Hallgrímur Helgason

Hallgrimur Helgason
Hallgrímur Helgason
Born	February 18, 1959 (1959-02-18) (age 58) Reykjavík
Occupation	Icelandic writer

Hallgrímur Helgason (born February 18, 1959 in Reykjavík) is an Icelandic painter, novelist, translator, and columnist.

Hallgrímur Helgason is an Icelandic writer and artist, born in Reykjavik, Iceland on February 18, 1959. He started out as a painter but gradually became a writer as well. His best known books are 101 Reykjavik (1996), The Hitman’s Guide to Housecleaning (2008) and The Thousand Degree Woman (2011). Two of his novels have been turned into films and four of them have been adapted for the stage. He has held over 30 solo exhibitions in Iceland, Sweden, Denmark and France, and his works can be found in the collections of several art museums.

Hallgrímur’s father, Helgi Hallgrímsson, is an engineer, the former head of the Icelandic Road Administration. His mother is Margrét Schram, a retired kindergarten teacher. His sister Nína Helgadóttir works for the Red Cross, his brother Gunnar Helgason is an actor and an award-winning writer of children’s’ books, and his brother Ásmundur Helgason works in advertising and publishing.

In 1984 Hallgrímur fathered his first child, Hallgerður Hallgrímsdóttir. In 1985, he met flautist Áshildur Haraldsdóttir, a student at the Boston Conservatory. They lived together in Boston, New York and Paris, got married in 1988 and divorced in 1992. In the years 2003-2009, Helgason lived with Oddný Sturludóttir, a city councilor. They have two children together, Kári Daníel born 2003, and Margrét María born 2005. Since 2009 Helgason has been living with Agla Magnúsdóttir, senior adviser at the Icelandic Literature Center. Hallgrímur and Agla live in Reykjavík and the island of Hrísey, with his younger kids and a dog named Lukka.

Helgason started out as a visual artist, studying at the Iceland Academy of the Arts (1980–81) and The Academy of Fine Arts in Munich, Germany (1981–82). Unsatisfied with both, he started painting on his own, mostly romantic colorful and “beautiful” landscapes inspired by his native Iceland, a clear break with the current fashions of conceptual and minimal art. After a couple of personal shows in Reykjavik, he spent the winter of 1985-86 in Boston, where he showed at Bromfield Gallery on Newbury Street, and met the Starn Twins (Doug and Mike Starn) and other artists represented by Stux Gallery, located in the same building.