Delulu and Solulu

Two words, like brother and sister.

A good friend had asked me, if I would like to illustrate a children`s book for him.

A children book about the moon.

So my gf and me travel to Danmark and for five days we live on an island in the forest by the seaside in a wooden hut.

We take long walks on the windy beach, in the forrests, let the place touch us.

The recent big storm has left it`s mark, the waters must have been rising and hungry, and what they left uneaten lays devastated - which has a magic of it's own to see. Like a child that went to bed without cleaning up, the room full of clutter. 

But I rush ahead: someone DID make a clean up!

Too early had we arrived and on the white terrace of the little house we found the leftover of a young chicken, dead. 

Must have been an animal, a fox or a bird of prey, that had enjoyed a meal here, or... was there maybe more to it..?

Anyway, we took the walk to the beach and before our return, the local cleaners must have found it too and besides some feather and blood marks, the cadaver was gone.

In the garden I find two fly agaric, but someone had left it not untouched, a triangle slice of the larger one had been cut out by knive.

And I find dry wood to ignate a hot fire in the furnance. 

Besides trying out scetches for the story, I also start to paint some pictures with Acryl, isn't it Picasso's 142th birthday anyway? 

It takes a few days, in between, the coulours have to dry, on our walks we always spot deers. They play "stand still, look, run and hide". 

Nightingdale comes to my mind, as the rock star in the hotel where I used to work - him named after a linden tree - calls himself a nightingale upon his nocturne nature. 

And as we are in Scandinavia my thoughts travel also to the Finish band Nightwish and their nightingdale songs "Know why the nightingdale sings" and "Escapist". 

And we visit a castle. The countryside changes into fairytale landscape. Geese in large groups rest on their journey, Nils Holgerson takes a pee. Later there is more to paint. 

Then the lunar eclipse arrives. Saturday, October 28.

In the morning, when it is still dark, I take myself to the seaside, enjoy the deserted space, the dark waves and the wind.

In the wet sands I find an empty bullet, blue and thick, freshly burned, the clouds hang deep, drizzle sprays my face. 

Then I hear shots.

Birds screech, rise to the dark sky in flocks.

The hunter must be very close. On my way back a female jogger crosses my path, breathless. 

An empty pickup from a paint shop rests at the beach parking lot, it has not been there only minutes before.

Sunday 29th arrives, time to head home. In this region a lot of the local names are connected with the linden tree. When driving through a linden tree town called "Lindelse", I see a pub named "KRO", which reminds of a book I have with me. Li-on of Li-ght, RAW on A-Li-elser Cro-Li.

We take a stop in Odense and stroll aimlessly through the old town.

Pictures of vikings. Red buildings. An African yells in Danish or French. Stands on the cobblestone street. It starts to drizzle again. 

Suddenly we stand in front of the yellow birth house of fairytale author H.C. Andersen! 

I hadn`t even known he'd been from there. 

At home I post them pictures online. A singer friend in the US comments, she loves the cobblestones, if she may share the picture. I consent and then I realize the picture was taken right on her birthday, Sunday October 29.

She tells me, her parents come from South America, but her grandfather was DANISH!

I ask her, maybe her grandfather had sent her birthday greetings this way?

-

A week later I had this strange epiphany that Mickey Mouse must be connected with the dvl himself somehow and draw him with devil horns instead of the black round ears, and only with one eye, just to put it down, maybe for later.

I take a nap. When waking up, I check my phone. And see an ad: for an illustration course with Gary Baseman, horned Mickey(!) says hello:

Yes, how fitting, I need to refresh my drawing skills for the children book anyway and book the course. 

Next day I decide to start an Instagram page where I would document my learning progress at drawing in connection with actual planetary constellations, named: #Astrologsabian (feel free to check it out). 

Two days later I feel the need to check on H. C. Andersen again and read his Wikipedia page. This is exactly when I read about the fairytale author's hopeless love with Swedish opera queen Jenny Lind(!) - oh another linden tree:

"Other disappointments in love included (...) One of his stories, "The Nightingale", was written as an expression of his passion for Jenny Lind and became the inspiration for her nickname, the "Swedish Nightingale".^[46] Andersen was often shy around women and had extreme difficulty in proposing to Lind. When Lind was boarding a train to go to an opera conc ert, Andersen gave Lind a letter of proposal. Her feelings towards him were not the same; she saw him as a brother, writing to him in 1844: "farewell ... God bless and protect my brother is the sincere wish of his affectionate sister, Jenny".^[47] It is suggested that Andersen expressed his disappointment by portraying Lind as the eponymous anti-heroine of his Snow Queen.^[48]

^{https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hans_Christian_Andersen}

^{Brother and sister. That where the names I had just given for two of the paintings I had created on the island!}

^{And exact at this moment(!) my female singer friend writes to me again and we talk about Andersen.}

^{And I check the website of the Andersen museum they had build next to his birth house,where I find a picture that is so close to the style of my pictures 'brother' and 'sister'. Only that it is in greenish instead. Funny I also had trees envisioned on mine.} 

^{Pictures of Angela Jolie, while shooting a film scene as opera queen Maria Callas at the Budapest Opera pop up on my fb timeline! An}d wait a minute, another old friend writes me, haven't seen him for 32 years, for 8 years not heard from him: He, a blond nordic looking opera singer is asking me for a painting, as he loves those two pictures so much! 

