The Lattice Group - That Everyday Feeling: Interview with Artist Gustaf von Arbin

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That Everyday Feeling: Interview with Artist Gustaf von Arbin

First comes the overwhelming desire to take care of him, this soft-spoken, dewy-eyed fellow with the slow, careful words and the childish giggle. But then, with a thrill, you realize that this young man is actually in complete control of himself, is in fact calculating and shrewd, summing you up with his laughing gaze. He tells us that, “When you’re putting on clothes, you’re putting together a color palette.” And, indeed, with a second look at what you may have dismissed as randomly thrown-together, you see a carefully crafted outfit intended to give the perfect impression of nonchalance. Here is a young man who is not merely what he seems. Like his art, this twenty-five year old Swede demands a thorough twice-over if you’re truly to get it. It’s neat, really, how well he fits into his own artistic golden rule: the extraordinary hides in the everyday. “A bottle can become a dove; it’s got the same shape, or a bowling pin. I see stuff everywhere that can become something else. It’s part of a fantasy world that exists among us.” Meet Gustaf von Arbin, the quotidian surrealist.

The Lattice Group sat down with Gustaf von Arbin, ad-world Art Director by day, free-lance artist at heart and illustrious Lattice Group illustrator somewhere in-between (see his illustrations for example in The Lattice Group online journal), to talk about advertising, creativity, and how to lift the everyday grind above the everyday grime. In this extensive spread of Gustaf’s work, look at how reality flirts shamelessly with fantasy. Take heed, reader, there is magic in the well-known.

How was moving to New York from Sweden?
I left Sweden because I thought it was so boring. But now I miss that boringness. The thing is that here, in New York, there are so many things happening. In Sweden, you learn to stare at a wall, and then from that wall there are so many things that happen. You go out, you work, you go home, you do a little bit of work, you watch some bad soap operas, and you go to sleep. It’s a very dull thing. But at the same time, it’s very beautiful. Because when everything is happy all the time, that just becomes the everyday thing, the routine. What I learned is that you can’t really escape the everyday feeling. Because wherever you are, it’s going to be new only in the beginning. But constantly trying to re-new yourself is not good either. I need some kind of stabilization of that everyday feeling to be creative.

Here, in New York, the head office boss texted us one morning and said that the bosses are fired and the new office is here, at a new place. They set up a new office in one night! That’s the way it is here. I got thrown out [of my apartment] with a one-day notice. Things turn around very fast here. In Sweden, you have a three-month notice if you get fired, to find a new thing. For instance, now that I’ve rented out my place in Sweden, I have to give three-month notice too. So if I need to move back suddenly, I have to live at my parents’ house!

Being more creative comes from being stable. You have the whole social security system in Sweden. Everything from firing to the health-care system to the living situation, it’s a whole different thing. Because when you don’t have anything to worry about then you can sit and daydream, almost. That’s when interesting things come. I need to get out of the New York rush-around habit, and come home, cook food, and sit and just stare at that wall again.

But I do really like that things are happening fast in New York. There’s something great with that. In Sweden, it can almost feel like things are standing still. And everyone looks the same. There’s more inspiration here, in a way, but the problem is that you can’t really take in inspiration if the bucket is full. If you’re over-stimulated. And then, if you just work all day – work, work, work – which a lot of people do here, you’re just kind of emptying the glass of water- your energy. And you need to fill it up.

Having worked in advertising in Sweden and now in the US, how do the two worlds compare?
I don’t know how accurate my answers will be since I can only speak from my own personal experience. But, in general, I think the US is so much broader, and there’s more money involved, so the clients are more afraid that [an ad] needs to be so broad that everyone really gets it. In that way, when it gets too broad it easily gets a bit flat. In Sweden, I feel like you’re able to push it a lot more, because it’s a smaller community. There’s less budget and you have to compensate for that by doing something creative. And clients understand that.

How does the advertising work environment in Sweden and the US compare?
It is very interesting how the agency I was at in Sweden worked. [There was] a masseuse that was there full time, and they had lunch every Friday and they had breakfast every morning. They really spent a lot of time treating their employees well, making everyone feel good at the place. It’s like a family, that place. And I think it gave very quick results. Because, when I started there, there were only 13 people. But by the next year it had become the Nordic head of a global network. We had won so many big new clients, they expanded from those 13 people to [about] 40. It’s amazing how that happened so quickly.

I think also that a big part of it was that they really spent time on the creative part. All the creatives were in all the different meetings…its almost like the creatives have the most say and I think that is in general what I feel the European advertising agencies are about, compared to in the US. The creatives have more say and more respect [in Europe]. And that is not because of the agency you are with but because of the clients you are with here [in the U.S]. Because the clients that you are with here are more broad. You have to reach out to so many more places, you have to get people in Arkansas or Kansas to really understand what the ad is about. You are able to be more bold in Sweden or in Europe, I think.

