Pirate portrait

Been playing around with Procreate again. Couldn’t think of anything new or original so Ijust drew one of my old characters.

I think I’m going to make a series of these things, it’s probably a good practice both for how to work with Procreate and for getting into this whole drawing thing again. Feels like it’s too long since I made any big comics project…

…long live the new flesh!

New year, new plans. Here are a few mentions of future stuff…

UPCOMING GRAPHIC NOVELS:
En Andra Chans (Tusen Serier) by me and Shko Askari
Sagor från Angered (working title) (Tusen Serier & Blå Stället) by me, Amanda Casanellas & Segal Mohammed
Piracy is Liberation v03 (Wormgod) IF I can only find the time for this, it’d definitely be about time to finally be able to continue this story…

EXHIBITIONS:
Cool Cykel (Tusen Serier presents Tanja Komadina) in February
I don’t want to dream (CBK presents Spyros Verykios and CBAvol36) in May

MORE BOOKS:
Berättelser om Yunnan – minnen från kulturrevolutionen (Tusen Serier) by Emei Burell
CBAvol36: In the pits of madness (CBK) with me as main editor, really excited about this one…
CBAvol37: Fragments (CBK)

FESTIVALS:
I’ll probably be going to the usual ones, maybe something new, we’ll see (preliminary dates)…
Copenhagen Comix (Feb)
SIS (May)
CRACK! (Jun)
Helsinki (Sep)
Novo Doba (Oct)

+ VARIOUS OTHER STUFF
It’s too early to tell yet, but we have some big plans for Hybriden. More news when we know if they will actually happen…

Death to 2016…

2016 ends and it’s time for a summation. I could comment on the new migration laws, on the ongoing/invigorated persecution of undocumented as well as beggars, the seeming rise of general stupidity, the steady decline of hope as species are going extinct at a rate we haven’t seen since the last ice age, various mad-people in power, abuses perpetrated by various states etc etc (I could also talk about celebrity deaths but why?). But I’m probably going to keep this personal and up-beat(?).

So here are some things I made/was involved in during the year. Mostly unpaid work as usual, which I’m getting increasingly tired of, but what are you going to do? Up-beat, was it? Right. Ok. This is me when I’m unemployed:

COMICS:
The Troll actually came out in the end of 2015, but it was still new when this year started, and it was also my only solo book, so I still feel that it counts.
I had some other plans for upcoming solo books, but none of them have turned into reality. Yet…

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Publication-wise when it comes to my own comics, this has been more of an anthology year, with some comics being published in several places:
Viral was drawn in 2015 but published this year in CBAvol30.
Medication, published in CBAvol35: BLEED, Komikaze #42 (web) and #15 (paper) and possibly Alkom’x #9
Idle hands & recreation in CBAvol34: Re: Creation and idleness  and possibly Alkom’x #9
Fragments will be in CBAvol37 and possibly Alkom’x #9
Arg Kanin om Samma gamla visa in Asylkalendern 2017.

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I sent some of these stories to some other places as well so they may turn up in more places in the future…

ASSOCIATIONS:
Some big steps forward were taken for both Tusen Serier and CBK. Both associations broke some ties with the Swedish Comics Association this year, which feels nice for various reasons that shall remain untold for now. It meant that CBK left the Comics Centre in the Mazetti building where we had been since 2005. Tusen Serier also finished the last project period that was run through the Comics Association. Both of these things lead up to both groups moving together and starting our new exhibition/store/studio/library/storage space Hybriden. We officially opened in March but it definitely feels like we’ve been there for more than a year… The new space also brought a brand-new webshop with it into existence.

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CBK also started to get its shit together with the release of CBAvol30: A new hope, which was the first volume made/compiled completely by the new editorial crew. We also published our last graphic novel issue, CBAvol33: Repeat Offenders by Julia Scott, and 3 more anthologies.

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FESTIVALS:
There was of course the AltCom 2016 festival, themed WORK. In many ways it felt like it was the best AltCom so far. We managed to create our own pocket universe during those few days in the end of July.

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Also visited some other festivals/events (not as many as planned, but enough):
SIS, CRACK!, Oulu art night, Novo Doba, Örebro.

