Inkalill

The Miranda tale

2010-12-18T07:41:00.000-08:00

I´m working on my graphic novel "The Inner Monster". This is a fantasy tale. To analyze the Jackson film of The Lord of the Rings should give me some insights in how this works. Why fantasy? What psychological needs are being met?
I heard someone say that some people does not have a inner voice in their heads. That shocked me. The inner voice that speaks to me, my voice, is vital to my happiness and comfort. It tells me the Ingalill story, the tale that is created just for me, it structures my experiences and explain them. It speaks my logic, which sometimes don´t compares with the official outer world logic at all. The outer world has quite strict rules: the reality must be something we all can agree upon. This consensus bind us to each other, but can be misused. Think about the frames of christianity in its negative aspects, or communism. You cannot, or should not press your own world view upon others, but it is done all the time.
Fantasy literature do not have so rigid bonds. It can write about the world as you think it should be, or fear it could be. I find fantasy to be a road to freedom. The only borders are my own limit.

In the Inner Monster I´ll try to describe the loss of trust. What makes some people to become monsters in the eye of society? Fritzl, Bundy, Mengele, sometime they must have had a choice to become something other than sadists. What stories did they tell themselves? Were there any stories at all?

Lord of the Rings -my precious ...

2010-11-10T12:07:00.000-08:00

Illustration by Alan Lee: Orthanc, the tower in Isengaard

For five days I´ve looked at the stuff on the special extended edition DVD box of the Lotr films by Pete Jackson and his fabulous crew. Wow, what a work! I´m too close still to come up with any art critic. The spirit behind the film-making, however, is easy to say something about. What love. And heroic bravery in taking it on and going through with it. My sincere respect to Peter Jackson for daring to push everything to it´s limits, and insisting upon fine details as well as gigantic scenes.
That speaks about real love given freely, and not bought love.
I´m going to look more, and I´m going to write about it. Just knowing about the beautiful miniatures and the big miniatures they built, make me awed when I look at the scenery in the films, many many highlights: Helm´s Deep, Isengaard, Lothlorien, Minas Tirith, The Black Gates, The City of the Dead. Fantastic.

I think Jackson did the absolutely right thing in inviting Alan Lee and John Howe, the two famous Tolkien- illustrators, to design the film. It was the link to the past the film needed. Their knowledge was invaluable. And thanks to those two, that they said yes, and joined.

A very small fairy-tale.

2010-10-25T13:49:00.000-07:00

Once upon a time there was a young boy nine years old. He lived with a mother who had a broken heart. He had a best friend, a rabbit named Moe. They used to escape under the garden fence and play in the green woods behind. A thursday afternoon they came upon an old shack leaning towards an oak tree. The door was invitingly half-open, and a trail of edible mushrooms grew over the doorstep and inside. "Let´s go inside"! Said the boy. He always thought a short time ahead, if at all. "Wait", said Moe. "You know what a trap is? It looks just like this." "What do we do then"? asked the boy. "We hide and wait." said Moe.
They found a hiding-place under a green bush, and a brown bear came by, by- and by. He ate the mushrooms all into the shack. All went silent. "Let´s go and see what did happen." whispered the boy. "Wait", said Moe. "If the bear is inside, alive and well, he´ll eat us. If the bear is dead, then who killed him? Maybe the killer wants to kill some more?" "What do we do then?"asked the boy. "We hide and wait", said Moe.
After a while they heard footsteps approaching, and a hunter came, with his gun ready, following the trail of the bear. He saw the shack, and with great caution, he sneaked up to the half-open door and peeped inside. Then he went inside.
Everything went silent. The boy and Moe looked at each other.
"What now"? asked the boy. "Shall we go inside and help the hunter with the bear?" "It wasn´t the hunter who set the trap" said Moe. "Always look at the body language. He didn´t know what was inside. He was insecure, and those edible mushrooms? Any animal could have walked into the trap, even a child. No, a bone, or a piece of flesh to lure a bear or a wolf would have been his choice for bait." "So we wait", said the boy. "You´re a quick learner, Boy." said Moe.
The shack began to move, and changed into a troll. He stretched and yawned, and patted the moss beside the great oak tree.
"A troll"! said the boy. "Let´s run!" "No." said Moe. "You have a little knife in your pocket. It´s made of steel. If you throw the knife over the troll, he´ll bust!" "But how can I throw the knife over the troll when he is as big as a shack?"
"Let me take care of that", said Moe.
Just as the troll laid down to get a nap, Moe jumped forward. "Good evening, mr. Troll." The troll looked around and saw the little rabbit. "Go away before I eat you". Said the troll. "I can´t hear you, mr. Troll", said Moe. He held his paw behind his ear and leaned forward. The troll thought he could lure the rabbit, and get even more food. He crouched down, like he´d try to speak to one who was hard of hearing, and made ready to grab the rabbits ears. "Come a little closer then", the troll said. But Moe backed between two tree-trunks, and said: "I´m a little dizzy too, mr. Troll. I must sit down a little!"
The Troll crept towards the rabbit, and was just at the right angle for the boy to throw his little knife over his head, and the boy did that.
A great bang and a flash, and the troll was gone!
Suddenly the bear, the hunter, and lots of animals and humans appeared, and they all ran away from the woods as fast as their feet could carry them.
Moe and the boy came home late, but the boy´s mother wasn´t angry at all. Her heart had mended, because one of the humans rescued from the troll was her dear husband, the boy´s father. They all lived happily ever after.

