Talk on Tintin.

A pic from my lecture on Tintin at Ädelfors folkhögskola, november 30. 
Photo: Marcus Benzien Lindmark.

Talks.

The talk on Tintin at Ädelfors went well, afterwards I had an interersting conversation with a couple of guys from the journalist course at the school.

Last week I was invited to do another talk at the Reality Club at Kalmar Konstmuseum. This was last wednesday. I think i went pretty well and I got a lot of encouraging comments from the audience afterwards.

This week and the next I will get a couple of days in the studio but I still have some teaching at the University to do before Christmas.

Tintin and I?

I'm preparing for a lecture on Tintin and issues of racism. I will also talk about how Hergé's work has influenced my art. Tomorrow at Ädelfors folkhögskola in Vetlanda.

Elucidating Inka / Doge

The Wowboy - A fearless combination

Today I'm having my friend Petter crashing here on the blog, posting the first draft for a potential graphic novel project:

A pale, thick haired, scandinavian viking suddenly wakes up in a foreign environment. Even if some things do resemble what his blue eyes are familiar with, many things are different. There's a sun rising in the morning, staying up in the sky all day, eventually descending when evening comes. However this sun seems to stay up longer, and the heavy clouds he's used to seldom appear here, but when they do they tend to leave a ton of winter. Usually it melts into summer the day after. Yes, the sky is mostly blue during daytime, and the stars at night helps him navigate between different beds. He's not perfectly sure where exactly he is, what's behind the enormous mountains in the west and how far away the nearest shore is in this desert-like country.

One thing that amuses him is the great range of different mead he can find here. There are also an infinite variety of breakfast cereals, but unfortunately no filmjölk (cultured milk). He finds the coffee a bit too transparent, but notices that he generally gets more coffee for his coins. So perhaps it evens up. Cups marked "S" seem to be equal to those marked "XXL" back in Scandinavia. However he cannot decide if that's entirely a good thing.

Initially people seem to be staring or at least looking closely at him when he walks down the windy streets. He values shoes that are comfortable for walking and jackets that can take a lot of wind and darkness, and even if the Cowboys also seem to dress to stand the weather, they still appear more stylish. Not the apparent ergonomic scandinavian look.

There are also things he needs to learn about social interaction. He has no trouble understanding "Howdy", but greetings like "What's up?" initially makes him dizzy. He soon realizes that the question doesn't ask for the long version of what he is up to as the cowboys seem to reply with another "What's up?" or "Hey". But he also notices that alarmingly many replies with a "Not much". It's confusing for a viking.

However, he likes what he experiences and what he sees, and most of all he enjoys the company of the cowboys he hangs out with. It's a sweet adventure by the foot of the mountains. Little by little he adjusts to wild west life, his stiff ergonomic viking manners blending together with refreshingly light hearted cowboy ways of living. Donuts suddenly combine with porridge, a shell jacket gets some fur, a cowboy hat grows horns and the coffee turns dark and thick. "Wow, that's awesome", says someone, almost every day. "Wow" replies our Wowboy with a gentle nod.

–

“Hi, can I crash on your blog?”
Blog surfing by Petter Hanberger
This is the story of my Boulder experience, and it’s a tiny experiment in collaborative communication, or guest blogging if you like. I’m hoping to find a new blog to crash each week, and contribute with a post that’s relevant for the specific host. If you know someone who’s blogging on animals or outdoor adventures, please let me know.

Stay tuned.

/PH

Previous episodes:
9/11/2011: INVOLUNTARY OFFLINE MODE,
hosted by Watch, Think, Make/Siri Johansson

@pepperhamburger
www.petterhanberger.se

Starman.

Another photo from the opening. Gunnar took this picture of Oscar balancing on the star.

Thank you all!

A lot of people participated in this project and I would like to thank you all for your involvement.

Jan Tegnemo at Mönsterås Metall who made the aluminium casting possible.

Bengt Selander and the guys at Nybro Rör och Mekaniska who fabricated all the stainless steel hardware.

Gunnar Englund at Fantasilaoratoriet who constructed and sculptetd the wood star.

Tobias at Kalmar Bläster och Lack who painted the green star.

Hans-Göran Martinsson at Kalmar Municipality for great collaboration with all the details.

The guys from Hansa Bygg for the foundations and help on site.

Anders Lönn who gave me some good advice on concrete casting and materials.

Jonas Forsberg who helped with the installation.

And finally Lars Gustavsson, designer, fabricator and inventor, who helped me in so many ways. General support, discussing ideas, helping me with the installation, concrete casting, transports and many other things. Many thanks Lars.

Opening.

Finally, the day for the opening! There was an open house at the daycare center and quite a lot of people showed up. The weather was almost as foggy as last Friday. The grass was in better shape than a week ago and I am pleased with how the whole sculpture look. The kids are still enjoying it, climbing it and playing hide and seek.

Photo: Elin Stenberg

Finish line!

Today was another foggy day and the day of final inspection of the stars. Everything went well and my clients were very satisfied with the piece. The official opening of the daycare center will be next Saturday, more from the opening later.

Last star.

With some help from Barks' movers and Lars I finally got the concrete star in place. After scrubbing and washing away loose pigments on the surface we left it for the kids to jump on. Tomorrow, the final inspection with representatives from the school and Kalmar municipality will take place. Left to do is adding material to the small mound to get the grass surface level with the stars.

Out of the mould.

I managed to lift the concrete star from the mould without any problems. For now it is resting, upside down in the old powerstation in Pukeberg, waiting for some movers to transport it to Rinkabyholm early thursday morning. My deadline is friday 10:00 AM so I can still make it.

