Another nice little present for Christmas I found in our mailbox, this time from Germany. Hanser Verlag, who already edited Otto (fährt Auto), releases a German version in february 2012 of ‘l’ABC de TOM’ (that I originally made in French, in 2010). The big horizontal, calendar-like format has been replaced by a proper regular book shape and my absurd attempts to French humor are now eloquently ‘übersetzt’ by the great Harry Rowohlt.
The editor even added some publicity for the author and his Otto-character. Ganz toll! (I gave this copy to my father, whose German is far better than mine)
Last week I received some pictures from a Japanese shopping mall where the usual Xmas parafernalia this year seem to be replaced by images of strange characters and European-style houses (enriched by the inevitable balls, golden chains and other seasonal kitch)
Here’s a little present I found in our (real) mailbox this morning. I made this image -now featured on the cover of this week’s Brussels cultural agenda- 2 years ago for a traveling Tati-tribute-exhibition. Last year it was printed on a postcard by Plaizier and that’s how it found it’s way (with some minor adaptions) to the magazine.
Inside, my latest Otto-title (in Dutch) is mentioned as a present-tip in the Xmas-shopping-guide (and 5 copies are offered for free by publisher Lannoo to the fast ones that mail the magic word Otto -and their address- by dec 19 to win@bdw.be)
The entire month of October I’ve been working mainly at nighttime since I had a client at the other side of the world. The whole project was linked to the reconstruction of houses in the aftermath of the 2011 tsunami in Japan and it was kind of weird to make images based on a story I hardly understood (due to the language barrier)…
… but at a certain moment it became clear that I was working on a book-project (again!) and that it had something to do s with Christmas…
(more inside-images can be found at the completely restyled BOOKS-page on this site)
After all the spin-off projects (sketches, booktitles, bookcovers, entire books, school logo’s, banners, birthday cards, e-mail wishes etc) I think I have the ‘moral duty’ to show the actual mother-project behind my alphabet-series of the last 3 years. The green tree of life with 26 pieces of fruit (animal-shaped letters or letter-shaped animals?) that French toy- & decoration-manufacturer Djéco commissioned 3 years ago and that finally got into production this year.
The painted originals turned out to be harder to print on wood then expected and not every single letter has become what I would have preferred, but at least the A, B and C look nice. That’s a start.
En septembre, juste après nos vacances d’été, j’ai dessiné une affiche pour une organisation française de sociétés coöpératives qui construisent des maisons et des appartements exclusivement destinés à des familles modestes qui (grâce aux aides de l’état et de leur municipalité), peuvent ainsi accéder à la propriété.
Revoyant cette immage, ça sent encore un peu l’été (et les vacances)…
Ik maakte begin dit jaar op vraag van tekenaar-schrijver-admiraal Ted Van Lieshout het coverbeeld voor een verzameling geïllustreerde gedichten van Nederlandse & Vlaamse bodem. De vrucht hiervan viel in september al van de boom, maar raapte ik nu pas op.
Aanvankelijk dacht ik (door die titel) aan een meer Middeleeuws beeld, maar dat bleek niet echt te passen bij de inhoud (en de vaste lay-out) van de reeks.
I had almost forgotten that about two years ago, I did send some sketches of a wooden alphabet in progress to Steve Heller in the US for a book showing sketchbooks of (real) typographers. Nice to stumble upon 2 spreads with my own trials & errors while visiting the Antwerp bookfair last month (I just received my copy by B-post, thanks).
One double page is filled with real (train-)sketches I made on my way to alphabet-city (Paris)…
… and the other one shows the painted versions (in acrylic paint on 2 white cardboards)
Recently spotted in Japanese travel magazine Tabi.
A journalist & photographer (+ interpretor!) of the magazine visited Belgium at the occasion of the Tintin-movie-launch and asked me some interesting questions about Hergé. Unfortunately I can’t recall the answers (and sure can’t read them). The small pictures of paintings below the article appeared in a catalogue of a recent group-exhibition of Belgians in Japan. Am I big in both now?
I designed a 50 X 70 cm sheet of wrapping paper for art-print-shop Plaizier in Brussels. Their previous wrapping paper featured a sophisticated pattern, elegantly designed by the ever brilliant Ever Meulen, and I decided to go for something completely different with a bric-à-brac of elements I found in my image bank and that refer to the shop’s hometown of Brussels.
Depending of the size of what you buy, you ‘ll find the whole, the half or one fourth of this imaginary map of the center of Brussels wrapped around your present.
