Simon Stålenhag

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Simon Stålenhag signs a book during the Gothenburg Book Fair in September 2016.

Simon Stålenhag (born January 20, 1984 ) is a Swedish artist, musician and designer who specializes in futuristic digital images that focus on nostalgic, rural and historical environments in Sweden. The locations of his works of art formed, among other things, the basis for the television series produced by Amazon with the title Tales from the Loop .

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Stålenhag grew up in a rural setting near Stockholm and made illustrations of the local landscape inspired by artists such as Lars Jonsson . After discovering conceptual artists Ralph McQuarrie and Syd Mead , he tried his hand at science fiction art. This work was initially created as a side project, without any planning behind it. Thematically, he often connects his childhood with topics from science fiction films, which leads to a stereotypical Swedish landscape with a neo-futuristic tendency. According to Stålenhag, this focus stems from his perceived distance from adulthood, with the science fiction elements added partly to grab the audience's attention and partly to influence the mood of the work. These ideas lead to a work that, in addition to ordinary Swedish objects such as Volvo and Saab automobiles, can also contain giant robots and megastructures.

In the course of developing his work, Stålenhag has created a backstory centered around an underground government facility. In parallel with the real demise of the Swedish welfare state , large machines are slowly breaking down, and the ultimate outcome remains a mystery. In a 2013 interview with The Verge it was said, "The only difference between the world of my art and ours is that ... since the early 20th century, the views and budgets have been much more in favor of science and technology."

Outside of his usual canon, Stålenhag also drew 28 pictures of dinosaurs for the prehistoric exhibits at the Swedish Natural History Museum after rediscovering his interest in the creatures from his childhood and contacting the museum in early 2013 to offer his assistance. In 2016, pictures of the hypothetical consequences of a rising ocean as a result of global warming followed for the Resilience Center of Stockholm University . He also did some commercial art for the sci-fi video game No Man's Sky .

Stålenhag uses a Wacom tablet and a computer to illustrate his work, which is said to resemble oil painting . Initially, he tried using various physical media to mimic a more traditional style, including gouache . Even after switching to digital methods, he has stated that he “puts a lot of effort into ensuring that the digital brushes behave naturally and that a certain amount of 'handwriting' is retained in the brushstrokes”. Most of his work is based on photos he took beforehand; these then serve as the starting point for a series of rough sketches before the final work is completed.

Books and adaptations

Most of Stålenhag's artwork was initially available online before being later published as prints. Since then, two narrative art books have emerged from this, Tales from the Loop in 2014 and Things from the Flood in 2016. Both deal with the construction of a super massive particle accelerator called the Loop . More recently, Stålenhag has covered the western United States in a third art book, The Electric State , which was also funded through the crowdfunding platform Kickstarter . The focus is on a girl and her robotic companion traversing the fictional state of Pacifica. Skybound Books published a North American edition of the work in October 2018.

In 2016, a Kickstarter campaign was launched to fund a pen and paper role-playing game called Tales from the Loop , which is based on the book of the same name; several media outlets compared it to the television series Stranger Things . The action takes place in either the United States or Sweden in the 1980s. In the role play, the players act as a group of teenagers who grapple with the aftermath of the loop. Different classes of characters correspond to stereotypical roles from childhood, such as " jock ", "bookworm" or " nerd ".

Tales from the Loop television series , which includes artwork from the book and was produced for Amazon Prime by Amazon Studios in association with Fox 21 Television Studios , Indio Studio, and 6th & Idaho , was fully released and adapted on April 3, 2020 from Stålenhags storytelling books. The first season comprises eight episodes with a running time of 50-57 minutes each. All scripts were written by Nathaniel Halpern, while each episode was directed by its own directors including Mark Romanek , Andrew Stanton and Jodie Foster . Stålenhag has signed a contract to continue working with Fox 21.

The film rights for The Electric State were sold to the Russo brothers in 2017 . Andrés Muschietti and Barbara Muschietti , the creators of the films Es (2017) and Es Kapitel 2 , are designated as directors and producers.

Other work

As part of the crowdfunding campaign for The Electric State, Stålenhag produced and released an electronic music album of the same title as a support target. In 2018 he released his second album Music For DOS , which contains ambient music written with old keyboards and the multi-track sequencer Impulse Tracker .

