--Mont Rouge diary

Asmus arrived at arranging the extra guides we needed for the climb. And we could never have had a better team. By now Joakim and I had been joined by the rest of our crew from Denmark so first of all we needed a few extra guides for the training. And to our luck Pica and Octavio showed up. A few days later, we met with the rest of the guides in 1500m from where the ascend began. Since there had been quite an amount of writing in the papers about my arrest, I started by telling them that I had no intention of harming their mountain. But I felt deeply for the issues I wanted to point out with the project, amongst which were the question of who owns the nature and the issue of pollution carried out by states and authorities. Fortunately all of them agreed to help me with my project. And without their professional help, enthusiasm and belief in my vision, I had been totally lost.

This project started out as a concept and as a vision. The concept is based on the question of who owns the nature and from here on to questions of how we treat nature and how we claim our right of a given territory. As to the idea of the visual expression of the concept I had a rather specific image in my mind of the weather being clear, with a view from the top of Mont Blanc over-looking the other lower mountaintops and clouds below. Arriving on the summit on Friday morning I couldn´t believe that the weather was exactly as I had hoped and the art photos I had taken are just as I had visioned them.

By Friday afternoon after having been to the summit I felt like a real mountaineer, more or less a champion of climbing mountains! I forgot how tired I was and I´m afraid I lost the respect and got careless, because all of a sudden I had a fall of at least 100m down a seriously steep slope. Suddenly, by some inexplicable piece of luck, my ice-ax showed up in my hand, enabling me to stop the fall. Bad experience! And weird, because apart from the imperative images of my loved ones, I couldn´t help but for a split of a second to think about what it would do to my work if I died now where it had just been successfully completed! I admit – I have a strong fear of death so naturally I had to think this when sliding at full speed down an icy mountain wall!, but the question is kind of intriguing. Touches on to the part cliché/ part truth about most artists hitting fame and recognition post mortem. Anyway, here I am, I survived, thanks to my ice ax. And by the way, the work isn´t done yet. There is still a desert of salt waiting for me to conclude the trilogy.

During the fall my hand was severely hurt. The guides were cool making a temporary “reparation” and teaching me that: Pain is just weakness leaving your body.
Which I immediately rewrote into a Pink Statian version:
Pain is just evilness leaving your body.

Pink State is a utopian place. But once in a while it materializes and by its peaceful existence recalls various humanistic values that we need to be reminded from time to time. The first Pink State was in Austria in 2005. The one on Mont Rouge was the second. But most importantly Pink State is a state of mind that we can carry in our mind and heart. Many good wishes for peace have met resistance throughout history. This has not been any different for Pink State. But in Pink State I believe that by good - evil shall be deterred. And I believe that most people share this sentiment. If so, and if one should wish to become a citizen of Pink State, one only needs to fill out the application form on my website and mail it to me.

As any other state, Pink State has its own passport and the state takes part of The Brotherhood Union. I invite everybody and first and foremost Michel Charlet, mayor of Chamonix, to send me an application for a Pink State citizenship, which will then be looked upon mildly.

The 20 brave people who worked with me on June 8th 2007 are all citizens and passport holders of Pink State. Passports that we had stamped once arriving in Copenhagen Airport. Next step for making Pink State official is an application to the UN. I believe we can do some good there.

Safe and sound, back on ground, I wish to finish my journal from an art expedition that turned out very successfully.

Apart from the planning I had been able to do ahead, the success was very much due to an incredible effort from all my helpers. From the beginning there was Michel Bordet. First time I met Michel, in Chamonix a month ago, I thought: ”What a sympathetic and calm man. He looks like a schoolteacher. If he can climb the Mont Blanc, certainly so can I...” (!) Did I become wiser? On the first day with Michel, Joakim and I had travelled since early morning. The evening before my wife and I had had a visit by my gallerist, which of course included the usual accompagnement of red wine, and for my part quite a few cigarettes as well... Then, a few hours of sleep, packing, getting to the airport with the traditional element of stress involved. Finally arriving in Chamonix at around 1 pm, we hooked up with Michel, rented the equipment we needed, bought supplies of water, soft drinks and chocolate bars and off we went, with the Aiguille du Midi lift taking us to 3800 m. At this moment the serious part of the entire expedition became clear to me. We were on our way...

I have been to Aiguille du Midi before, when in Chamonix for the preparation of the project. Each time I have taken the lift, bringing one up to 3800m from the city at 1000m. Coming directly to this height you can´t help starting to feel the thin air right away. Taking the stairs you become short of breath. But you easily forget this because you don´t really have to do anything exhausting and the view of the Mont Blanc is magnificent. The last time I was up there I was watching two guys who just did the most amazing, extreme thing. I was standing enjoying the view while all of a sudden they passed me and the sign warning about the danger of going beyond this point. The two guys put on their skis and went onto a slope that wasn´t even a slope but an edge with a step of a thousand meters down to each side. This very place was where Joakim and I found ourselves together with Michel in the afternoon on the day when we had just arrived. At that point I realized that I was now a part of this extreme family of crazy people going beyond the warning signs!

My watch said 2 pm, and to my knowledge it had already been a rather eventful day, but I was mistaken. Now the day really started! – taking off from Aiguille du Midi and heading for Refugio Torino in Italy. A walk of 5-6 hours in deep, deep new snow. At a point Joakim actually fell asleep, standing upright. For 20 seconds or so he was completely gone. And I could only envy him his power nap, as I thought I was going to die of exhaustion.

The next fantastic guy on our way to the top(!) was our chiefguide Asmus Nørreslet who took over where Michel left us. Literally speaking that took place on the Bar Le National in Chamonix, where he met up with us a few hours after having returned to Chamonix from The Caribbean Sea. Here the route was planned. We were going to ascend the Mont Blanc from the much longer Gouter route as Les Trois Mont Blanc-route was too difficult and dangerous, due to heavy snow fall.