EXHIBITIONS:
Vasta-Aine was an exhibition at the Oulu Comics Centre, featuring 3 of my recent comics, Medication, Fragments and Happiness.
-I had an exhibition at the CUK Imago in Belgrade during Novo Doba, with some of my old Wormgod prints and some original paintings.
-And, also during Novo Doba, I painted a mural at the Zemun-based cultural centre Matrijaršija.
-The BLEED group exhibition at Hybriden, organized by CBK and Kinga Dukaj, was the coolest exhibition I’ve been a part of for a long while. I made three paintings for this exhibition that took place in the midst of a seriel killer’s murder scene, walls and ceiling covered with plastic sheets, blood (most of it fake) spattered everywhere, special music by Feberdröm

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MORE BOOKS:
Tusen Serier released a batch of new books this year:
Fem historier om prostituerande by Amalia Alvarez
Myling by Amanda Casanellas & Yossra El Said
Mapuche by Jorge Varas Varilla
Void by Susanne Johansson (published in cooperation with Wormgod)
Cool Cykel by Tanja Komadina

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THE ANGERED THING:
In November I took over from Amanda Casanellas who was there in October as the Tusen Serier residence artist at Konstepidemin in Gothenburg, a special residency that they had in cooperation with Blå Stället in Angered. During one month I could (mostly) concentrate on one thing instead of a hundred, which was probably quite healthy. I took some breaks to be at the BLEED exhibition and the Örebro festival, but still managed to draw 55 pages based on Amanda’s ideas, which were based on stories from Angered. Urban legends, folk tales, local mythology which we will work into a story to be published at some point during 2017…

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LIKE TEARS IN RAIN:
There were probably some more things that might be worth mentioning, some short comics, illustrations, book covers, maybe some project or other, but I simply can’t remember everything and I’m too lazy to look it up.

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So I’m going to leave you with a (surprisingly long) list of stuff I’ve watched/played/read in the sessions of downtime squeezed in between all the rest. It’s not all from this year, because only idiots think that there’s no past. And yes, these are just from the top of my head, things I recommend that happened to not slip my mind:

PS3/4:
DMC | Beyond: Two Souls | Enslaved | Alice 2 | The Last Guardian (finally!) | Shadow of the Beast (worthy remake of childhood nostalgia) | Life is strange (just started but seems promising)

TV SERIES (the most noteworthy new discoveries / steady classics):
South ParkRick & MortyWestworld | Crazy Head | The OA | Orphan Black | Preacher | Daredevil | Jessica Jones | Luke Cage | Doctor Who (even if there was only one new episodes)

FILMS:
Ryuzo and the Seven Henchmen (Kitano is back!) | Sausage Party(!) | Maps to the stars | Lamerica | He never died | Extracted | Mr Six | Batman v Superman (Martha?!) | May Allah bless France | M. Butterfly | Borgman | The Lobster | High-Rise | Schizopolis | Kontroll | The Witch | Urge | Upstream Color | GhostbustersVanishing Waves (ok, I saw this in 2015, but still worth mentioning) | + of course the MCU stuff…

COMICS:
Low | The Wicked + the Divine | Supreme Blue Rose | Starve | Punk Rock Jesus | Empty Zone | Monstress | (all of) Hellblazer | Deadenders | Bitch Planet | Velvet | New Lone Wolf & Cub | Lazarus | Saga | Nameless | Injection | Caliban | Blackgas | Stormwatch (Ellis) | Animal Man (finally caught up on Morrison’s run)| Trees | Deadly Class | Miracleman | Annihilator | + caught up on the X-books up until Secret Wars

BOOKS:
Woman on the edge of time by Marge Piercy | The Dispossessed by Ursula K LeGuin

Yeah, regular books take me a long time, so 2 in one year is unusually good.

LONG LIVE THE NEW FLESH:
Hope you found something interesting that you might have otherwise missed in these lists, and enjoy the last few hours of the year…

Second Christmas!

Let’s celebrating the birth of the CBK web-shop!

You can find most of my books at the site, and a whole lot of other stuff.

From the site:

Once upon a time, there was a small group of comic artists with a big dream. 15 years later the shop was finally born. We invite you to celebrate this magnificent event, internally known as “Second Christmas.”

2ndXmas

Saunter through our virtual bookshelves, sigh with pleasure upon seeing our works in all their glory and find that not only CBK‘s works are presented. Tusen Serier and Wormgod are our first affiliates that we are proud to represent.

Use coupon code: newcbkshop2016 to get a 20% discount on everything but subscriptions in our new shop.

We love taking orders from you!

Memories of 2016…

As we have seen in The Troll. memories work both backwards and forwards in what we usually see as the linear flow of time.

thetroll-memories

They’re not always exactly corresponding to what actually happens when it actually happens, so bear that in mind when reading these recollections from the future:

SPACE

CBK and Tusen Serier will move into a new space together at Mitt Möllan. It will work as a combined exhibition space and studio, with the possibility for workshops and a store for buying our books, as well as stuff from Wormgod, Ritualen and others that are connected to CBK or Tusen Serier in some way.

BOOKS

Personally, I really really want to get started on the next Piracy is Liberation book. I also have ideas for The Troll 2, but I promised myself I would make another Piracy book first. It’s been far too long…

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I wrote the script for a book that is now being drawn by Shko Askari, to be published by Tusen Serier pretty soon, I hope. I have a preliminary title for it, but I’m trying to think of a better one, so I won’t tell you what it is.

