Peter Laugesen Interview: Walking Provides Inner Peace

“If you get distracted and can't find peace and quiet in the world, such as in big cities or on the internet you should walk away from it.”
The 78-year old Danish poet Peter Laugesen has had great experiences out of walking for hours. Here he shares his advice to young artists about what he considers to be the benefits of walking.

“You have to leave things that you feel distract you if you want something else. Figuratively speaking, you should just walk in the landscape.”

Peter Laugesen has experienced what walking can do to you. “It can be in a city. Just walk around. Don’t do anything but walk around. Just watch and listen to what’s going on where you are. And keep doing that until it works. When it works, you feel inner peace. That’s my experience and that of many others.”

“I believe that we should learn only to attend to and only concentrate on what is really important,” Laugesen states. “I think we are all connected on a very deep and significant level. It’s about finding it and expressing it and being where it’s important to be.”

Peter Laugesen (b 1942) is one of Denmark’s most acclaimed poets. His debut came in 1967 with the collection of poems entitled ‘Landscape’. Since then, Laugesen has published more than 40 collections of poems. Besides being a poet Peter Laugesen is a playwright and a translator. His celebrated translations include Sylvia Plath, Gertrude Stein, Antonin Artaud, Hugo Ball, Gunnar Björling, and Charles Olson. Peter Laugesen has received numerous literary prizes, he is a member of the Danish Academy and has received a lifelong artists’ grant from the Danish Arts Foundation.

Peter Laugesen was interviewed by Christian Lund on the island of Fanø in September 2020.

Camera: Jakob Solbakken
Edit: Kasper Bech Dyg
Produced by Christian Lund
Copyright: Louisiana Channel, Louisiana Museum of Modern Art, 2020
Supported by C.L. Davids Fond og Samling

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