The happy moment

2010-09-07T09:04:00.000-07:00

... is when I´m floating in a good story. Or experiencing physical things in the present, like laughing, eating, walking or listening to music. Hah. Now, what then? I have returned to my blog, and have to write something! It is expected!
Let me tell you about my life since last time.

I passed the exams. I lived on the brink of poverty all summer, but it was sunshine most of the time, my family had all we needed to be happy and I thought a lot. About my work, my life and the truth about everything. Felina is now on her journey among publishers. The Knights of Dor on their journey in the digital world, the stories can be bought for a song and seventeen crowns on Itunes. Miranda is changed, I have made sketches of most of the story called "The Monster Inside". The small film we made in my student group has been put up on the hundred-year birthday of NTNU, my university, and it was great. I am going to write my master thesis about something Fantasy/Fantastic/Fiction/Truth/Trans-art.
My children, my two beautiful boys are now grown-ups. They have moved out. I love them, and I´m happy for them. Sometimes it´s hard to become independent. They need money sometimes, and to hear they´re missed and still loved.

I´m kind of floating along, I don´t know exactly what I want. I feel so very young sometimes. The child in me exists along with the crone in me, and the mother? My motherhood is different, I am a new kind of mother. The role has changed somewhat. Who am I? I used to think about myself as an artist. The school teaches me to see myself as a critic, a hunter for the truth, a person with power to discard and elevate stories. The small jobs I´m offered puts me in a position as a teacher of story-telling.

What will the future bring? I need to believe in something.

Pet slavery in a hole in the earth

2010-05-21T08:14:00.000-07:00

Hi, friends.
Long time no see! My exam days are nearly over, just one left (about western films, the genre of). There´s a new web comic I´d like to recommend to you: Seven Years in Dog-Land by John Avatar.
He has me spellbound with his original and revealing fable. The drawings can look too rugged in the first place, but if one take a second look, see the bravery and belief in his manner of drawing. He don´t play safe, but draws the figures just as he see them in his mind, come what strange lines that may. This, strangely, gives the characters a reality you believe in. I love his drawing.
The plot is intelligent and original, again, strangely, for a story like this, believable. It has the truth you can find in Aesop´s fables.
Here is what John Avatar himself says on his webpage:

"I like comics. Not for what they are and how they are perceived today, but what they can be.
I like dogs. Who doesn't? They're man's best friend. But I wonder if they've ever made a conscious choice to be man's best friend.
And if the position of humans and dogs are interchanged, how will we see the world from their eyes?
That is my pondering, and there's no better medium than comics to tell my story.
So I've blended these two ingredients, and conjured what you see here: a comic of talking dogs, beastly men, Shakespearean undertones, and a great journey.

When Alice runs away from home to look for her lost dog, little she knows that she may never return. She stumbles upon the kingdom of Dog-Land, an alternate world where dogs are the masters, and humans, their pets.
Under the crimson sky of this misshapen realm, the sprightly ten-year-old begins her true journey – of discovering what it truly means to be human – as she seeks a way back to our world.
Seven Years in Dog-Land is a literary fantasy set in a gritty and cruel kingdom of dogs. It is an exploration of humans’ relationship nature and the human condition itself.

When I first came across the “Seven Ages of Man”, as seen in Shakespeare’s “As you like it”, I knew it would be a good skeleton for fleshing out the plot for my story. This led to deciding on having Alice spend 7 years on Dog-Land, so each year will coincide with every stage in Shakespeare’s “Seven Ages”. When I got down to the plot details, I was continually surprised by how my story made perfect sense when I simply followed what the “Seven Ages” means."

Take a look at this webcomic. You will not regret it.

The news

2010-03-19T10:49:00.000-07:00

I read the news today oh, boy.
From chaos to a billion in revenue;
a leader of a scooter club
patrols the icy roads ...

Nine of ten are paying for a trail seventy miles into the woods they long to go o o ...

I read the news today oh, yeah.
The fur of foxes cost much more
the greatest auction in the world
was held in Helsingfors

Russians and Chinese was the highest bidders for the silver skins the ermine were going upwards too o o ...

Thanks for reading this poem, inspired by a Day in the Life by Beatles.

Tim Finnegan´s wake

2010-03-06T00:26:00.000-08:00

"A lovely corpse, and lots of fun in Finnegan´s wake!" I´m listening to this old Irish folk song with Johnny Logan. The song is about a funeral of a drunkard. When he lies in the grave, his friends are having a good time, to honor his memory. But when the "priest"? sprinkles his body with whiskey, he wakes up, and joins the party. Hilariously! I´m falling into a joyous mood myself.
I´m beginning to think, the more you know, the more you can create. What is clichés? Not enough knowledge. What is bad? A lack of structure and organization? Is there one answer to questions, or many? Many answers, do they come from different kinds of knowledge? If we have knowledge, do we use it? And what has all this to do with Finnegan´s wake?
Stereotype: a drunkard lives a sad and dark life. He destroys his family by being unpredictable and moody. He is not to be trusted, because he´s only loyal to his intoxicant. He is either bad or pitiful.
Okay. If I should write something absolutely in contrast, maybe it would go like this: A girl has high ideals, and wants to shine like a sun, spreading joy and happiness. She discovers the use of toxics, that it can give her a different view of herself and the world around her, that her dream can come true. She discovers new colors, new meaning with music, a warm feeling of happiness and flow. It´s another dimension. Her problem becomes the common world. Compared to the toxic world, it is grey and hopeless. The choice is easy, or difficult when family is involved, and her life is lived in toxic glory. There are moments of great happiness and revelation.
But with knowledge and fantasy, you can have it all. You can connect this world and the other world, and maybe it´s a slower path, but revelations and happiness will spill over to your family as well. It is a safer path. But I won´t condemn the drunkard for taking the easy one. I would wish her moments like in Finnegan´s wake, highlights of laughter and fun ...