I didn’t manage to make the Transgressions 2 book last year, which would have a soundtrack by Brazilian band Anarcho Vomit Noise, but with any luck that could also happen this year.

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PUBLISHING

Apart from the Askari book, there are several more books planned from Tusen Serier. Here are a few of them:

Myling by Amanda Casanellas & Yossra El Said:

myling-1

Five stories about prostituters by Amalia Alvarez:

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Void by Susanne Johansson (published as a collaboration between Wormgod & Tusen Serier):

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Mapuche – Jordens folk by Jorge Varilla

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From CBK, CBA vol 30 already came from the printer but hasn’t been officially released yet, so that will happen when we get the new space up and running:

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This is actually the last issue from last year, so there will be 4 more in 2016. But more on those later. We’re right now in the process of finishing the selection for vol 32, which has been a far more complicated process that expected, then there’s a graphic novel issue by Julia Scott (some time around May) and two more anthology issues before the year is over. We’re right now preparing the call for submissions for those books.

I will be the main editor of vol 37, but that’s not until 2018. No hurry…

EXHIBITIONS

The Troll exhibition is still up at the old Tusen Serier place, but it’s not really open for the public any longer…

We also have some other stuff planned for the new place, but it’s all very vague so far, so I can’t say any more about it yet…

I’ve been asked to have an exhibition at the comics centre in Oulu in August. That’s gonna be fun, especially if I’ll be able to go there to see it myself. Tommi Musturi will have an exhibition there at the same time, so that could turn out really nice.

FESTIVALS

So the AltCom festival will happen in August, after all (for a while we thought we would have no budget for it at all, but then we got some so now everything is ok). We will try to figure out the last details in the coming few months, and then there will be some kind of announcement about it.

AltCom2016promo

Not sure yet which other festivals I’m going to, but here’s a preliminary plan for the tour of 2016:

Uppsala Comix
Fumetto
SIS
CRACK!
Helsinki
Novo Doba

Maybe also Å-fest and possibly something else. It all depends on funding, mostly. Anyway, see you there, hopefully!

MORE

Oh, and did I mention that I am currently unemployed? Luckily, there should be no problem with the unemployment insurance, so it’s ok, but I will need to spend some time looking for new paid jobs. Some of the above will come with some money, but most of it is pure creativity and lack of self-preservation skills.

As you may have noticed, I didn’t include any links here, so for more information you can go to www.elftorp.com and find your way to most of what I’ve mentioned here.

Anyway. The future is coming towards us and not all of it is bright. As usual. So let’s just do our best and I’ll see you when it arrives.

Tystnaden efter tumultet (recension)

Recension av Piracy is Liberation vol 01 & 02 i Helsingborgs Dagblad, skriven av Jonas Thente:

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Men i huvudsak handlar det hela om upproret mot en fascistisk stat som håller befolkningen i ett järngrepp av konsumtion och tv-tittande. Vi befinner oss i en stadsstat vars topografi påminner om Fritz Langs dystra “Metropolis” eller Alex Proyas klaustrofobiska “Dark City”, skevt tecknad i svartvitexpressionism av Elftorp. Arbetarna kallas oförblommerat för slavar och de övre samhällsklasserna för härskare – eller slaves/masters eftersom serien är på engelska.

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Det finns andra inslag också, varav några ganska mystiska – såsom de valliknande, Lovecraft-inspirerade “gudar” som svävar in från en annan dimension då och då. Eller de metainslag då personer rör sig genom tiden, över serierutornas nivå. På något ställe finns här rentav ytterligare en nivå, när två av dessa personer utanför serievärlden frågar sig om det kan finnas någon ytterligare dimension med någon som betraktar dem. Det finns det ju: vi läsare.

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Allt som allt verkar Mattias Elftorps kreativa energi bygga på just den praktik som hans huvudfigurer Pirate, Information, Purple och de andra berusar sig med: slumpmässig information bestående av politisk teori, litteratur, film, musik och annat som han centrifugerar ut i sitt universum.

Om man vill hålla sig till seriemediet så är det framför allt en modern klassiker man associerar Elftorps prestation med. Det är Warren Ellis anarkistiska sf-berättelse “Transmetropolitan”, i vilken den utan tvekan Hunter S Thompson-inspirerade journalisten Spider Jerusalem ar sig an det moderna konsumtionssamhället i en rasande satir över USA.

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Den främsta drivkraften är en utopisk vrede som blir alltmer komplicerad ju längre serien framskrider.

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Jag tänker också att Elftorps unika, magnifikt konstruerade och passionerat genomförda framtidsparabel, kommer att bli än mer intressant nu när han har börjat tackla tystnaden efter tumultet.