Words by Dunelm Jackson
I arranged to meet Cornelia at a riverside café on the edge of Springfield Park in Clapton. Cornelia is a leftfield dream-pop chanteuse from a remote island in Sweden. Now based in London, she’s just released the stunning “Aquarius Dreams” single with her sugar sweet vocals over Optigon big top sounds and crunchy marching band drum machines. I was a touch nervous as I’m more used to interviewing shy DJ/ Producer types so I didn’t know what to expect from a Pop star already fairly famous in Sweden. I was worried she’d fit the mould – arriving 2 hours late flanked with managers / PR bods and bodyguards and demanding all of the customers leave the café.
On arrival she looked every bit the pop star with wild curly red hair, dressed in an eccentric full length black and white number that was somewhere between Hasidic Jew and Medieval court Jester. Thankfully though there was no entourage and she seemed really enthusiastic about the interview. She spoke softly in perfect English with confidence and conviction. I could see that she was glowing with enthusiasm for her work. As I got to know her over a pot of Green tea and a chocolate éclair, I could tell that her creativity is not bound to the “singer songwriter” bracket and more the artist with a holistic perspective. Cornelia is involved in all parts of her work and she finds it most successful “when arts combine and become great story tellers. A song is a story. An image is another. Together they can build bridges. “.
Is Cornelia your real name?
Yes. I inherited it from my grand grandmother.
Where is your family from?
Depends how far back you go. I’m told of some French and Finnish ancestors but… Sweden is where all my grannys and cousins grew up. I moved around a lot as a child, but when I hit ten years old we finally settled on an island called Öland. I still consider it my home and I go there as often as possible.
What was it like growing up on a remote Island?
Lonely but calm. Isolated but free.
How does London compare?
London is a Social Monster. So much fun yet very, very loud.
Do you have a favourite hangout?
Yes. Where I can trust to be alone.
You have been described as a “Style Icon” in your home country – Is fashion a big influence on your work?
I don’t like the concept of fashion that much. But I do express myself through what I wear.
What’s the concept of fashion?
That you can set trends, I guess. I have no interest in trends.
Do you have any favourite designers?
I wear a lot of Alfhild Kulpers pieces on stage and off stage. She knows me, I know her. Alfhild graduated from St Martins Womenswear this summer, and she just started to work for Victor and Rolf in Amsterdam. She’s a great artist.
Listening to Aquarius Dreams I get a sense that there’s some conflict going on. Do you have trouble balancing all your different responsibilities?
I do. I think everybody does. Sometimes you have to make sacrifices for art, and sometimes you have to make sacrifices for love. It’s always difficult to make that choice and you will never know whether you made the right choice or not.
The Video for Aquarius Dreams must have taken ages – can you tell us about the process?
I bounced a lot of ideas back and forth with Martyn Thomas, before we got to the point of actually making this video. Martyn had been wanting to use this for years and he put an amazing amount of work into it’s making. Every single frame you see in the video is not only filmed but printed and drawn on by hand and re-photographed by him. If I were to tell you more closely about the process it would be an interview of it’s own. I think there is a making-of-video out there somewhere on the internet with an interview with Martyn who describes the process in detail.
What I find most illustrative about the video is that living beings are being portraited in sketched and slightly unreal manner, while all dead objects still look real or what most people would call ‘normal’. There’s a reason for this.
You give a lot of thought to your visuals. At your release party there was a guy using some sort of oils and an Overhead Projector?
Paulski. He’s another amazing artist.
You Dj as well right? What’s Social Monster?
I pretend to be a DJ when me and Mooken do our Social Monster nights. There we invite our favourite DJs to play records with us. So far we had DJs like Éclair Fifi, Mamiko Motto, Duff Disco, Ruf Dug, Nightwave, Johnny Dett… Social Monster is a collective for new, interesting and dance floor friendly music. We do radio shows, put up nights, run a blog… things like that. It’s good to engage in other’s people’s music but your own once in a while.
What about Camp Mozart – what’s on the horizon with the label?
Camp Mozart has been a great platform for my music ever since I started the label. However, I’d like it to become a platform for other artists as well. Hopefully we won’t have to wait too long for this to happen.