Animation

2010-02-07T12:37:00.000-08:00

At the school we´re working across the disciplines. It´s called "Experts in team" and my group is going to set up a performance of kind. It must contain music, 3D film and human beings. We´ll try to mix in some animation too. Since I´m very interested in it, I´ve grabbed the opportunity to read books and try my Cs4 premium suite, bought as soon as I knew I was a student with price moderations. After effects and adobe pro, dreamweaver and flash- and a school library to search in.
I´ve lent a couple of books, bought one too.
Now I´ve just made my first rotoscope - converting images from a small film sequence to photoshop layers, and drawing over, and taken 90 small drawings into flash ... and I made it. It worked! My first little rotoscope. I´m thrilled.
Lot more to learn, though. But what exciting possibilities!

Dr. Caligaris Cabinet

2010-01-24T03:38:00.000-08:00

I lent a strange film at the library. Dr. Caligaris Cabinet, age border: 15 years. Instructor: Robert Wiese, photographer: Willy Hameister, manus: Carl Mayer and Hans Janowitz. It was made in 1919 in Germany, black and white, a silent movie, re-published by BASIC MEDIA LTD. It was like being transported into another time.
The plot: A young man sits and chats with an older man. The young man tells him a strange story: A tent owner in a traveling fun fair displays a sleeping man, Cesare, who can foresee the future, and does everything the owner, Dr. Caligari, tells him to. The doctor takes a dislike to a man, and he is found murdered the next day. More murders happens, and Dr. Caligari is suspected of using the sleepwalker to do the dark deeds. Then the story gets weird, or weirder. Dr. Caligari is the director for a mental hospital, and the young man is his patient. The whole story is a hallucination. 1919! A fifteen-year old child wouldn´t have battened an eyelid seeing this. Well, maybe he would, over the dramatic gestures and pathos the actors were using. And the heavy make-up. And the props.
This story has something, though. First, it is refreshing to watch something so different from modern films. I fell straightaway for the way they had made the background: theatrical drawings, tilted, askew, the fun fair merely some tents in front of a image of a huddled city on a hill. And Dr. Caligari as a small, old man, no grandeur at all, creepy and suspicious. To see Dr. Caligari as a director in a position of power afterwards, was directly unsettling. You got a glimpse of the fear and paranoia the young man felt in the story.

Merry Christmas!

2009-12-23T22:58:00.000-08:00

Another year. I wonder if I´m going to get loudspeaker today. My former ones got busted, and I have used earphones and my Macill-loudspeakers since. I miss my music. In the newspapers: about the church of our Lady in the middle of Trondheim, they can´t afford to have a day and night open church next year, but all the volunteers will help to support it for two or three days/nights a week, and it´ll always be open at daytime.
There´s a long interview with the users and the volunteers, the people tell how the church is an important place in their lives. The homeless, the drug addicts, the lonely people, all comes to the church for a meal, a prayer, a meeting-place and to lit a candle for someone loved or a wish for a better world. They look forward to celebrating in the church, there are musicians and artists coming to entertain.
Christmas is family time. But all the people are family. I feel inspired when reading about things like these. I want to paint or write about it. Selfless love, no, unconditioned love, how to describe that?
I wish you all would experience that, unconditioned love. A place that´s always open for you.
Merry Christmas!

Exam!

2009-11-30T05:08:00.000-08:00

Exam, yeah. I´m in the midst of it. I´m writing thirteen pages about two articles written by two norwegian art critics. I´ve delved deep into Platon´s ideas about the ideal state, and what place he intended art to have in it. He seems to be very suspicious about letting in the Muses. I wonder how he would´ve looked upon comics? Maybe as we look on tagging and grafitti on the walls today. Emotional junk. Platon saw public emotions and art as dangerous.
Strange thing, his own works are beautiful things of art. The dialogue "Ion", for instance. He must have meant a particular art, then? Well, this old wise man, Platon, had an enemy. Another old wise man. I can´t wait to read the dialogue he wrote about him, I look forward to find some exciting philosophical cat-calling in it. Ever heard about Gorgias? He´s the villain. Gorgias was a master rhetoric. it means he could persuade people to believe anything. That they really didn´t exist, for instance.
What has this to do with the norwegian art critics?
Well, they are walking in the fringe of unknown territory when it comes to art critic. One is doing a performance article in public, or is it a joke, a hoax? the other is breaking down sentences and writing stray thoughts, a puzzle for the readers to put together, if they want an impression of the whole artwork. I find both writers courageous. I got a feeling that the academic world has its own laws and lands, and the schools will defend their borders. Platons ideal state? Will Gorgias be let in? Philosophy and rhetoric, truth and art, together in peace. They both need each other.

The philosophy of art

2009-11-08T06:14:00.000-08:00

Platon wrote a dialogue called "Ion". This work is about an artist, called Ion, who has just won a great competition in reciting the famous epos´s of Homer. Ion meets the old man Socrates, and gets entangled in a conversation about art. The summary is, Ion just mimics Homer, with no real knowledge about the idea or structure in the work. Socrates shows him this by asking Ion questions and arguing about the answers. It ends with Ion admitting his ignorance.

I feel this is like my own situation. I, too, mimic the main way to tell and draw, and haven´t thought about looking at the basic structure of what I´m doing or asking myself where I am. I´m reasonably good in doing my craft, like Ion. But to be shiny on the surface isn´t the goal. Works of art should be like humans, creations with a soul, a functioning body and a distinct personality.

