I am not that scared of the dark in particular. I am scared of change. Why this has come to be a curse (yeah well perhaps not a curse as much as a fobia, eventhough I feel that the word “fobia” is perhaps a little bit to steep a word for such a description) of mine I dont know. But that is, as they say (whoever they are), as it is. It also seems it cannot be helped since I have constantly, throughout my life, put myself in positions where change is inevitably the only prefered outcome of a situation. But still change scares the beejeezes out of me.

This has posed as a little bit of a problem for me in my past relationships thoward fellow companions and friends. You see, I dont want them to change. Well, ofcourse I dont want them to stagnate in progression or not evolve. I just do not want them to…change into grownups, or whatever you might wanna call it. To mature is, in my opinion, not to grow up. I know that I am comming off as a little bit uva Peter Pan complex here but bare with me for a spell will ya.

So, they grow up, and as they do the freedom of youth seem to wither away in their hearts. They let their lives, once again, become compromised by the monsters under the bed. Only this time, as I stated above, the monsters dont live under the bed. They live in money. Or in fear of not having/loosing. They live in the fear of not being enough in the eyes of their spectators. We impose ur monsters on our surroundings and it is a fucking sad thing.
All of those things matter none.

But we think they do. So we loose ourselves in the pursuit of understanding the things around us that seem so abstract that we take them for pure thruths. Instead of trying to understand ourselves. The only thing we actually have a shot at truly understanding.

The saddest thing is loosing someone dear through their incompetence of not realising what is real and true: themselves.

Anyway my life has changed drastically the last month since I moved from Gothenburg to Paris. I have alot of agendas with this epic change in the life of me and I might share those further on. Be it by Art or more pretentious blog-ranting.

Still working on hard on different projects though: new El Huervo record, a small iPad game, paintings and Miman.
Miman even got its own section so I suggest you check it out if you wanna know more about what that is about.

Cant paint in my flat though so I am currently looking for a place to do that before I loose my joints. But perhaps this absence of painting has been good for me since a new big, I dont know what to call it but lets call it mission, mission (yeah its supposed to be that way, I did not write two times like that just for kicks. If it does not make sense to ya just read the sentence again) has started to take form in the corners of my mind. Some of the ArtWork for Miman actually spurred this notion and they will serve as the start of a lot of elaborate sketches for this new artistic path.

Cant wait til I find a place to paint…

I´ll enclose two of the sketches below so you can have a looksee at what is to come.

Call The Tune.

Clandestine Emotions.

So if my ranting did not make any sense to you it will all become clear in due time.
If not, well then I guess you must have bumped into the wrong website.

Some time ago I watched the movie HellBoy 2: The Golden Army and the main conflict in that movie is derived from a mutual agreement that to attain peace between the world of magic and the world of men as well as preventing further future warfare since recent named army had more or less, in total cold blood as the army itself consisted of indestructible golden clad robots/golems, run the opposing forces over (the World of Men) with little effort and the sheer brutality of this feat brought some repentance into the heart of its creator and his employer (The Elven King, Rule of the World of Magic).

The Elven Prince finds this agreement a farse and an unfavourable outcome for the inhabitants of the World of Magic as he questions why his people has to crawl in the dark while Man flourishes in light, not treating her part of the truce with its proper grace, laying waste to Mother Nature. So he consequently sets out to destroy humanity for her treason. Claimig the world would be a better place without its presence.

Yeah. I mean, we do ravage the earth. Without some lack of respect for what it has given us during our insignificant time here. If such a bargain or truce had taken place in times of Olde I too could bring myself to feel that we might not always deserve our place upon the Earth. We did once live in junction with nature and its other inhabitants (animals and such) in a way that was more respectful than it is today.

Stories such as the ones found in HellBoy spures a thought in my mind. We are perhaps here at natures grace. There should have been a promise made long ago, a pact if you will, that “Ok. You men do what you gotta do with yer illusions of grandeur. Evolve and become the peak of our food chain. But please promise not to forget that we live here too.”

And I wonder. How long will we be able to keep our current path before we reach a dead end? What will we do then, when the forrests are on fire and our cities start to fall? Are we just gonna say “Hey uhm…we´re really sorry it turned out this way and all. Cant we just let bygones be bygones and let us have some of that meat and milk of yours?”

Treat what we have been given with more respect. I am not saying that a cabin in the woods for everyone and all is the right solution but rather that just as we people demand respect the same should go for everything around us too. Just because it cant speak does not mean it wants us to pour oil and asbestos up its ass and what not.

But perhaps I am just being a bit hippie about all this.

Oh, by the way this painting here is a commission for my Morfar (thats GrandDad to you) and he was awesome enough to, aside from the fee for the painting, give me a little extra on the side. Wich is very much appreciated not only because the gesture itself is nice enough but because I will really need it on my move to Paris. Props for that. He is a cool guy. And so is his wife (my GrandMother, eventhough she is not a guy).

