'm thinking, is that sculptor? Is everyone every it's so many men.

Turid Gyllenhammar: 10:45

They make naked woman. I made an exhibition about breast cancer woman, so I was a little bit upset about all these sexual sculpturing that and they are selling, of course. And they were thinking making these dresses, it's the layer around the little girl, and it's a protection. And, you know, the people who buy them, the man, they could say, where are the boobs? I say, there are no boobs.

Turid Gyllenhammar: 11:16

It's it's little girls, and they are the new future, and it's a dream of a dress. And Kira here at, she's also been working with materials be before. So she said to me, I could go and find some beautiful stones for you to your dresses. So it's a it's become a a thing between me and her. I think she's coming here now.

Turid Gyllenhammar: 11:46

Hello? Thank you. Hello. It's Thank you so much. Yeah.

Turid Gyllenhammar: 11:53

Hi. Good day. Yeah. I talked about you now.

Sarah Monk: 11:56

Yes. We just I

Turid Gyllenhammar: 11:57

I said it become a a a walk between us because you find all my Yeah. Stones. Amy, she will be.

Sarah Monk: 12:05

Kiera McMartin arrives with Turid's new catalogue. You can see an online version of the catalog at turidgillenhammer.com. Just look under project Nuova vita, Or you can find photos of all the art we discuss on Instagram, or our website, materially speaking.com. If you can look now, you'll see the breathtaking range of colors that marble comes in. Pink, blue, green, black, and gold.

Sarah Monk: 12:28

If you can't, don't worry. Turid and I will do our best to get them across to you.

Sarah Monk: 12:37

You were talking about Kiera and the project. So, it's actually very nice that the catalogs just arrived from Kiera. Do you want to talk about that?

Sarah Monk: 12:44

How do you feel about the catalog, and what have you just done to it?

Turid Gyllenhammar: 12:47

I have made a new catalog because I had made 9 new dresses this winter. And I wanted also some, picture from the older work. So it's very nice to see the catalog.

Sarah Monk: 13:05

And and so the Nuova Vita is it's the it's the young girls, the future.

Turid Gyllenhammar: 13:11

It's the future, and it's also the protect the kids in a way.

Turid Gyllenhammar: 13:16

How's that?

Turid Gyllenhammar: 13:17

I I think it's so much it's it's quite feministic. Very many religious, they put down the woman, so I want them to be strong and proud. And what people say when they they they tell me when they saw them, they look proud.

Turid Gyllenhammar: 13:38

They are moving in a way without heads. Boys, they also need protection. If you think of the bad ties and dress, it's for both. I'm not sure if it have to be only about the girls, but about the future and about the human being.

Sarah Monk: 14:01

So so these are I I think they're absolutely beautiful. So they are they're like a a dress with nobody inside it. Yeah. But they're made of stone, so they're strong.

Turid Gyllenhammar: 14:12

But they all have have names. Like, I I name them Kiera from Studihaj, my kids, my 2 daughters, and all my friends. When I had the exhibition in Petra Santa, I had 21 different. And now we are in the exhibition in Norway. I have 31.

Turid Gyllenhammar: 14:31

And no one named all my beloved friends who died last 5 years, strong woman who died of cancer that it was very hard for me to take the names and put down the dresses. It was a special feeling. Some dresses, I I get more maybe I get more, involved, you know, feelings involved in making them.

Sarah Monk: 14:58

Now I can see the the huge range of color and stones. So can you talk through all the stones that you've used and what what they

Turid Gyllenhammar: 15:09

mean to you? People, they they ask me if I paint, if if the blue granite from Angola, and if I know the colors inside the stone because the the last stone now, the gray stone from France, the gray and black and white, you can't really you can see there are some patterns, but you don't know what's inside before you are in there. So it's like a Christmas present that you open a box, and in there, it's so fascinating for every new dress. I would think of, making 40, but I'm not sure if I'm going to stop on 40.

Sarah Monk: 15:52

And where do you get the stones from?

Turid Gyllenhammar: 15:54

The stones, because of Petrasanta have this story, or or the coast here have the story of making plates for buildings and kitchens, and there are special list of, making plates. They get stone from the whole world in here. So you could we, Akira, go round to small places to try to get blocks who are not so big because they want to sell you, you know, knock to for a building. And I just want one block. It's enough for 5 dresses over the same, so I made additional 5.

Sarah Monk: 16:34

And can you talk us through the other covers there?

Turid Gyllenhammar: 16:36

Green green stone here. My, husband bought for me for my our 32 years of wedding.

Sarah Monk: 16:45

That's lovely. And what is it? It's a beautiful

Turid Gyllenhammar: 16:47

print. It's a Vardeming from China. But the name is the daughter from one of my best friends.

Sarah Monk: 16:58

Can we look at some others in the same way? Hear the stories.

Turid Gyllenhammar: 17:03

And then I have, Jane. That's one of my friends who died 5 years ago.

Sarah Monk: 17:10

I'm sorry.

Turid Gyllenhammar: 17:10

That's a, Portoro. An Italian black marble with the with the gold lines.

Sarah Monk: 17:22

That's from just up the coast, isn't it?

Turid Gyllenhammar: 17:24

Just up the coast here. And then you have Turil. It's an, Calcutta marble. It's an Italian marble. Quite simple.