The philosophy of art is important, because you have to find your own answer. Imitating mainstream is a beginning, but isn´t the best.

The city of Odda

2009-10-15T03:34:00.000-07:00

The literature festival in Odda included this year images as well as words. Illustrators and comic creators were invited, also authors who had gotten their books transformed to films. Very interesting! In the video, a short glimpse of one of the factories Odda is renowned for. Other things to experience are the mountains, the fjord and the waterfalls. An ice glacier, Folgefonna, lies within walking distance of the city. Well, it´s a long walk, but, it´s possible.
Odda was also made famous by the great landslide that took several houses. In fact, it have had several such slides, albeit that was one of the biggest in this century, and since I was a little girl, I´ve heard about the really great slide, not yet occurred, the one everybody fears: a whole mountaintop over Tyssedal (the place where one of the other factories is situated) is prophesied to slide into the fjord, wiping out everything below. I hope it´ll never happen. There is a museum in Tyssedal which contains a great amount of the history of Odda and the whole fjord it lies by, the Sørfjorden (the south fjord).

The great factories, all about melting metal, smoke and fire, has had a great impact on the culture. Many authors from Odda celebrated the friendship and community spirit they had grown up with. It was the workers against "them", the directors, the farmers, the outsiders. The Union and the politics was important. It is still told a story about a first May celebration, when everybody were maching under the flags of their unions, how the communists and the worker´s unions collided and got into a massive fistfight, a long time ago.
People here are great storytellers. And this spirit, combined with the life as factory workers, have given them an unique way of expressing themselves. Several authors, playwrights and comic creators have grown up here.

The Raptus comic festival

2009-10-12T08:56:00.000-07:00

At the Raptus festival in Bergen, 11-13 September 2009, many comic creators gathered to meet fans and each others. Milo Manara, Cary Nord, Joe Casey, Charlie Adlard, Vince Deporter, Barbara Canepa, Peter Madsen, Juanjo Guarnido, Massimo De Vita, Thierry Capezzone, Lars Lauvik, Frode Øverli, Ingebjorg Jensen, Arild Midthun, Gunnar Staalesen, myself and Mike Collins, amongst others. It was great fun, I had with me my brand new video recorder, and got some small glimpses of the event. Regrettably, what I got, was just a tiny percent of it all.
I have more footage, and will try to mix something again soon. The people talking in the film are Norwegian comic artists. The bright little kid was a fan of Mike Collins, who drew a fantastic image for him. No wonder he says, "Raptus is great!"

The well of plots

2009-10-02T05:31:00.001-07:00

I have a well of plots.
At home, in my cave, there are dozen of dozens of books, notes, sketches and synopses. It dates back from when I was five years old, my mother collected books of my drawings and poems. If my descendants don´t burn it all on a bonfire, some brave souls will have an interesting time searching for the gold nuggets amongst the sand corns.

I read about Thomas Edison, the near-deaf, ADHD child, the inventor, nicknamed the Magician of Menlo Park. In Menlo park, his immense laboratory that covered two districts, contained samples of "everything": 8000 types of chemicals, screws, needles, wires, human and animal hair, silk of all sorts, hooves, shark teeth, turtle shells, rubber, every mineral, etc.
What a well of inspiration!
Our surroundings are playing a role. Heck, our chaotic working-spaces are essential to some of us! I don´t need all those ink glasses on my desk, or the clay figurines, or the bust of Bjorneboe. I would have more room to draw if the stack of wood cases were gone, or the pencils and the colors placed somewhere else.

But I love to see my thingies. They represent possibilities to me!

When I look back, I can see how heavily influenced I was of the environment of my time. The books I read, toys I played with, the films I saw, the comics I bought. The music, my friends. And of course, the nature.

All things beautiful

2009-09-18T02:59:00.000-07:00

"As you wander through this troubled world, in search of all things beautiful" ... this is a line from the song "Lullaby" by Dixie Chicks. So fine a song, so great a line. After working so hard, so long, I am out in the world again. When I take the bus to school in the morning, I look at all those beautiful people riding along. Their hair, their clothes, all those different faces and sizes. I am stuck with awe. These god-like beings are living in the same world as me, on the same bus.

And on the school: revelations of authors and thinkers you have heard about, but never got to knew before now. And others, completely strangers, which voices that sound so true. Lands, history, the secret knowledge of looking and judging.
I feel like I have entered another reality, in my old body, but without the old cravings for sex, success and ambition you had when young. I like this hunger for knowledge, it feels so much better than the hunger for money and the trap of consuming habits.

I think my spiritual body will get in good shape here.

The mystery of Orbs

2009-09-04T10:23:00.001-07:00

What is an Orb? Relatives of mine took a lot of pictures they suddenly showed up in, around christmas time. Their theory: spirits, coming together when there was celebration and family unions. My husband got an Orb beside him in two pictures, transparent but big. Could it be a long-dead relative coming to say hello?

Our relatives lives by a fjord. The place has an old folk tale attached: Two farmers were driving in a wagon by a horse. Near the "Roesbergura" the horse stopped, and would not go a step further. The men grew angry, and whipped the poor horse, but it stood still even then.
One of the men got an idea this could be something otherwordly, and looked through the steel ring in the horse´s headgear. Then he saw a great wedding crowd crossing the road in front of them. Bride and bridegroom, and the fiddler, and the families. They were small of stature, up to our knees in height, and all clad in blue. Their heads were big in comparison to their bodies.
When the wedding thong had passed, the horse went on by itself.