In addition Stålenhag was involved in a variety of commercials, movies and video games, including his work on the Jump 'n' Run game Ripple Dot Zero , developed in collaboration with Tommy Salomonsson.

Individual evidence

  1. ^ Meet the Dystopian Artist Behind Amazon's "Tales From the Loop". Accessed April 13, 2020 (English).
  2. ↑ a b c d Dante D'Orazio: Incredible paintings of sci-fi suburbia will make you wish you were Swedish ( en ) In: The Verge . August 3, 2013. Accessed April 13, 2020.
  3. ↑ a b c d e Devon Maloney: This Art Is Cool: Imagining a Dystopian Sweden Full of Robots and Dinosaurs ( en ) In: Wired . September 6, 2016. Accessed April 13, 2020.
  4. ^ A b Cory Doctorow: Swedish seventies neoretrofuturism: the paintings of Simon Stålenhag . In: Boing Boing . August 21, 2013. Accessed April 13, 2020.
  5. ↑ a b Jack de Quidt: Exploring the Uncanny, Sci-Fi Dystopias of Simon Stålenhag ( en ) In: Waypoint . October 11, 2018. Retrieved April 13, 2020.
  6. ^ Ross Andersen: The Artists Who Paint Dinosaurs ( en ) In: The Atlantic . October 5, 2015. Accessed April 13, 2020.
  7. ↑ Emma Gray Ellis: To Save the Oceans, These Guys Are Turning to Sci-Fi ( en ) In: Wired . September 22, 2013. Accessed April 13, 2020.
  8. ↑ Marcus Estrada: No Man's Sky Explorer's Edition, Vinyl OST, More Announced ( en ) In: Hardcore Gamer . March 3, 2016. Accessed April 13, 2020.
  9. ↑ a b c Andrew Liptak: Simon Stålenhag's next book of retro sci-fi art is now on Kickstarter ( en ) In: The Verge . July 5, 2015. Accessed April 13, 2020.
  10. ↑ Simon Stålenhag's hauntingly beautiful retro sci-fi art ( en ) In: CNN . January 31, 2018. Accessed April 13, 2020.
  11. ↑ Skybound Books Picks Up Simon Stålenhag's THE ELECTRIC STATE - Skybound. In: Skybound. January 18, 2018, accessed April 13, 2020 .
  12. ^ Andrew Liptak: RPG Tales from the Loop lets you channel Stranger Things and ET ( en ) In: The Verge . December 1, 2016. Accessed April 13, 2020.
  13. ↑ Beth Elderkin: Tales From The Loop RPG Will Make You Feel Like A (Stranger Things) Kid Again ( en ) In: Gizmodo . July 30, 2017. Retrieved April 13, 2020.
  14. ↑ Beth Elderkin: Amazon Is Turning Simon Stålenhag's Tales From The Loop Series Into A TV Show ( en ) In: Gizmodo . July 19, 2018. Retrieved April 13, 2020.
  15. ↑ Lesley Goldberg: 'Tales From the Loop' TV Series Set at Amazon ( en ) In: The Hollywood Reporter . July 17, 2018. Retrieved April 13, 2020.
  16. ↑ Tales From The Loop ( en ) Retrieved April 13, 2020.
  17. ↑ Denise Petski: 'Tales From The Loop' Creator Nathaniel Halpern Inks Overall Deal With Fox 21 Television Studios ( en ) Deadline. March 6, 2020. Accessed April 13, 2020.
  18. ↑ Mike Fleming: Russo Brothers Win Sci-Fi Novel 'The Electric State' For 'It' Team Andy & Barbara Muschietti ( en ) December 14, 2017. Retrieved April 13, 2020.
  19. ↑ Simon Stålenhag: The Electric State | Simon Stålenhag ( en ) In: Bandcamp . October 5, 2017. Retrieved April 13, 2020.
  20. ↑ We Have a Soundtrack! ( en ) In: Kickstarter . July 17, 2017. Retrieved April 13, 2020.
  21. ↑ Rob Bechizza: Music for DOS: lo-fi album by Simon Stålenhag ( en ) In: Boing Boing . August 23, 2018. Accessed April 13, 2020.

Web links

Commons : Simon Stålenhag  - collection of images, videos and audio files


personal data
SURNAME Stålenhag, Simon
BRIEF DESCRIPTION Swedish artist, musician and designer
DATE OF BIRTH 20th January 1984