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Olympic Posters Top 3

3. Stockholm 1912

The Olympic games were introduced in ancient Greece, inventor of democracy and nude male wrestling. This Swedish-designed poster clearly tries to reflect these noble traditions, but avoids the full frontal issue by tastefully wrapping a fun yellow ribbon around the flag waving athlete's penis. This added a whole new festive element to the games, which apparently was the last one to issue solid gold medals. Good times.

2. Mexico 1968

Sweden was still relevant some fifty years later when the Swedish pentathlete Jans-Gunnar Liljenwall became the first Olympic athlete to be disqualified because of doping; apparently he had “several beers” just prior to competing. One wonders why, when he could have just stared at the poster of the event for a couple of minutes to achieve the same effect.

1. Montreal 1976

Nothing says “Olympic games” more than a gay beaver, right? At least that seems to be the thinking of the Canadian Olympic Committee at the time. Of course the colours could represent the continents as they do in the olympic rings... but in the Olympic spirit of nude men wrestling I'm going to go with my ”gay beaver” interpretation anyway.

How's this for a fun fact though: Princess Anne of the United Kingdom (member of her country's equestrian team) was the only female competitor of these games not to submit to a sex test, introduced ten years earlier after the suspicion that several of the best women athletes from the Soviet Union and Eastern Europe were actually men. Gay old times.

Tv-resistori cover by Elina and Jaakko

Turku based pop group Tv-resistori is releasing their third LP in April. Yrjö commissioned me to make the cover art for their self titled release already in 2008 but then things like babies and solo projects happened among the group and the process was put on hold for over two years. I compiled the covers in January 2011 from various pencil drawings that I made with Jaakko Pallasvuo. / Elina

Jenni Rope: Cutters/Cork

Jenni Rope's art work will be part of the Cutters/Cork exhibition taking place in West Cork Art Centre, Ireland from February 5th to March 12th.

"Cutters/Cork has already being flagged by the Sunday Times newspaper as a 'must see' exhibition and is certainly one of the most exciting exhibitions at West Cork Art Centre in 2011. It is a showcase for the exhilarating and newly invigorated art form of collage. Featuring the work of more than 50 international artists and possibly up to 300 artworks, american artist James Gallagher has brought them all together in Cutters/Cork to illustrate the range and depth of collage taking place to today."

If you happen to be in Ireland, this is definitely worth seeing! Go Jenni!

Full list of the artists and more info: http://www.westcorkartscentre.com/

Terhi Ekebom / Comics-Art!

Terhi Ekebom made a stunning wall painting for Comics-Art! exhibition. Exhibition, located in Art Center Kasarmi/Tuusula Illustrative Art Museum, celebrates 100 years of Finnish comics.

Open till 22.5.2011, so there's plenty of time to see ;)

See how the painting was build from here. Photos from the opening party on Napa Agency's Flickr.

2011, the year of DIY

Looks like Napa Illustration's services won't be needed this year with calendars like this in the shops. Or should that be the other way around?

The cover artwork isn't setting the standards too high either. But aren't they missing a trick by not leaving it blank?

Ho ho ho!

Napa Illustrations wishes y'all a merry christmas, and an illustrative new year!

Jenni Rope / Pienen iltahetki

Jenni Rope illustrated this beautiful CD booklet for The Parish Union of Helsinki. The CD booklet, commissioned by Dynamo Advertising, consists a CD, a songbook and a poster. Pienen iltahetki CD is given as a gift for Helsinkian families with newly born babies.

Jenni, what was the brief of the commission?

"The brief was to make record cover illustration for a CD booklet of traditional children's songs remakes."

What kind of technique did you use for this work?

"The art director Jere Saulivaara suggested me one of my techniques, the pencil texture drawing style. I was happy to go with it, as I hadn't used it for a couple of years. Illustrating something like angels and Christian symbols felt easy for me with this style. I added some collage bits to the style to make it more colorful and happy."

You were asked to make a remake of this traditional painting of angel guiding two little kids over the bridge. Was it hard to make your own version of it?

"First I thought it would be a tough one, but actually when I got into it, it came out very fresh I think. To some parts of it I was working with a light table and some part I went just freehand. It's a bit different looking than my drawings usually and I was surprised that it felt good doing it."

How was the commission in over all?

"This work was very interesting and challenging for me. I'm happy with the result! The booklet is sent to thousands of Helsinkian families with newly born babies and I guess a lot of people will be looking at it and listening to it. I'm sure it will be a nice present for them.

The CD booklet is part of the Pienelle parasta campaign. Jenni has also illustrated the web site and brochure for the campaign.

Terhi Ekebom / Multicoloured Dreams

Have you noticed that construction site walls in Helsinki look somehow nicer than usually? It might have something to do with Multicoloured Dreams, a visual movement taking over the temporary constructions and fabrications and turning them as street art galleries.

Our illustrator Terhi Ekebom was asked to participate in Multicoloured Dreams' project Serie 2-Miesten Viiko. Go and check out Terhi's wall painting Palikkakaupunki on Kiseleff's house construction site wall, right next to The Senate Square.

http://mcdreams.wordpress.com/

New arrivals at the Kasper Stromman Exclusive Webshop

With christmas just around the corner, what better way to do your christmas shoppping than by clicking your way to the Kasper Stromman Exclusive Webshop? With new and exciting products hand picked by Mr. Stromman himself, the discerning customer will be sure not to leave the site empty handed.