I have never seen Orbs before. Looks like shining old coins. Dust particles? Why are they only in some pics, not in all? This is an Unsolved Mystery!

I´m a student now!

2009-08-15T07:45:00.000-07:00

Life can sure be weird. Two months ago we had debt, no money and no work. After fifteen years in a cellar office, working mostly alone making comics, I decided I needed something else. So I applied for a Master's Thesis in Art Criticism and Cultural Dissemination on NTNU, the world famous university in Trondheim, my home city. To my great surprise and delight, I got a yes, you´re welcome!

At the same time, my old home got sold, our debts got paid and we had some money to live for.

I went to the Matriculation Ceremony at Campus Gløshaugen, and found myself in a sea of very young folks. With my grey locks and fifty-one years I felt a little lost. But the speeches were interesting, and the music great. They have a Jazz line where people learn to compose music.
Later I went to Dragvoll, the campus I am to go to.
I found the library there. O, heaven! A sea of books to dive into, to swim in, and throw up into the air, like old uncle Scrooge did in Carl Barks´s stories! It was fabulous! I got a student card, a theatre card, a film card, a bus card and a card to the Studentersamfunnet, a round red building in Trondheim where they have concerts, political debates, parties and a newspaper and TV production set.

Something new is about to begin. I´m very exited.

Money for nothing

2009-06-30T05:47:00.000-07:00

There have been wealthy artists who could support their families and living without worries about future income. So it is possible.

To get paid for all your work? That would have been great. Heck, to get paid for half your work, would have been fantastic. But no one is guaranteed a fee when you create something free-lance. You take the risk, if you´re good enough, or lucky enough, you pull it off.

Sometimes I feel that I should have chosen a safer path. Become a librarian or an archeologist, and have free time to just enjoying other peoples art, to go to theatre plays, concerts, cinemas and exhibitions, reading stacks of comics and books, listening to the music of the world.

It would have been a so much easier life, I think.

I have children to take care of. My two boys are nearly grown up, they are so beautiful and alive, dating girls, playing games, eating, having fun, planning their future. My other children, the comics I have made, has gone into books, but don´t seem to sell well. I can blame the financial crisis, the tough competition of other good comics, that Norway is a small country, etc. etc.

Nobody wants to dissect their children. I am kind of blind to their faults, I think ... I just love them.

Animated dogs running

2009-06-13T09:29:00.000-07:00

Hi! I have worked all day long trying to expose the secret of animation. I have been through lots of tutorials now and then. I have made a tiny one in photoshop today, that is a start, but I want to do them in flash too! That &%$#" data language is not easy for me, but after two years, I finally begin to understand a fraction. I feel stupid.

Odyssevs, the tricky hero

2009-06-06T16:42:00.000-07:00

The tale of Odyssevs is well known. Steven Grant and Scott Bieser have made a new take on the story, wickedly clever done.
"Odyssevs the rebel". We meet our hero after the siege of Troy, swimming in the ocean, quarreling with the sea god Poseidon. The dialogue is brilliant. Odyssevs came alive at once as a stubborn, cynical but attractive man, who won´t adore and worship the Gods. A man with principles.
It certainly helps that the art is very well done. Clear lines, shades of grey, black and white, very easy to read and get caught in the mood of the drama.
I promise you, if you like 300, if you love an intelligent plot, if you have a feeling for history, ... you´ll not be sorry if you look into the Big Head Press´tale about the sly idealist Odyssevs.

Ideas

2009-04-23T03:38:00.001-07:00

"If nature has made any one thing less susceptible than all others of exclusive property, it is the action of the thinking power called an idea, which an individual may exclusively possess as long as he keeps it to himself; but the moment it is divulged, it forces itself into the possession of everyone, and the receiver cannot dispossess himself of it. Its peculiar character, too, is that no one possesses the less, because every other possesses the whole of it. He who receives an idea from me, receives instruction himself without lessening mine; as he who lights his taper at mine, receives light without darkening me. That ideas should freely spread from one to another over the globe, for the moral and mutual instruction of man, and improvement of his condition, seems to have been peculiarly and benevolently designed by nature, when she made them, like fire, expansible over all space, without lessening their density at any point, and like the air in which we breathe, move, and have our physical being, incapable of confinement or exclusive appropriation. Inventions then cannot, in nature, be a subject of property."
- Thomas Jefferson

This was a great read.
I wish people who reads my two books of the Knights of Dor (my second book is released on the market on Monday, the 18.th. May) will feel good and be inspired.
I am sad I can´t just let all folks read The Knights of Dor for free, yet. I have a publisher to take care of, who believes in my stuff and wants to sell it. So let there be time for that first, and release later. In 1900 the duration of utility patents lasted 17 years, then the inventions were free for all ... the Knights of Dor will come sooner, I think!
Long live the ideas of everyone!

Gypsy, a surreal heroine

2009-03-20T07:39:00.000-07:00

Gypsy is a web comic running on Girlamatic, and it is free to read. On full screen on Kidjutsu, here:

First impression: professional, playfully drawn. Attractive use of lines, planes and hachure. The puppet troupe introduction worked very well for me. The mood was funny, surreal, silly on the surface. The heroine, Gypsy, is very anti-heroic, and portraits apathy and hopelessness in the complex world today, a world craving for us to participate in a number of ways, school, job, family relationships. When she lies down watching the puppet troupe performing the same show over and over again, it reminds me of watching TV just to escape from boredom and pressure to participate. Her mum looks upon her daughter as a burden, and is trying to get rid of her by leaving her with a doctor, Ziggy.