Oil on Canvas. Measurements unknown since I forgot to take care of that before I let it go. SOLD!

I break. Yeah. You gotta break. But what the fuck am I supposed to do when I am not creating? Huh!? Sit on my, soon to be, fat ass and just ponder and get overwhelmed  by all the thoughts in my head?
So it seemed.
I am a slow learner. These past six months I´ve learned that leasson. To take a break. Or at least a little bit as I am sure that I will still, one fine day, end up in a possition where all feels upsidedown (yes. I know that you are supposed to sepparate those words you linguistique charlatan besserwisser but to me it looks better this way, plus I gotta get rid of some youthfull moving against the stream)  but do not fret! It always takes a few turns to truly get the gears right. Right?

So what does all this ranting amount into? Well, I think that I wont take stuff so seriously for a while. Iwill just paint and create without a feeling of it all needing to mean so frickin much. So portraits are good. And comissions. I can just do what I do, somewhat based on another fellow beings swayings.

I made this piece for Johan. It is a portrait. Johan has a tattoo on his arm. It say: given to fly. I think that is awesome.

So I gotta tell ya.  My fingers are itching again. My arms and my head are given to fly. And fly I shall.
But sometimes you (as well as I, my friend) need to land and rest our weary bones.

Oil on Canvas. 60 * 80 (cm). Comission. SOLD!

Watercolor and Ink on Paper. Measurements not available (sorry). GIFT!

You are the blood that scares me when I get hurt
You are the calm that stills my tumbling soul
You put the sway in my heart
And the swagger in my stow
We are not two
But one now. 

I´ve been working on the new game with Erik and it is comming along nicely. Although I must say that it is a daunting task indeed to chase a magnum opus. Not that we really had that in mind. Maybe Erik did. Personaly I just felt like I needed to do my own thing with a videogame. But it is growing into something that is ours. And it seems it will be something truly big. Both for ourselves and for the people who are to experience it one fine day.
This ofcourse takes alot of time and energy used. I thought that I would have more over for painting but I realised that I can only have so much going on at once. It has taken me some time to realise this though and in the process of realising a big sense of weariness has loomed over me.  It has almost become a hang up. I wanted to do it all at once. But you only have so much energy you can use before something breaks and you start kicking the dead horse.
I kicked that horse for quite some time.

I am still tired but things are starting to clear.  Right now I am making a big piece of art with Erik Svedäng, Johannes Gotlén and Tobias Sjögren and it is an honor to be a part of it.

I will still paint though but seing as I put alot of focus on “Miman” (as the it is called at the moment) it will not be at the same pace as last year.

I did manage to rack up a pretty big one this last month. It is something new. It is something that is evolving. But I can clearly see something different comming out. I have been exploring the moment and subjects that are lighter than before. I guess I got tired of being heavy hearted for a while and wanted to celebrate situations of pure calm.  Those moments when nothing matters but what is going on right in front of you. It is only then we can experience feelings of pure love for ourselves and the ones we care about. When our hang ups seem miles away. It is important to do this from time to time. Life is either as easy or as hard as we make it out to be. We have, in the end, awesome influence over how we want to feel.

So let go. Forget what others may think. Even if it may make you look abit silly. Hang out on your hang ups for a spell. It makes life so much easier. Not only for yourself but also for the ones you love.

Oil on Canvas. 150 * 100 (cm). 

I painted this as a commission (I dont know if that is the correct spelling but right now there is just not enough strength to crack up a dictionary and start looking) for a girl I know. She wanted some horses in it and I thought “heck, I cant paint horses”. Animals in general is something I dont like to put on a canvas because right now I am fully occupied with trying to figure out the human race. But as I painted. somewhere along the line it kind of got to me. In a good way. I think I understood why she wanted horses in her commission for I did a little research about her on Facebook. There where a lot of pictures on there with her and various horses. And they all seemed to calm her so much. It was really quite beautiful. So even if I am not fully accostumed with socializing with animals I could see that it brings alot of people comfort and harmony. As art does for me. And art is, for me, a truly deep and comforting exercise. There are, I am sure, powers of similar structure at work there. And it all comes from a certain depth that we all carry inside. Feelings of wonder and feelings of turmoil. They all derive from that depth.

Many people try to stray from that depth for fear of what chaos their emotions and feelings may cause. They need structure in their lives and for that I do not blame them, one must thread lightly into the darkness. But structure and chaos, just as light and darkness, are two sides of the same coin and therefore one cannot exist wihtout the other. In order to bring height one must also embrace depth.

Oil on panel 80 * 63 (cm). SOLD!