Brother and Sister, Acryl on canvas 2023

Installation from museum H. C. Andersens Hus, Odense, Danmark

https://hungarytoday.hu/angelina-jolie-joined-by-another-a-list-actor-in-budapest/

And another message arrives, this time from France: a friend posts a picture about her on the Sea coast in the sunset and a coffee machine with her outside her VR.

Only hours before I had done a scetch of this shaman bird at the coast at sunset and on the left side above the SAME coffee machine.

At the same time I had done 2 other scetches. One was about an imaginary friend I have had as a child. He is an elder man with a grey hat and often in grey suits or grey rain coat. A bit like a MIB, but in grey and friendly:

Again my fb timeline drops this children book cover called 'moon dreaming'(!), with many little of this men in grey:

But I continue my research on H. C. Andersen. I find this article about HCA traveling to Portugal and the same article mentions the Portuguese writer Fernando Pessoa, and look the pictures of him: He is the grey rain coat man! 

https://adriftindk.wordpress.com/2018/03/04/fernando-pessoa-multiplicity-in-lisbon/

And the SAME article describes how this author Pessoa was visited by none other than Aleister Crowley and about his interest in astrology. 

"The word pessoa means person in Portuguese, deriving from the Latin persona, the mask worn by Roman actors; just one of the small details which make the man so intriguing. An outsider’s outsider, for most of his life Pessoa worked as a freelance commercial translator while contributing poetry and essays to journals and newspapers. He was interested in theosophy, spiritualism and the occult, corresponding with Aleister Crowley, and helped him to stage a fake suicide in Lisbon in 1930. A keen amateur astrologist, Pessoa made horoscopes of his clients and friends, as well as of his heteronyms and even of literary journals. All this had a strong influence on his writing; he felt “sometimes suddenly being owned by something else”. 

Staged suicide? Read more about it and how Pessoa came in touch with the Beast in correcting his horoscope here (unfortunately the second part is missing):

https://sintra-portugal.blogspot.com/2010/07/aleister-crowley-and-fernando-pessoa-or.html

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fernando_Pessoa

Pessoa was also a great James Joyce fan, whom I also adore and who brought me life saving snycs during a dark phase of my life. And I had done a third scetch when doing the two mentioned above: Dali.

Now it is getting surreal, I haven't seen my SISTER for months.

SAME evening she texts me on her upcoming visit next day: she booked a restaurant and if I know this place? No, never heard of it, name is: DALI.

Dali, where Delulu and Solulu meet. I am happy Saint Michael - San Miguel - was also there.

If will continue to draw for that moon child(ren) book? Hell yeah, the journey has just begun... 

Oh, bare grace misery

Just a child without a fairytale am I
Dark but so lovely
A Little Match Girl freezing in the snow"

The little match girl by HCA, cited by Finish opera metal band Nightwish (album Wishmaster) 

What does the free fall feel like?

Asks the boy with a spark in his eye
Know why the nightingale sings?
Is the answer to everything

Taking a step to a world unbound
Spinning my fantasies all around
Freed from the gravital leash
I swear the heaven's in my reach

Dancing with the spirit of the air
In this ocean so open and fair
Making love to the gods above
On my maiden voyage so bold

Landing safely to the blue lagoon
Don't know if this is the earth or the moon
Joy of living is no more a mask
The Eden I found will forever last

Migrating with the geese
My soul has finally found peace
Doesn't matter that man has no wings
As long as I hear the nightingale sing

(Nightwish - Know why the nightingale sings) 

Who's there knocking at my window
The owl and the Dead Boy
This night whispers my name
All the dying children
Virgin snow beneath my feet
Painting the world in white
I tread the way
And lose myself into a tale
Come hell or high water
My search will go on
Clayborn voyage without an end

Nightingale in a golden cage
That's me locked inside reality's maze
Come someone, make my heavy heart light
Come on, come bring me back to life
A nightingale in a golden cage
That's me locked inside reality's maze
Come someone, make my heavy heart light
It all starts with a lullaby

(Nightwish - Escapist)