Gypsy was destined by the gods to be a traveller, but is totally passive. The doctor tries to take her journey with her, but fails.
The puppet troupe are also a symbol of artists and media people, they are rewriting the story in their way, struggling with their equipment, people reacts to them either giving them praise and money, or kicking their behinds.

My last impression: This is a very satirical story, telling something about the world and reality we live in. A quality comic with several layers.

From the cast: Gypsy is the daughter of the CEO and founder of the world's largest entertainment corporation, and the actual creator of the Gypsygirl doll that empire is based on. In the last segment of her 10th Educatorial, her brain filled to capacity causing a waking coma-like state.

Ziggy has finally gotten her private practice off the ground when Mama Rose shows up and leaves Gypsy behind. To make good on her advertised promise for a speedy cure, the good doctor is forced to take Gypsy wherever she needs to go to complete her Post-Educatorial Service.

This particular puppet troupe was hired by Mama Rose as part of the Broadway Cure prescribed to the catatonic Gypsy. The group consists of: 2 Producers, 1 Director, 1 Stage Manager, 2 Stagehands, 3 Spear Carriers, 3 Principal Performers, 1 Understudy, 1 Conductor, and 12 Orchestra Members.

Mama Rose parlayed her daughter's one and only creative impulse into a multi-billion dollar corporation. Per tradition, when the last or only child completes the Primary Educatorial, they are sent away from the home with noting more than the clothes on their backs. The Parent[s] may begin their Retirement. Unfortunately for Mama, Gypsy is afflicted with Brain Freeze, effectively blocking the execution of this tradition.

A serious case of Brain Freeze can't keep Gypsy from having a globe-spanning adventure. Updates weekly.

John Peters has been bouncing around the outer rim of the comics industry since 1997 with Forty Winks and other comic projects, including Pretty Female Assassin Pixie [also with Vincent Sneed] and Crazy Asian Girl [with Lonnie Allen]. Gypsy! is his first major solo project. He likes sushi, and has a large collection of tree branches.

Christopher Schultz has written a very good Gypsy! rewiev.

Internet ...

2009-02-22T16:15:00.000-08:00

Oh, brave new world!
Internet is the best thing since radio and TV was invented. I love to have access to the world. I sincerely hope the net won´t fall into the hands of people who wants to own it. I would be willing to trade the freedom of the net, for my own copyright, if need be. Not the ownership of my works, but the right to copy my works.

To read all those web comics and stories people lay out, is a great source of pleasure. It is immensely inspiring. It is like the time when music evolved into spirituals, blues, jazz and rock´n roll.

The financial crisis are welcome in a way. Me and mine have a hard time now, mainly because of it, but if this crisis can shift the world´s economies into a healthier state, with a more humanely focus, I am willing to endure it.
When earning money becomes the most important thing in your life, it is wrong, be you rich or poor.
The most satisfying things in life, is, in my opinion: Love. Expression. Experience. Relationships. Knowledge. Laughter, well-being, fun!

Money is just a way to get these things! And you don´t have to roll in dough to have love, or experience, or fun.
Internet gives you many versions of these things that are needed, for free. It is like a vast resource for every one that can read, hear or look! In old days, the rulers would not give liberty to common men to learn to read and write. Why? Because they could begin to think for themselves, to ask questions about the rules! It took a long time before this right to knowledge was granted to men and later women alike.
To go back to the old days before, is unthinkable now. If I lost the net now, for instance, it would almost feel like I´d lost a sense.

The Enemy in the tale

2009-02-03T16:27:00.000-08:00

The antagonist, the rival, the enemy. The contrast to the Hero. The person who brings temperature into the story. One of the reasons he exists, is to create unity and friendship, it always helps with a common fiend.
But what fragment of our own psyche is called forth to become the crook in the story on paper? Is it the dark lusts, hidden despair and angry feelings we will not admit that we have? Is that why the antagonist have such power, and, attraction?
If our ego consciousness was the king in our land, the rival would be the forces that would upset this reign. If the reign is good, that would be a bad thing. The known is better than the unknown. Or...?
The thing about power is that he who has it, defines what is right. But truth can maybe be something else, too. And love is certainly the greatest truth there is. But, again, there´s many ways to love one another, ranging from surface lightness to deep obsessions.
Life isn´t static. A hundred years ago, the poets in Norway was like rock-stars. Scandals, drinking, women trouble, adored by the people, and so forth. Theirs was the voice that called for revolution and freedom. All the people listened to them, or the gossip about them.
Today, the poets are nearly invisible in the media news, loved only by the very special interested.
The stage is claimed by others.

The terrorists are the great enemy today, as the communists were before them. But rules and rigidity are a major turn-off when it comes to attraction. People who demand total subjection of thoughts and feelings are just boring.

I like my crooks to be alive, to be interesting. They are symbols of revolution, and herolds of change. They are different ideas and the label: "evil" is there only because thats the way we expect the story to be like. There is, of course, sick crooks too, but they´re mainly pathetic...

Ink...

2009-02-01T17:54:00.000-08:00

They are incredibly strong! I am talking about ink colors. Just look!
I love Ink. So powerful. It gives life to stories. The ones who can make people feel something, are kings and queens!

