Pauline Curnier Jardin. The Entertaining of the Shy in Finallyland, 2007

A certain winter in Rauma City, Finland, i made drawings:

small, big, funny, sad, fearful, and happy.
Drinking bear-beers drawing bears,
learning how to run in the water,
dealing with my outside jacket,
waiting for my lover from a rocket.
and
Taking a look at the TVO...
- "Oh! But it got a smile, the smile of the blues" said Alice to herself.
- "So let's have some atomic amusements with my friends."

And they all enjoyed the life like that, playing with happiness in the landscapes of Finallyland.

I made these drawings during my residence in Rauma during the winter 2007.
They are all fragments inspired by the life here and a lot of stories I have heard and enjoyed during this time. They are also inspired by the musics of Donovan, Obsolete and Robert Crumb, and some others, picking up in a special Karaoke bar in Rauma. I have listened everyday the Donovan's "Hurdy Gurdy Man" album, since the day I bought it in Turku just because of the title "the Entertaing of a Shy Girl".

In these drawings, I have tried to transmit the happiness of this beautiful song, and my owns. I like my drawing's characters as my fictional friends or relatives. The Shy, my Shy can't act or speak except on this white space i gave them to tell their stories. In a way they are very close to comic's characters. Drawing is as spontaneous as the imagination, as if the story is very intricated. For me it is a craft to tell tales...again and again.

Thank you for your stories
Antti Kalin and Kanerva Kuisma, Genevieve Jardin, Claire Vallier, Titta and Mika, Jaakko Pullinen, Kati Kivimaki, Hannele Kolsio, Robert Louis Stevenson, Donovan, the Beatles, Syd Barett, Tuomari Nurmio, Obsolete, the voice of Elyas Khan and the voice of Bourvil and Jacqueline Maillan, the tv, the radio, the wifi, the elks, the paintings in the church, the Runeberg’s wife muffins, my neighbours, the Red Cross’s flea market, the railways train’s flea market, the best karaoke bar of Rauma, the fishermen on the ice on sunny monday morning, the children, the visitors center over there, the streets, the swimming-pool and the running-in-the-water's teacher who is pregnant.