Ongoing periods (under)

Saying "During" with under

When you want to describe something happening within a specific timeframe or duration, English uses the word "during". In Swedish, you use the temporal preposition under. You will often see it paired with verbs that describe continuous actions, such as pågå (to go on / to last).

The exhibition goes on during the whole summer.
Utställningen pågår under hela sommaren.
We visited the gallery during the weekend to look at the art.
Vi besökte galleriet under helgen för att titta på konsten.

Periods and Events

You can use under before both broad units of time (like a season or a historical period) and specific events (like a tour or a lesson).

Many things happened during that period.
Många saker hände under den perioden.
The artist who painted the portrait spoke during the tour.
Konstnären som målade porträttet pratade under visningen.
You must interpret the text during the lesson.
Du måste tolka texten under lektionen.

When visiting a gallery, you might want to share your thoughts on the pieces. The verb for "to interpret" is tolka. You will also frequently encounter the adjective samtida (contemporary) used to describe modern art. Notice how samtida ends in an -a, a form it keeps regardless of the gender or number of the noun it modifies.

It is difficult to interpret the contemporary sculpture.
Det är svårt att tolka den samtida skulpturen.
The gallery only shows the contemporary artworks.
Galleriet visar bara de samtida konstverken.
The artist lets us interpret the artwork.
Konstnären låter oss tolka konstverket.
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