My own McGuffins

2009-01-25T07:57:00.000-08:00

I am in the middle of my seventh Miranda story, The Crystal Mountain. On my desk I have spread around all my crystal collection, gathered when I became curious of alternative conventions, some years ago. I went to the fairs there, and looked at all the bling- statuettes, pendulums, stones in every shape, dreamcatchers, amulets, jewelry.
Then I saw this big rock crystal. I had to have it. It laid like a living creature in my hand, like somebody´s body part ... I loved that stone instantly, don´t ask me why.
Later, I searched for more stones. I found many more, but none of them gave me the strong feelings like the first ... until I finally found the last in my collection. It was a raw-cut "cathedral" crystal- and it whispered to me. Every time I touched it, the crystal talked, it was like traces of music, a little like the sound you get in burnt ceramics.
I haven´t looked for rock crystals since.
But they inspired me in the comic creation, and when I see them on my desk, they are like old friends encouraging me.

The Fool of Love- Flipside by Brion Foulke

2009-01-22T08:26:00.000-08:00

Flipside is a comic I stumbled upon at the beginning of 2006, when I first landed on the webcomics continent. I have read it ever since, and I like it very much. Despite the description that the main figure, Maytag, is a nymphomaniac jester girl, I´ve always found this comic to be deeply ethical, touching moral issues in an original way.
If I look at the story, seeing it symbolically, Maytag, the jester girl, represents unconditioned love. Sex is a part of it, of course. Now Bernadette, her companion, is different. She has pride, and an honor codex. She could represent conscience. When love and conscience loves each other, something heroic is born...
The art is expressing the storyline and the characters naturally, and the simple, clear lines and black and shaded parts functions very well. I read an interview at Comixtalk with mr. Foulke, where he said that his wish was to be able to draw like the good manga artists does. I must say, for me, he is already there. Flipside surpasses many of the manga tales I´ve read, because it´s story is so original.

Little boy blues- a poetic webcomic

2009-01-13T13:21:00.000-08:00

The lil´depressed boy, by Struble.
The Lil´Depressed Boy... My first impression was that this comic looked and felt very professional and organized. It has the clarity and simplicity of a good comic. You understand immediately the mood of the story and the character´s personality and driving force.
It has a very unique main figure, a boy with his head and arms wrapped in cloth, which gives him a rag-doll look, and sets him apart from all the other characters, which looks normal. It is a streak of genius, the cloth both simplifies the boy´s expressions, like a smiley face, you always knows how he feels, and it is deeply symbolic. The lil´depressed boy is a loner, the cloth is both sheltering him and closing him out from the crowd.
The color blue are also stating the comics overall mood and gives it a very strong identity.
Several artists have drawn the comic, all professionals, and it is interesting to see that their different styles don´t matter at all. The color, the rag-doll look and not at least Struble´s text are so powerful that all chapters are bound together as a whole.
Esthetic and beautiful drawn.
This is one of the most "musical" comics I have read. The lil´depressed boy himself is apparently a musician, writing songs. I really liked the mentions of songs in this comic. The creativity is lightening up the Lil´Depressed Boy´s loneliness and gives a counterweigh to the sadness. He longs for love, in the form of a girlfriend. There were several fine sequences with insight in the matter of love and loneliness. Struble´s text has great quality, it is often in the form of poetry. It really express the feelings of shyness and longing, of desperation and hope.
Narrowing down on choices is also the strength of this work. By closing out a lot of stuff, what is left is very clear and focused. Less is more!

It is absolutely a comic well worth reading.

Comic reviews - first try

2009-01-10T08:01:00.000-08:00

Here I sit in my home office, and there is snow outside. When I´m working with making comics, which I´m doing almost all the time, is it nice to divert one´s thoughts once in a while. Writing is one fun thing to do. Making reviews of people´s comics is a bit scary, so I have to do something about that. I want it to be fun, entertaining and educating. I don´t know yet if I´m a good, a bad or a hopeless reviewer, but I want to try. So where do I start? Shall I go to Belfry, Buzzcomics, The WebComic list or Frumphnet, and pick one randomly? Maybe the guys I review will hate me! Is it polite to ask permission first? On the other side, will that same guys ever stumble upon this godforsaken blog in the midst of nowhere? Will anybody read this at all?
But I´ll do it! I´ll just do it! I´ll take a deep breath and review! Stay tuned and be welcomed back in a couple of days, you surfing wayfaring strangers on the netway! You´ll be surprised!

The Felina figurines

2008-12-20T09:10:00.000-08:00

When the holidays comes, I want to relax. So I sit down by the table and makes figurines. Mostly Felina of cernit, it´s a fine material one can harden in the oven, with a wax-like surface shimmer. Usually I give the figures away to friends. The Comics museum in Norway has many of them.
I´ve made a Felina house of paper material, and each room shall contain a scene from various Felina stories. It´s great fun to play with things like this.

Discovering great locations

2008-12-12T08:48:00.001-08:00

You can find great locations everywhere. This is the one and only emerald mine that exist in Norway. I went there while I was creating a Miranda story; The Emerald Mine, and it was hugely inspiring to se that place. See image under, from that story...
This cave was left many years ago, it lay by a lake, on a farmer´s land. It held open for tourists, you had to pay a little money to walk in. Then you could see a small house filled with newspaper articles about the mine, and examples of emeralds. You couldn´t take away stones from the cave, but you could search for emeralds around it, on a small stony beach. I found a couple of pebbles with green dots in it. I was happy with that.
The lake and the wood around the cave was beautiful. It was a great experience.

The nature

2008-12-10T09:59:00.000-08:00

The place where the story unfolds itself, is important. If you find an interesting location, you give the tale a flavor. Since I live in Norway, a long land with several great landscapes, from mountains and fjords to mountains, skerries and the great sea, it´s easy to let stories play out there. Old norwegian fairy-tales contains a lot of nature spirits. Here is one of them, the "draug", a scary troll that lived in the ocean and dragged people under when they fell out of boats.

