Stranger In A Dane Land

When my family was preparing to move to Denmark, a country where we had neither family nor history, I did a lot of cultural research about the Danish people wondering: Could we make friends? Could we build a community of parents and neighbors similar to the one we were leaving in New York City? All research pointed towards no. We took a leap of faith and got on the plane.

My wife had an office full of colleagues and our children had schoolmates, so we were fairly confident that those structures would provide the opportunity to meet like minded people and friends. I was working for a website back in America as a cartoonist which was very enjoyable but isolating. Over the previous twelve years I’d met two co-workers in person while working for MMA websites. Living in Denmark added a physical distance to that digital divide, and my own future was nebulous.

Mixed Martial Arts (MMA) illustrations for my The Fine Art of Violence book series.

A month after landing I started looking for my people by attending art openings. One evening during Joanna Mugford’s opening exhibition at Art Escape Studios, owner Melanie Dawn pointed out Nicol Savinetti in the crowd and said “You should get to know her. She runs a networking group for artists.” It sounded too good to be true; with trembling nerves I approached Nicol and quickly found myself invited to an IMMART dinner. A week later I was sitting at a long table in Gallerie-Lorien in Fredericksberg, dining with a dozen people from as many countries, all finding their way to live and thrive in a foreign country. I made friends, was invited to participate in group shows, to be welcomed to events,  conversations, and homes. It was like a social life on steroids.

During the course of the next two years I’ve seen my children become fluent in Danish, make friends, and experience a childhood completely different from Brooklyn and Queens of the 1980’s. As parents, this is tremendously encouraging even though our own professional lives have been more of a roller coaster. My wife left her company for a new one, and the website where I’d worked for six years was purchased and our entire staff laid off. I found myself in a different country, feeling like a rowboat that had sailed too far from shore. This was a moment to question the decision to move to Denmark, away from my family and friends, the only place I’d lived. After contemplation, I decided to mostly quit Mixed Martial Arts and embrace Denmark as the place where I would build a new career.

I thought about the Japanese woodblock artist Yoshida Hiroshi. His depictions of the American southwest are completely different from the imagery Americans use to portray their homeland. I realized that an outsider’s eye can show the denizens of a country something they’ve failed to see, having taken it for granted all their lives. I got on my bicycle and started drawing the landscape. Danes always make me laugh when they downplay the abundance of nature available in this country.

I spent most of my childhood in East New York in my grandparents’ house near the Van Siclen Avenue train station. In my childhood you never left anything of value unattended. Crack houses, burnt out cars, and packs of dogs were our nature, so I started chronicling the “unremarkable” beauty of everyday Danish life.

Biking through Roskilde and Copenhagen with pens and a sketchbook, newsprint pads and charcoal, I started creating a collection of people and places, a diary of observation. Christiania, Tisvldelege, Bornholm, and my adopted home of Roskilde. All the time, sharing these with members of IMMART, getting feedback and helping me maintain momentum.

It’s so important for an artist to find that balance between solitude and loneliness. We need the meditative isolation of studio time, but just as important is the camaraderie and recognition of our peers. With the encouragement garnered from the sketches I set about turning them into wood engravings. I put together a small collection of framed pieces and sent out the call to IMMART. They rallied to Roskilde and the first exhibition of new work was a success. Having an assortment of international creatives gave the event a shot of energy and kept my momentum going. Leads started to materialize and I was invited to move the art to a local coffee shop. That led to more opportunities and now I’m going to have my first solo show in Copenhagen at Cafe Manefiskeren in Christiania, in February 2025.

Whether through organized social events or simply having a cup of coffee with the friends I’ve made, IMMART has been by my side throughout this Danish adventure. When I was brand new in Denmark the only social interaction I could count on was waving to the cemetery crew while I walked our kids to school each morning. After joining IMMART I feel like I’m always connected to a group of people who are terminally creative, brilliant, and friendly. It can’t be emphasized how much friendship can make or break our ability to thrive in the world.

Thanks for reading! I’d like to invite you to join me on February 8th, 2025 at Månefiskeren in Christiania for this exhibition.

Chris Rini currently lives in Roskilde. He is a graduate of both Fashion Institute of Technology – FIT and Hunter College, New York, and his artwork has been featured in galleries in New York City and Chicago. In his spare time he builds terrariums and plays guitar and keyboards in the musical group, The=Equation.

Read more about Chris and his previous work and an interview with Chris for The Copenhagen Post.