The Dark Underbelly of Stockholm

If you haven’t been to Stockholm yet, you probably imagine a beautiful waterfront  city with gorgeous, healthy ,  happy looking people crawling all over the place.  You are right.   But I discovered the dark underbelly.   I loved it.  And…I even had a free tour of it.

Is it seamy, smarmy, or smutty (one of my Swedish grandmother’s favorite words)?  Are there nefarious goings-on occurring  in backstreets and down dark smoky alleys?  Want to hear more?





Gotcha!   Underneath this amazing (I hate that overused word, but it really is the right one) city they have adorned their subway stations with some wonderful art, and if you purchase a subway ticket you can have a free guided tour covering some most interesting installations. (Note, these tours take place during the summer for certain non-Swedish languges and only on certain days, so check the website. They run year-round if you speak Swedish)  Our guide was knowledgeable and made great suggestions as to other stops to visit.     



The art itself is widely varied,  and as always,  the beauty of it is in the eyes of you, the beholder.  Tile work, wooden  cutouts,  paintings, 3-D sculptures…there is so much.  Some of the art was made elsewhere and installed, and some stations are basically rock caves completely covered by glorious painting  (see photo left).  Some is downright scarey, some breathtaking and some worth some time to study.    



From the right  



I think my favorite had to be the sports murals,  wide rectangles where the scene is completely different if you look from the left side vs. the right side.    If you stand dead center its a confusing hodge-podge of colors.    



From the left....



 The subway system of Stockholm has trains running constantly during daytime hours.  The cars are clean and you get where you want  PDF.  Pretty darn fast.   My Stockholm wish list had one site that was not close to the downtown area and it made it fast and convenient and easy to get there.  We were even able to use our pass to make a bus connection to our final destination that day.  And,  there was a stop very close to our hotel in Gamla Stan, the oldest part of the city.  Of the 100 stations, 90+ have an artistic installation of some sort or another.



Writings of Strindberg (see his head in the background?)



Please visit this link to metrobits, where you can see more spectacular (professional) photos of some of the installations, and general background info.

Plan ahead!  They don’t take reservations so be sure to carve that time out of your schedule for this treat.  It leaves from the central downtown station.  I was on a three- day pass and visited a number of other stations after the tour to see more art. 



I thought I’d love Stockholm.  My Minnesota born Swedish grandmother, Anna Albertina Hanson,  longed to visit and never did, so this visit was for her.  But it stole my heart and rocketed toward the top of my favorite cities list.   

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