The man who drew the troll image, Theodor Kittelsen, was a master in creating trolls and "vetti", and almost all Norwegians thinks of his drawings when they thinks of trolls. The ugly, green one in the boat was drawn by me in a story about Felina. I often goes to the fairy-tale drawings of Kittelsen when I need inspiration.

The last picture is from Hamarøy, an island at the coast far more north than Trondheim, where I live, over the polar circle. There´s where the nights are clear as the days in the summertime. There´s also lots of mosquitos there. And fish! You just have to thow out the bait, and the cods and the macerels are jumping ahead of each other to get it... ;-)

About Trondheim

2008-12-06T06:23:00.001-08:00

This is a picture I made some years ago for the newspaper here, Adresseavisen. It shows a view of the Trondheimsfjorden, and some of the marvels around it. If you ever get to Trondheim, there´s lots of more things to see, music museum, science museum, old houses at Sverresborg etc. The other image is from downtown by the river Nidelven. We have an old row of houses used to contain dried fish and so on, a little like our other great city farther down west, Bergen.

House for sale...

2008-11-30T13:27:00.000-08:00

This mountain picture was taken on our way back from Hardanger to Trondheim. The day was glorious.

We had been in Hardanger for three weeks, cleaning out my parent´s house and putting it up for sale.

The roads were slippery, and the daylight lasted only eight hours, so the last part of the journey was quite interesting. I was very happy when we got home...

Felina: The Silver Cross, part 3: The villains

2008-11-27T04:09:00.000-08:00

The villain in a story is the most important person after the hero. The contrasts between them creates drama. Who should get the honor of being the enemy of my curious, cunning and courageous cat?

Should I have a woman villain? I wondered. No... there were far more interesting manly villains to chose from. Villaintry depended on which side you were on... Olav Tryggvesson, the rude king, could as easily be a scoundrel as well as a hero. The same went for Haakon Earl, the ruler of Trondheim before Olav T. Haakon was a sly guy, charismatic but treacherous, a womanizer and a master of the dark art of seiding (shamanism, magic). I voted for him, he was far more interesting and intelligent than self-righteous Olav T.

But... I needed another crook who could drag Felina into the story. A more anonymous one. I settled for a fox named Crimson, who should be Haakon´s shaman priest in the Viking age.

In Snorri, the tale told that Olav T. catched all the sorcerors in the county of Trondheim, and put them out on a skerry called Skratteskjær, where they drowned at high tide. I also read that one of the mightiest shamans was called Raud den Ramme.

Raud, aka Crimson, became the second viking age villain.

Felina: The SilverCross, part 2: women in the Viking age

2008-10-26T12:13:00.001-07:00

When I read in Snorri, I wondered how people could survive in the viking age. And the women? If they made themselves renowned, it was either for their beauty or for being nagging harridans, sometimes they were both. Take queen Gunnhild, for instance. She was described as a witch. She had a lot of sons, and nagged them into revenge, murder and war against everyone. Or Sigrid Storraade! A Swedish queen, who was so proud that she hated being proposed to, by minor kings. At last she invited all suitors to a party where she would choose one of them as her husband, and they came from far away to try their luck. She burned them all alive by locking them into the guesthouse and lit the fire. End of problems.

In the picture, you can see her being proposed to by Olav Tryggvesson, king of Norway. He wasn´t the most diplomatic fellow in the gallery of kings. He hit her with his glove and called her a "heathen dog" when she didn´t want to become a christian. That sealed Olav´s destiny. Sigrid became his mortal enemy and married the Swedish king instead, and then nagged the poor guy until he declared war against Olav Tryggvesson.

Continues ...

Felina: The Silver Cross, part 1

2008-10-26T10:02:00.000-07:00

In the beginning, there were sketches of my cat on letters and packets. They became Felina, my second comic figure, who was to feed my family for thirteen years, earning fees from various newspapers.
Felina, the comic, was approximately four years old when I made the Silver Cross story. Every Saturday there were a standard page in the Adresseavisa newspaper in Trondheim with her. Adresseavisen was the only newspaper who wanted long serial stories, witch I like best to draw and write.

So on the brink of 1997, the year when Trondheim city would be celebrating its one thousand year birthday, I decided to make a story that would go on for one whole year and be about the founding and history of Trondheim, somehow.

Felina is a cat librerian in the funny animal genre. As a child I loved the Donald Duck stories of Carl Barks, so Felina was directly inspired from his duck universe. But this should be a Norwegian version, and instead of Duckburg, there was Shom - the name came from an old Norwegian folksong about a man getting work by a farmer in Telemark, and getting so rich that he buys a cow, a goat, a hen etc. and of course, his own farm - Named "Ria di via di ostan tia di o di o di shom shom shom." That is also the refrain, by the way ...

To make a story, you go treasure-hunting. And the fertile grounds to dig up something valuable was the history, of course. So I sat down and read the Snorri Sturlason Saga about the old kings and rulers of Trondheim and Norway. The book was heavy, literally and figuratively, but very, very interesting. Straightaway I was making notes, not just for Felina, but another story too, and I thought it was more difficult to decide what I had to cut out, more than what I could find to use... and I had to change a good deal of events to suit the story, so it would be coherent and clear. It was important to keep the mood and feeling of that age, and for that, I wanted Felina to be a viking bard, a troubadour.

Then I could put songs and poems into the story in a natural way.

Continues...