Turid Gyllenhammar: 17:36

Some stones you have to make make simple. The white Carrara, like, on the Mai here. You can make stripes and roses and but others.

Sarah Monk: 17:51

That that's statuary.

Turid Gyllenhammar: 17:53

Yeah. That's the white statuary from Carrara.

Sarah Monk: 17:55

And how do you find that special to work with?

Turid Gyllenhammar: 17:58

That's more soft to work with than, the granite.

Sarah Monk: 18:02

Takes more detail.

Turid Gyllenhammar: 18:04

You can take much of this is the this is my daughter's name, Marne, my oldest daughter. It's an, sudalite, granite from Bolivia. And what? And it's it's really hard stone, and it had to be a simple model. And the white

Sarah Monk: 18:19

the colors in this one, what would you say the colors are, Emeron?

Turid Gyllenhammar: 18:22

It's, cobalt blue or aquamarine. Blue and white. It's beautiful. It is absolutely beautiful. And tilde, it's in is in, white stethoscope marble, so that you could make hearts and stripes and patterns like embroideries.

Sarah Monk: 18:47

That's beautiful too.

Turid Gyllenhammar: 18:50

And I have one dress we call the Turin.

Sarah Monk: 18:57

That one's gorgeous.

Turid Gyllenhammar: 18:58

Tawes, she is an is an onyx with, red and white stripes. Beautiful stone.

Sarah Monk: 19:06

From Iran?

Turid Gyllenhammar: 19:06

From Iran. Here.

Sarah Monk: 19:13

That one is unbelievable. That one is called Gerd. Is that Anurad? Gerd?

Turid Gyllenhammar: 19:18

That's my, mother-in-law. She was very happy.

Sarah Monk: 19:23

I bet she was. Yes. Is that like her? Does it did did did you choose that?

Turid Gyllenhammar: 19:29

She likes she was very happy. Both of my my my mother and my grandmother, they died last year. And they my mother died one week before the exhibition, so she didn't see the so that was really sad. It was really sad. So this is the models.

Sarah Monk: 19:50

So you make them first. You were explaining earlier in the studio. Yeah. Can you talk us through that process?

Turid Gyllenhammar: 19:56

Yeah. I when I was going to make the dresses, I started with clay. So I have made maybe 100 little, models who are not more than 20 centimeters or 15 centimeters. I made one in in real size of a child dress, but then it becomes too naturalistic. So I I chose to make them small and, and make them a little bit more abstract.

Turid Gyllenhammar: 20:26

Yes. I maybe they will get more and more abstract, maybe in the end. And, of course, my my dress is full of roses.

Sarah Monk: 20:36

Why is that?

Turid Gyllenhammar: 20:38

Yeah. I was thinking, maybe you you think you you are going to a rose garden, but you are you don't have a rose garden. You have to work for everything, and you you that's the life. You go through life. You get kids, and you get cancer, and you survive, and you, you still try to work it out.

Sarah Monk: 20:59

And that's the rose garden? Yeah. I love that. And I love the dress. So it's it's white.

Sarah Monk: 21:06

What sort of stone did you choose for you?

Turid Gyllenhammar: 21:08

That's okay. That's, Italian white.

Sarah Monk: 21:11

From Gafagnania, which is also nearby. Yeah. Beautiful.

Turid Gyllenhammar: 21:18

I took the plane down to Petrasanta for 7 years ago and took the train to Petra Santa. I feel like I was 17 years on my own, didn't know anyone, and had an appointment to come up to Studio 7, and I was so scared. I was scared of of everything. I was scared of being alone. And then the ride through Norway said, oh, you will feel miserable for 3 days, and then you get used to being alone.

Turid Gyllenhammar: 21:54

Sometimes it is miserable, but mostly, it's nice to bike, to to work, to read, and and see a romantic comedio, and have a family over for visiting. But my daughter, who had my first grandchild, last year, She think the mommy mommy is a little bit too much away now.

Sarah Monk: 22:21

How do you feel about that?

Turid Gyllenhammar: 22:24

I'm working hard to be, nearby, and 2 weeks ago, I went home to babysit, for 2 days. And he knows me, and I'm really happy about that because I think child to to get child is is one of the most important thing in my life, and I wanted to be there for my grandchildren.

Sarah Monk: 22:51

But, the artisans, the skills here, what what have you found here, and how have you learned?

Turid Gyllenhammar: 22:56

I learned a lot. And I in my mind, when I arrived here, start working 7 years ago, I was I have to do everything by myself. Nobody was going to touch my stone. But then I learned that it's you could learn from them, and they could do some work for you. And then so I'm so now I'm so pleased to work together.

Turid Gyllenhammar: 23:23

And now when we have to finish the piece in the last 2 days now, I'm so standing there with this boy helping me, polishing, and I just feel so lucky.

Sarah Monk: 23:36

Fabulous.

Turid Gyllenhammar: 23:36

But I think you have to you have to take some chance in your life, like I did. It was an opportunity, so I took it.

Sarah Monk: 23:50

Thanks to Turid Gyllenhammer. You can check out her work at turidgillenhammer.com. For photographs of all the works we discuss, check out our Instagram or website at materiallyspeaking.com. Production thanks go to my editor, Michael Hall. Recording thanks to Duncan Thornley at MAP Studios.