My name is Malin Kjelsrud. I was born in 1972 and live in Oslo, Norway. For as long as I can remember I have drawn, written and painted. My dream has always been to study art in an academy, but it never came to that. My artistical “education” has been “arts and crafts” in high school, a course in aquarelle painting and two really good courses in painting at Vika Kunstskole, in addition to self-studies. My formal education is 9 years public school, 3 years in Business high school, 3 years University College (to become a nurse) HiO 1995-1998), 1 year “IT-candidate” (Næringsakademiet 2000-2001), 1,5 year “office management for healthcare systems” (Utdanningshuset 2004-2005).

One is not supposed to be too personal online, and especially not if one is trying to be taken seriously as an “artist”, but I still choose to tell a bit more about myself. Life hasn’t always been so easy. But I try really hard to focus on what is positive and not give what’s negative more space than needed. I am chronically ill, and have been so for many years. It has taken too much time and energy to fight against disease and its fears, the healthcare system and the social security system. I have, amongst other things, ME and arthrosis. This means that I can’t handle much work or pressure before my body shuts down. The cliché “to live WITH a disease rather than FOR a disease” is my motto. It is, as I said earlier, about turning something negative into something positive, and for me that means to use those – unfortunately unpredictably present and unknown how long-lasting – moments that my body functions reasonably well for painting, drawing, writing and thinking.

CONTACT INFORMATION:

Malin Kjelsrud
Stasjonsveien 57
0771 OSLO, Norway
malin@viffvaff.com

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Trivia about me:

Kids: Julie, born 1994 and Kai, born 2000.
Boyfriend/soulmate: Dagfinn Koch
Totem-animal: Giraffe (aka ViffVaff)

I like:

• Autumn in Oslo
• Swimming in freshwater
• The smell of printing ink
• Spanish food. (Well, food in general is more correct, I guess.)
• Really small excavators
• Wine, coffee, Berliner Weiße mit Himbeer, Tinto de Verano, ice cold water
• Amelié from Montmartre
• Too many writers and painters to even begin to mention
• Sleeping
• Taking pictures of people when they do something they like
• Writing pop-lyrics and being part of making music
• Nils-Fredrik Nielsens Tristesses: (ex: Nobody can spread such darkness as the one who has seen the light)
• Arto Paasilinnas humour, especially in “Collective suicide”
• South Park
• Chocolate (unfortunately…)

I dislike:

• Not being able to get the grasp of German Grammar
• Paulo Coelho (apart from “Veronica”)
• Fanatic people (whatever they obsess about)
• Unsharp pencils
• Jellyfish
• When the will to do something is bigger than the ability
• Being touched in the belly button
• Webdesigning
• Speaking on the telephone
• Written dialects, splitted words and bad grammar (I’m talking about norwegian now, my english and german is not good enough to even begin to critizise others…)

The world would be a better place if:

• David Gahan would do the lead vocal on Rammsteins version of “Stripped”
• Everybody drove their cars like I do
• All the good things in life were free and healthy (such as wine, cigarettes, food, chocolate and painkillers)