I dream of a beautiful depth

Here in this time

Where I shouldn´t have kept

A run for the dime

Yet I ran as I slept

But the dream wasn´t mine

It was layed waste by the rhyme

And you know I wouldn´t have wept

If it wasn´t

For the beautiful depth.

That being said, I like the fact that such a movement has had the kind of impact on our everyday society that it actually has. It is the tradition of a people opressed, taking its form in a culture we gladly indulge in, that we fill our ears and lives with, almost forgetting that its voice is sprung from our own misdoings. It is one of the few musical artforms, that I feel has such a diversity, without loosing credebility. Plus its monotonous flow suits my workprogress very well as it is sprung from a state of almost meditationary assets.

My homecountry (that being Sweden) does practice this artform very well but there are but a mere small number exercising it to a level I feel truly does its herritage justice. Most of the things I hear only indulge in the everyday swedish life, I thing I wont fully cast away since I do believe we convey what we experience. Eventhough, none has come as close to a truth as The Latin Kings. A Swedish truth that gives a, from what I know, proper picture of the things here that can be synonymous to the origins of hiphop.

I just wanted to share this. No reasons really besides a need to tell. A share of thoughts. As I often do with my art.

I wonder what I am doing there. Why was I carried away? Did I do something wrong?

That is what got me thinking; the notion that it was supposedly something of my own doing that changed the pressence around me and me as an inhabitant. I was not being carried away by something else. I drifted off. Lost focus from the things that i believe are true, fair and comforting to the unbenefitial something wich I can only describe as a sinister dwelling.

As of late this has been a reccuring, most harsh, truth. Something I blame the surrounding for at first but after some contemplation realise is, as I stated, a doing I alone have control over. Maybe it is because of everything that has happened those past months and I wont bore you with the petty details as they are quite irrelevant . They are both good and bad, I´ll leave it at that.

But I drift off. It is this stream of ups and downs that we all experience in our everyday lives that suddenly gets interrupted by previously named force with relentless lack of empathy. And I get cought in its gaze. But the gaze helps me come to that important conclusion wich I could not find through the shallow state of straight and narrow routine. I get reconnected with my feelings. Its as if I am being told by myself what drives and what gives and if I am not careful I will be punished. For that is what it is. A blessing and a curse, cliché it may be; still what it is:

Convey your emotions and use them as your allies or they will become the one enemy you will not be able to defeat.

Dali said (or rather wrote) that to become a great artist one must fill two most important criterias.

1. Carry the name of Dali.

2. Be married to his wife.

The first criteria is merely a jest sprung from Dalis lack of humility thowards his own excellence but in the second he tries to explain the importance of commitment. He is not talking about his wife per se, he is rather implying that he has commited himself to art, much in the manner of marriage, and the reader needs to do the same if he/she hopes to reach a level of artistic enlightenment he already enjoys.

You cannot run from problems in a relationship or they will become a passive agressive pressence that slowly shatters what love might be present. Art is the same. Or not perhaps art. Being an artist and commiting to art is the same. Whatever you feel or wichever problems you might have need to be dealt with in your artistic manner; the gift as well as the price for wich it was given.

So I drift off, eventhough it may seem daunting at first, and choose a life less ordinary.

Taken, by my own force.

Watercolors and ink on paper 26 *21 (cm).

Now its here.

Its out there for any ear who wishes to take part in my sonic universe. It has truly been a new experience for me and I want to thank all who helped realise this little rant of mine. So thank you Shelby Cinca, Oscar Rydelius and Philip Åkerblad. There are alot of other people who have affected me in this process and contributed to the outcome of the songs as they are all drawn from the feelings and experiences of my life the past 5 years. The record is kind of a closure and a foundation for the beginning of a new chapter. The music you can listen to in this album has truly helped me through all that has been and made me realise that the old cliché “that wich does not kill only makes you stronger” has more truth in it than its apparently shallow meaning holds at a first glance. I dont know if it will convey those feelings and emotions that has been put in there throughout the process of its making or strike the same chords as it does for me but that is of lesser importance. That is what art is about to some extent; putting creative energy to good use fueled by emotions and achieve a subjective truth that may help spur a new truth in the souls of others.

Thank you for listening.

The next one will be for you.

Someone once said that a person can never be more alone than in the company of others.

I praise the one who give to such a person. A gift of understanding and comfort. A selfish act, one that des not require anything in return.

This is for you. If it was not for your warmth a life would be less of love.

Oil on canvas 120 * 80 (cm). 10.000 SEK.

In the words of the song that inspired the title of this piece:

Give me a reason to stay constantly ignored
Give me an angle that I haven’t tried before
A guarantee for being honestly compaired
You want to live when life is achingly unfair

Don’t make a move you’ll look ridiculous again
You share no interest but it’s easy to pretend
Don’t start the action it will turn against you soon
No one is going to follow and you’ll stand there like a fool

Dont Give up.