Days of Laughter I-IV

I got my four unique artists Days of Laughter I-IV back from the bookbinder Flodstrands a little more than a week ago. I’m so pleased with them! All those little details in the bookbinding – and the fact that they look and work as planned. This set of artist books in a box is intended as an art piece, not as documentation. It is laughter in a book, laughter as a book.

the covers are screen printed by me

100 pages of an ever-changing laughter, each book containing a different laughter

if you want to get back to a special laughter you can use the pink ribbon

Flodstrands Bookbinder has made a fantastic job

The background is this: during five weeks I made five big drawings of laughter (130 x 100 cm). I started on Mondays and drew, erased, drew, erased and drew again - and on Fridays I stopped. I photographed the process in ever changing daylight and each drawing resulted in more than hundred photos. The fifth and last drawing was utterly uninteresting during all the process and thus didn’t make as an art piece. The set of 100 photos of each drawing became four animations (meant to be projections) and now: artist books.

documenting my sketches

As part of my preparatory work for process book 2 and 3 I'm trying to properly document all the sketches I always make before arriving at the final art pieces. My work process involves many steps and a lot of after thought. Most of these ink drawings were made already in August 2015 and I didn't manage to get the art pieces working until autumn 2016 and the beginning of 2017!

I always work on parallel series as I very often have to let my work take a break. With these form cut drawings I tried so many adaptions that didn't work before I found the right solution.

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"PARTY LAUGHTERS", installation view at Gislaved Konsthall February 2017

showing size

These tiny print-outs of my drawings (made to better plan my photo session) look just like the real drawings, don't they?

This is the real thing, though. Each drawing measuring 70x50 cm. Did you notice the coffee cup? I put it there as size reference, but I'm not sure if it really works ...

... and then I added me. I like the blue as a contrast to all the monochrome tones.

Size and motion

I've just had a photo session day at the studio documenting some new work but also taking some better photos of older art pieces.

It's weird - even though I've been taking photos of my art for many years now I still feel I have so much more to learn. It's not just about using the camera and the right light source, but also about how to convey size, materiality, concept - and even motion in a photo (or a set of photos). As most people will just see my work online it's crucial that I succeed with this - how can anyone otherwise understand my work and appreciate it? I'm nowadays also trying filming what I do - check my Instagram to see some short film clips. What do you think works best?

Days of Laughter

The publication course also made me think more of the possibilities to use printed material as art. I made four unique books of laughter called "Days of Laughter". Part of this work can be seen in my process book (Laughter).

The books are quite big and I screen printed the cover papers myself. I am now waiting for the book binder to finish his work for me. I'm very excited about these books and it is hard to wait patiently ...

Each book contains many pages of laughter (approx 100) 

My process book

The book is called "LAUGHTER graphite eraser paper" (in Swedish though) and contains photos of my work in process, drawings in my studio, finished art pieces, som shorts texts and an interview with me conducted by Angelica Olsson.

I now have my dummy and will print the book in a small edition in February and bind it myself as it contains some pages in transparent special paper. A version in English is also coming up later this spring!

A great publishing course

I just took a publishing course at Valand Academy (one semester halftime). Not only did we explore digital publications and pdf format, but we also made some paper publications. We finished the course with a book release and an exhibition at Galleri Monitor.

I’ve been reflecting a lot about how people experience my art and the best way to present my art pieces - because most people will not experience them in real life. I work a lot with scale and material which is really hard to mediate digitally or in printed matter. Thus I ended up making a small material and process book, which is to be the first one in a series of three.

a visitor checking out my process book "LAUGHTER graphite eraser paper"

Summing up 2016: July - September

In July I went on a well deserved vacation on Crete with my family 

and enjoyed as well some free time in Sweden doing those special summer things - like picking wild raspberries. 

In August I was back in the studio giving my aging balloons some attention and finally getting to work on my own art (all spring was dedicated to making money).

In the end of September I went with my family to Greece again; this time when it was not so hot - so we could visit all those ancient sites.

Meanwhile I participated in a group exhibition about Public Art at Galleri KC in Gothenburg.

summing up 2016: April-June

In April and May I continued with my Land Art project developing the methodology and giving many workshops for preschoolers. 

May came with beautiful weather and I participated with a Land Art installation along Stensjöpromenaden in Mölndal as part of Green Gothenburg.

But not everything was a success ... I made a suggestion for a public commission for a school - but my competitor got the job ... The things happens now and then.

Then I had an exhibition showing the sketches and work process for a public commission for a school ("here, take mine") from 2013  - at Skissernas Rum at Gallery KC Väst.

In June my Land Art project resulted in a methodology book (120 pages, in Swedish) for artists - available on-line here - and to spread the word I gave lectures ... 

 and Land Art workshops for artists.

During the last days of June I made a wall painting for Artmadethis - an urban art project promoting female artists in the four biggest cities in Sweden.

I named the painting "Let them eat cake"

summing up 2016: Jan-March

2016 was a horrible year for me privately, especially the first half year. Which is one of the reasons why I took a break from blogging.

But I do not wish to linger on that subject - professionally 2016 was a good year and focusing on working helped me through some hard time.

All of January was dedicated to a printmaking project for preschoolers together with Carina Eriksson at Sinkadusen - a creative resource-center for preschools in Mölndal. Almost 100 children got the chance to try several different ways to work with printmaking and every time we looked to a different artist's work for inspiration (one of them being me).

In February and March I kept focusing on printmaking when making an investigation and report on how the Printmaking department at Akademin Valand could improve with suggestions for changing the workshop's all over lay-out and what new investments could be made. I visited many printmaking studios - here at the photo the lithographic workshop at the school of Fine Art in Stockholm.

First half of 2016 was also the time for my Land Art Project (supported by a generous grant from the region) - a pedagogical project to develop the methods working with preschools and with the goal to get more artists to work with Land Art for preschoolers. February- March I focused on the preschool teachers with workshops outdoors (cold...). Here you can read about the whole project (in Swedish though) 

During this period I also completed a public commission for a preschool in Getinge (Halmstad Municipal) - and in March it was finally mounted!

Looking back at this period I wonder how many hours a week I worked? Did I sleep?
Did I take any day off at all?

sketching for a public commission

Right now I'm having an extremely busy period; sketching for a public commission, attending long meetings in Stockholm for the Swedish National Artists' Association and right now I'm spending a week in Lidköping guest teaching (and of course working on grant applications etc at night) ...

Shadow play

A last photo from my exhibition; the laughing faces in the window as shadows on the gallery wall....

more photos from my exhibition

Photos from my exhibition; Part Party

I've been working with form-cut laughters for some time now - but it's just recently that I feel like I've started to find the way to use them properly. I've felt that I wanted to work with the 2-dimensionel drawing in the 3-dimensionel space ... but not really known how to ...

My just terminated exhibition at "Bageriet" was a way to try some of my solutions out with an audience. I call this hanging figure-group "Party Party". They swirl around in space and their sometimes distinct shadows dance on the wall. Different light conditions create changes in expression and the figures have different colours on both sides.