HERR H ONE-SHOT

"Mr H" - An unfinished masterpiece.

"I always to write a story about a German psyche. I would picture a special, orderly, strict world where there is no room for self-reflection, where a level-headed and impassive man who works dilligently, votes, pays taxes, provides for his family, pays in installments for his dwelling and furniture and attempts to make everything look very right.

And everything should happen in Austria, which is, by my poor judgement, appears to look like a double Germany.

The story would deal with existence, ascesis, melancholy, suppression of creative elements in the Man, and awakening of some negation, nihilism and even manifestation of minor rebellion, where the man suddenly reviews his political beliefs, unexpectedly tracks the desert, travels Seven Seas and beyond, becomes a poet, remits all his fortune to combat unknown diseases, finds religion or messianism." - A. Badashkeeva

Aleksandra Badashkeeva worked over her comic "Mr H" when she studied under a student exchange program in a graphics class taught by Prof. Markus Huber in 2010. Although the comic was left incomplete, its artistic form was unaffected, as neither was Novalis' unfinished novel Henrich van Ofterdingen.

The story Herr H. has a captivating detective plot; similar literary roots can be found in the oeuvre of the modernist Polish author Bruno Schulz, who was also an artist. The visual language created by Aleksandra specifically for this story is an intricate quintessence of images and materials, swirling into a self-existent parallel visual universe. The images and background textures accomplished in a complex author's technique tend to become peculiar character - our imaginary guides to the fascinating artist's imaginary world.

And this "visual story" is never finished, but rather begins all over again with every new page, as if bursting in new and mysterious "buds" of the author's drawings. After all, representatives of abstract impressionism used to say about themselves: "Art is never finished, and we like to start our paintings rather than finish them".