Copy II

This is a drawing I have been working on for some time. I have made a homage to Caravaggio, another favourite painter, using the composition and figures from his painting Supper at Emmaus from 1601.

I changed the perspective a bit because the point of view is higher in my drawing than it is in caravaggios painting.

Abraham Bloemaert did the same thing in 1622...

...and Rembrant in 1648.

Maybe Caravaggio had seen the Titzian painting from 1535.

Copy

When I was working on my lecture on Tintin in February, rereading all the albums, I noticed something familiar when I saw the frame with the Inka from Prisoners of the Sun. I checked and yes, the likeness with Bellinis Doge of Venice was obvious.

We start with the frame with the Inca.

Take away the colours to see the lineart clearly.

Superimpose it over the Bellini painting, I have dimmed the colours a bit for clarity, and you can clearly see the likeness. Notice how the profile, cheek bones, eyes, mouth and even the dimples match. I don't think this is a coincidence, rather an intelligent loan by Hergé.

Here are the two side by side. Bellini is one of my favourite painters, this painting especially. I definitely saw Hergés version first so I wonder if that has something to do with me appreciating the Doge painting.

In my opinion this doesn't deteriorate Hergés work in any way. I see it as a homage to Bellini and as T.S. Eliot said: 'Bad writers imitate, good writers steal'.

On Site.

Finally I was able to install three of the stars. With a lot of lifting power from Lars, Jonas and two guys from Hansa Bygg, we got them in place. The kids at the day care center went crazy when they finally got to climb the stars, when i left after securing the stars to the foundations there were two to three kids on every star.

Jonas and Lars look pleased and they should be, actually it took four guys lifting to get the stars in place. Thank you guys for the help!

600

Ahter the 600 grit paper, I'm satisfied with the finish, at least for now. There definately will be a lot of wear from the kids klimbing and playing with the stars. Hopefully the stars will age to a beautiful patina.

100

I'm using a lot of paper, now 100 grit.

Concrete casting.

As you may notice the concrete im using in the upper photo is black. We pigmented that batch with Íron Oxide pigment. The black layer is about 20 mm, next is about 40 mm of unpigmented gray concrete. The outer surface will, when it has cured, be treated with a mixture of lineseed oil, bees wax and black pigment.

Lars helped me with the casting, a long days hard work. The concrete layer is about 60 mm thick and besides the reinforcement bars reinforced with polypropylen and glass fibers. The weight is about 250 kg. In about two weeks we will see the result.

Done.

The reinforcement bars are done, bent and bound.

Reinforcement bars.

Making templates for guides.

Cutting, bending and shaping stainless reinforcement bars.

Mould improvements.

I used some two by fours to reinforce the frame around the mould. Lars G came by and we discussed the casting on tuesday.

The bottom of the mould now sits about 5 mm from the floor. So when I start casting it will rest on the floor.

I also had an opportunity to use my new sander where I had spillt some resin into the mould.

3 stars.

I drove to Gunnar at Fantasilaboratoriet to pick up the wood star. After som heavy lifting we finally got it on the trailer. Gunnar has done an excellent work, sculpting the star, I'm really pleased with the outcome.

Now I've got three stars in my yard, I think it looks pretty nice.

Sanding

Now all traces from the sandcasting is gone. I am still sanding with 40 grit paper to get an even surface.

Scott McCloud

I just ordered another copy of Understanding Comics by Scott McCloud. This way we will have one copy each to refer to in the ongoing work with Places People Stories.

I read UC for the first time several years ago and I think it is an excellent work discussing not just comics an how to understand them but also referring to creating graphic art in general, including fine art painting. Check out for example McClouds' theory on abstraction in the Big Triangle. Outstanding!

New Project

Working on a new project. Places People Stories is a ongoing project aimed to result in a conference publication in comic book form for the conference with the same name. This conference investigates the relations between people and places, focusing on the role of stories in constructing meaning and affecting human emotions. The project is a collaboration between Petter Hanberger and I as a team and Linnaeus University, Kalmar. We have set out to produce an indepedent original work that is relevant to the main aims for the conference.

We can't work in the studio because its cluttered up with moulds and fiberglass for the concrete cast.

You realise this is pretty serious work: ).

The other side.

Laminated some fiberglass reinforcement on the other side this morning. After finishing work with the sander the mould should be ready to use.

Epoxi.

Glued the plywood to the mould using home made glue made of epoxi resin and filler. Then I laminated with fiberglass for strength. After curing I will finish the other side tomorrow.

Reinforcement.

Working on some reinforcements on the mould. After consulting Göran I decided to make a quite deep frame out of plywood all around the mould. This way I will be able to fix the mould while I am working with the concrete.

Finish work.

Finally the mould is cleaned from the remains of the model. Used my new Festool Geared eccentric sander ROTEX RO 125 for the first time. A really sweet tool. Note improvised connection between sander and dust extractor.

Concrete.

Henrik from Hansa Bygg, responsible for the foundations for the stars, in action at Rinkabyholmsskolan.

And this is the result. He will dismantle the molds tomorrow and refill with soil.

Cover.

This is great! Jean-Marie Distaso from France covered my painting "Wood Chase". Check out his work at: Tableaux a l'eau.

Stuck.

Due to not enough wax on the plug I have to scrape out the paint that got stuck in the mould. I'm half way there.

Grinding.

Still a lot of grinding to do.

Grinding.

I have starded to grind the suface smooth. I start with 40 grit paper and plan to finish sanding with 800 grit paper. I'm looking for a smooth matte silver surface.