How, from your experience, do the work hours compare between Sweden and the US advertising industries?
If you have a big project, of course you work all week and all nights. But on your regular days, the difference is probably that in Sweden people go home at like 5 o’clock and here in New York it is more like 7. But I know that every agency is different. And at some agencies in Sweden they never go home.

Your final work at the Beckman School of Design in Stockholm was a huge success, can you tell us about it?
Why, thank you. Well, for my final examination project at Beckmans School of Design, I made 9 animated films about everyday life. Each film shows a different daily routine that becomes something fantastical, some kind of a daydream, and is looped to emulate the feeling of repetition. The technique I used was stop-frame and cut-outs at the rate of 12 pics per second. The Swedish Subway Art Commission chose the project to be shown at Stockholmʼs Odenplans subway station for 3 months. The set for the project was an apartment that I created. I wanted to give the impression that you were in one of my characterʼs living rooms. Each television set played a different film. Props – like a globe, books about travel, a painting of a river, and ice skates – add to the idea of daydreaming and the aspiration to have outside adventures, and to leave the daily routine.

I think that everyone who took a little time to actually watch the films loop – I think that’s when it became kind of wonderful because the whole idea was revolving around the everyday life being kind of a loop – so when you got that, that’s when you kind of got it. And people who stayed and did that, they really appreciated it.

See all the "Daytrips" films at www.gustafvonarbin.se

Bellow are still frames from several of the short films as well as photos from the exhibit and of Gustaf working on the project.

One of the projects you’ve done in New York City is called “homie.” Can you tell us about it?
When I moved here I realized that there was so much stuff in the street everywhere. So I went around and just picked things up. After walking a couple of blocks I found a bed here, and then a desk there. After a while I went back along the same route, picked everything up, and put it together into a room. I found it interesting, making rooms out of things. First of all, making something out of trash, which is actually not trash. And then, also, creating a room – What’s the room? What’s outside?

And I called myself “homie” because, first of all, I found it interesting, like, homeless people, building rooms for them in a way. Instead of sleeping on the street they could put together an office; like a hotel room and stuff. Also, it’s a home and then it’s on the street, so it became this in-between thing. I left a mark, a signature, and tried to make the mark fit into the room in a way. When I built the room I tried to not just use furniture, but also use garbage bags as pillows – try to see those things that people think are trash [and] make them into things that are actually useful.

I tried to [build them] as quickly as possible. Afterwards I just took a photo and then I left it. Of course it gets taken away in one day or something, that’s the way it is. For those people that see it it’s something that’s very fast. It’s almost like a dream: you see it and then it’s gone the next day.

Is the impact that your art has on other people important to you? Like you said, often someone sees it and then it’s gone. Do you ever want your art to be more permanent?
I like both sides, but when you do something permanent there’s a lot more pressure, in a way. It’s important for me that you’re able to look at something and feel and understand it. I work in advertising and it’s super important that people who only have a couple of seconds driving in a car catch an ad. It’s not that I want my art to be easy, but I want people to get what I want to say.

See images from the "Homie" installations bellow.

You are a freelance illustrator. How would you describe your style?
I have a general style that I try to communicate with all of my work. I want it to feel like there is a person behind it, a real hand that is behind the artwork. I don’t like things that are computer-made.

What are you currently working on?
I always work a lot. I do a lot of things on the side, small things. I’m doing a magazine together with a friend, Vassili Brault. We’re trying to make it more of an inspirational piece, making all the photo-shoots as inspirational as possible, almost like art pieces. Like yesterday we took porn-star images in magazines and we looked at them, and we took models, dressed them up, put them in the same positions, then took the exact same picture and cut those clothes out, and put them on top of the porn-stars. So the porn starts become fashion models.

Where do you see yourself in 10 years?
It’s a very difficult question for me right now because I have a 9 to 5 job and I’m dreaming of being free and traveling and doing art. But I think, ideally I would be somewhere in the world, doesn’t matter where. Maybe Sweden, I miss Sweden a lot. Yes. Only making art. I would love to have a family when I’m at least 32. I feel that stress. That’s why I’m not like, ‘oh, that’s fun, I’ll do that for a few years.’ I don’t know if it’s a Swedish thing, but you like to see yourself always thinking forward. I very much like the way I was brought up: close to nature and with a very solid, big family. I think a lot of good comes out of a nice life doing what you want, but knowing where your feet are.

Look out for where those feet take Gustaf von Arbin in the future. We predict that this budding artist has a big career ahead.