Amsterdam Creatives | Christina Hallstrom at AGA

In a busy café steam buzzes behind the bar. The sun is busy on a September afternoon. A bio bread and vegetable market spreads along the square.
I wake at nine with stinging eyes. The previous day was a hurried mess of catching trains in between two-minute photo-shoots.

After the sky darkens, I walk along lonely canals in the back of Amsterdam’s busy, humming center to a neon-striped café with black walls and thumping music. There, Kristien and I drink white wine and discuss her previous life, driving a tour bus through Yemen, Latin America and Europe.

I sleep restlessly and wake with a heavy head. I guzzle strong coffee and watch a boy in blue type on a small computer.
In the evening a thunderstorm glitters the sky with lightening and hard rain.

A designer wears a pastoral flower suit in white and round spectacles. His tall, lanky body stems from a smooth, bald head.

“Hello, hello, welcome in.” He greets incomers to his solo show at the door. “I have a small gift for you – just for coming!” He pins a tiny, charcoal sculptural piece to my shirt.

“Don’t worry, I’m gay – not trying to do anything fancy here.” He laughs, sending his head in a rocking, jovial sway.

“Welcome, welcome.”

The room is packed with black-clothed bodies.

“It’s like a sauna in here!” Maria exclaims.

I lift a flute of champagne from a tray carried by a balding boy in white. Large charcoal pins display on long black drapes that hang from the ceiling.

“Hallo! Hallo!”

Guests greet one another with three kisses – peck, peck, peck.

Christina Hallstrom creates enigmatic screenprints at Amsterdam Grafisch Ateliers.