“Our clientele will no doubt be more than pleased byt these new arrivals” muses Kasper Stromman, “so much in fact, that we feel this new range of goods is almost like a christmas present in itself”.

This enchanted yuletide journey starts at www.kasperstromman.com.

Jenni Rope / The Open Daybook

Jenni Rope was invited to design one page for The Open Daybook, published by Mark Batty Publishers in November 2010. All the original work from the book will be also exhibited at LACE in Los Angeles from January 5, 2011.

"The Open Daybook, edited by David P. Earle, is both compilation of original art work and a functional perpetual calendar. Over the course of a single year, three hundred and sixty five artists were assigned a date and given 24 hours to create a work of art. Each artist's day is a page in the book. The design of each dated page allows users to record their life and engage artistically with this diverse array of wonderful artists."

NYC launch at Printed Matter - Saturday, December 11th, 5 - 7pm

http://www.davidpearle.com/theopendaybook

Elina's animation in Kiasma-teatteri

Stage Fright (drawn animation, 2 min, 2008)
by Elina Minn
1.12 at 18.00 / Kiasma-teatteri
In a screening of short art films dealing with stage and performance.
More info here

Psst, it's free.

Jenni Rope: Paintings / Napa Galleria 27.10. – 27.11.2010

Jenni Rope: Paintings / 27.10. – 27.11.2010

“Laita siihen, että kun Nukku-Matti meni sateisenharmaana loppukesän päivänä metsäretkelle, poimi oksia ja kukkia ja sieniä, maalasi ne, leikkasi maalauksen silpuksi, meni nukkumaan, näki unta puusta ja vuoresta, käveli unissaan silpun luokse ja liimasi palaset paperille, niin siinä on Jenni Ropen työ.” –Anonyymi ystävä

Viimeisen vuoden aikana Ropen töitä on nähty vain ulkomailla. My Forest-maalaussarja on kiertänyt Chicagossa, Berliinissä ja Tokiossa. Napa Gallerian näyttely esittelee näistä näyttelyistä valikoidun kokoelman akryyli- ja kollaasimaalauksia sekä miniveistoksia.

Napa Galleria
Eerikinkatu 18
Helsinki

Avoinna ke-pe 12-18, la 12-16

www.jennirope.com
www.napabooks.com

Tigertime!

You're not one of ”those people” who think it's lame to exhibit in a library, are you? Well think again, because how often do you get to see artwork this classy, anywhere? That's right, not very often.

How fun then that Kasper is displaying some “roaring” artwork from his children's book Tigerkontoret at Rikhardinkadun kirjasto this month. Think about it; you could borrow a book on some interesting subject while you're there anyway. That can't be a bad thing.

Esteban at the Helsinki Book Fair

Tomorrow there's the rare chance to hear Kasper talk about his book Kiitos Esteban 2002–2010 at the Helsinki Book Fair. So rare in fact that it will happen twice: one o'clock at the Comics Society stand and five o'clock at the Kirjakahvila stage.

Kaspers regrets to announce that long time friend and collaborator Bo Hager couldn't make it to the fair, but he might read an open letter from the the man instead. How exciting is that?

Pauliina Mäkelä: Supermarsu

VISU Gallery is exhibiting Napa illustrator Pauliina Mäkelä’s works in November. Exhibition is showing Pauliina’s illustrations made for the popular book series Supermarsu, written by Paula Noronen.

Exhibition is part of the children’s and juvenile’s Loistavaa! event and will be open from October 30 to January 27.

Welcome to opening party on Sat 30.10. from 2-4 pm!

Visu Galleria, Pormestarinkatu 2, 67100 Kokkola

Open Tue-Wed, Fri-Sat 12-16 & Thu 16-20

www.pauliinamakela.com

JANNE HARJU, designer of the Valentine's Day stamps 2011!!

Take a look at the cool stamps designed by Napa's illustrator Janne Harju! The stamps were designed especially for Valentine's Day greetings, 2011. Read more on Itella's web site (in Finnish).

..and if you're on Facebook: see more pics here.

6G julistenäyttely / Ossi Pirkonen

6G-graafikkoryhmä, eli Samuli Harjunpää, Tero Harsunen, Sami Kuosmanen, Antti Kurvinen, Santtu Mustonen, Ossi Pirkonen, Ville Salervo ja Patrik Typpö ilmaisevat julisteen keinoin näkemyksiään kertakäyttöyhteiskunnasta.

Näyttely on esillä Korjaamon vaunusalissa (Töölönkatu 51 A-B) 22.10.2010 – 9.1.2011. Töölönkatu 51 A-B. www.korjaamo.fi

Kiitos Esteban 2002–2010

Kasper is talking about his new book tomorrow 16.30 at the Helsinki Comic Festival. Expect nothing less than an enchanting look into the mind behind the legend that is Esteban. It's been eight years in the making, you know.

King of Kasperpedia

(Click for larger images)

More fascinating reads at newly launched Burner Magazine.