• a retired doctor, but how comforting it is to have him along. He´s an old friend - I´ve known him forever. A doctor from the nearby runners club can´t beat that,
• a really good friend who is supportive in terms of as well age and weight, and whose calm nature is a valued opposite to my more flamboyant self,
• my warmhearted and faithful gallerist, who has prepared for this expedition by swapping his endurance at the well set table with endurance in the fittness centre,
• my loyal-and-always-supportive-and-never-reluctant-with-criticism art historical assistant,
• a musician, who like some other Julie Andrews will spread the tones of whatever comes to his mind during the expedition over the mountaintops,
• an art collector, not that he has that many of my things in his collection - but there is of course still hope, with a great spirit of mind and a great sense for beauty,
• a film-documentarist-journalist whose personality, magnificent voice and bright mind make it possible for us to be able to share this unique experience with a lot of people in a very personal way,
• and my photographer without whom this just wouldn´t feel right, as his participation in The Ice Cube Project not only boosted our professional relationship but also turned it into a deep felt friendship.

And now a confession – the only one for now – I came down here together with Joakim a few days prior to the rest of the crew, in order to get a bit a head.

But it´s tough. It´s really, really tough! The ascents for one thing, not to mention the descents that are at least as demanding. Another thing is the air. It is so thin that the physical challenges are doubled. I have already started worrying if this will end up as a bad copy of the Robinson Expedition or if we all will be able to make it to the top of that incredibly beautiful mountain that lies right there just waiting for its change...

There are probably several good reasons why one would want to climb a mountain. The experience of nature, the excitement, the physical challenge. But art? And should one finally decide to do so for the purpose of making art, wouldn´t it be an idea to gather a team of runners from the nearby runners club to go along with you?

Well, that´s not exactly what I did. In stead, I´m now heading of, as an artist genius or mad scientist?, for the summit of this very beautiful and rather difficult accessible Mont Blanc together with:

In the evening I joined the team in a hut in the mountains, passing a cosy evening and a freezing cold night before getting up at 5.30 and heading from the hut in Torino just across the Italien border back to France to Aiguille du Midi. This is a beautiful route crossing the Vallé Blanche. We went along as the sun rose over the mountain tops and enjoyed the quietness of the magnificent nature, the silence only being interrupted once in a while by the dramatic sound of avalanches and falling rocks. Suddenly another, more mechanical, noise appeared. It was the sound of a helicopter that seemed to be cruising around the area were I had passed the day yesterday. The sound came closer and the helicopter passed us close by, finally landing right next to us. Out came two policemen asking for me and as I stepped forward they told me they had come to detain me for questioning about me painting on the Mont Blanc.

Today turned out rather dramatically as I got arrested by the French police on the Mont Blanc massif. But I should probably turn back time and start today´s blog yesterday. My crew had arrived, and while they were having their first training day, I went off to spent some time on my own in the mountains. Inspired by the practical complications that arise in the mountains when you have to go, I carved a toilet in the snow. In order for people to be able more easily to find it, I painted it red using biodegradable fruit color. The same type I used for my Ice Cube Project in Greenland.

In the helicopter I was very nervous. As I have had no encounters with the French police before and as they were speaking to each other in French and on the radio, I felt very uncomfortable. Kent, from the team, had been allowed to come along (as my guardian angel or was it because he had quite a difficult time on the snowy and steep mountain slopes? We will never know. Anyway, I was very happy to have him beside me in the helicopter, confessing to him that I was terrified of the rumors of what goes on late at night in prisons where a lot of men hunger for women....!)

Safely on the ground Kent had to stay outside as the police took me in custody. Once in the station, talking to the police officer I calmed down as he was actually quite a friendly guy. We talked about my piece of art. He told me that the Mont Blanc massif is a protected area and that I wasn´t allowed to paint it. I told of course how the material I had used was biodegradable which I have a biological report that manifests. After taking my deposition they let me off the hook, telling me ”We are watching you, mr. Evaristti”. But they didn´t tell me not to go on with my art project on the summit of Mont Blanc, as I never, really, intended to paint the top. I have worked with all kind of materials as I like to work in whatever material suits the situation and the concept of my work. Paint is only one mean out of so many. When I get to Mont Blanc I will be gentle with it, tug it in like a precious loved one and declare the proud state of Pink State on this particular spot - the roof of Europe.

We did it! We reached the summit of Mont Blanc this morning at 8.30. The weather was extraordinary fantastic with a beautiful view of the clouds and the other mountains down below. After a night of thunder and lightning in our little shelter at 3800 m the weather had turned upside down, which we saw right away being met by a starry night when we began the last climb for the summit at 3 in the morning. The beginning of the climb was in the dark and after a few hours the ascending sun kept us company.
Finally at the summit we began the transformation of Mont Blanc to Mont Rouge, and the construction of a new pink state on this unique location. Our guides were fantastic and in the end we all sang the national hymn of pink state composed for the occasion by Kenneth Thordal who played along on his ukulele. At this moment Pascal arrived in the helicopter with Lars and Henrik on board, whose recordings I´m looking very much forward to seeing when once again we hit civilization.

National hymn of Pink State  No need to hide, welcome inside, watch the pink elephants dancing. Tomato icebergs, floating around you, try to unwind, see what you find, it´s a state of mind. Won´t you please try to be kind, won´t you please try to be kind?  
By Kenneth Thordal 2007

Links: 
www.norreslet.dk
www.michelbordet.com
www.tvmountain.com
www.thordal.com
www.helico.fr