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!