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Lleno de color y crítica, ‘Future’ de Tommi Musturi es una joya que cualquier persona a la que le guste la novela gráfica, el cómic o la ilustración debería tener en su casa. Porque Future es sorprendente a nivel visual e hilarante a nivel escrito. Además de que me encanta la mezcla de consultorio de un ente totalmente inventado, con las tiras cómicas, rodeado de magia y color y de 2400 tipos diferentes de ilustración y dibujo, con una cartelería loquísima que hace que te explote la cabeza.
Y es que esta recopilación de los tomos de Future, con todo lo que nos presenta, es una obra para analizar, para meterse dentro ¡y flipar en colores con ella! Y es que si fuera poco, explorar los posibles futuros de la humanidad de todas las formas diversas que podrás encontrar en las páginas, con maquetación loquísima que de verdad es muy difícil de encontrar algo igual a la obra de Tommi, porque el autor otra cosa no, pero tiene magia en sus dedos y una imaginación brutal en su cabeza, porque ser capaz de poder aunar tantos estilos es una destreza fuera de lo normal.
Por eso Tommi se erige como un gran artista, porque es capaz de hacer casi cualquier cosa, la verdad es que como persona que ha estudiado ilustración me encantaría meterme en su cabeza para saber cómo funciona y, sobre todo, para saber cómo es capaz de encajar muchas de las gamas cromáticas de sus ilustraciones, porque tiene una apuesta de color que también es muy arriesgada y que salva de una manera magistral.
Vamos, que si esta mini reseña no te sorprende, ahora tienes una entrevista que le hemos podido a hacer al propio Tommi, ¡así que aprovecha y hazte con esta obra de arte!
Rut Alameda, directora de Altavoz Cultural
ENTREVISTA A TOMMI MUSTURI
What was the first idea to create Future? What is the main feeling you think you are showing to the audience?
I started to work with Future already 2012. The main idea was to make a book on ‘possible futures of mankind’. The times were (and are) complex and for a lot of us the future is just blur. With Future graphic novel I meant to give some kind of views on future of ours. In all the book takes a look in the past, present and the futures as it is necessary to somehow explain the reasons behind the events. Comic narration is as well exceptionally good form in explaining reasons and consequences – that’s somehow built inside the comic way of narration. Anyway, I spent five years on research and writing, on the background of my other projects, and started to focus on the actual drawing from 2017 until 2023. Due the very ’soapy’ theme I needed to have a wide range of diverse perspectives on the subject. That’s the reason the book is rather fragmented. I also like fragmented storytelling as it gives more room for actual thinking. ‘Open’ narration is a good way to keep the reader aware as well.
How do you think the future of a place or a culture can tell us about the past of their people? What could Future tell us about Tommi Musturi’s art nowadays?
People all around the globe are rather similar – they eat, sleep and reproduce. People have dreams of better future or steady life no matter if they’re rich or poor. We’re born naked and raised by the cultures around us. These days part of the cultures are global while some are local. What’s sure is that the cultures that raise us these days are more and more vulnerable for affection from outside. This factoring is driven mostly with harmful means – aims to make us consume more, political aims etc. – followed by the balancing good intentions. There are already people whose lifes are based on fake news. This is dangerous and it’s difficult to compete with the fake easy answers by telling the complex unwanted truth. Still, I think the answer lies in own very own local cultures, our non-digital roots in general. I think the value of local acts will count more and more. That’s also one reason why I started recently a bookstore in the small village me and my family currently live in.
What comes to our past that’s of course the most important thing to understand – our past and understanding of it explains a lot of our future. Due the global effecting digital culture we also should be aware of the global history. This is a huge task for the education. Note that that dull people are easier to control while people with knowledge are able to make their decisions. What comes to my own art, in comics I’m somehow aiming towards a mash-up – a style that would be unidentified, free and hard to define. I want to remain surprising and offer something that the reader does not expect. Meanwhile, after Future I’ve started to work on 3rd book of Samuel, which is kind of my ‘home ground’ since I’ve drawn few hundred pages and two books of it already. It’ll take 2–3 years to finish the upcoming book (with work title ‘Rainbow’s End’) and what comes after that, I really don’t know.
What do you expect about the translate experience through Barrett’s Spanish version of the book? You are so international!
It’s interesting to get Future out in several languages. The comics cultures and audiences are really different in each language area and I hope to get feedback from all around the world. I’ve released few books in Spanish, released by Aristas Martínez and Fulgencio Pimentel so at least some people should be aware of my work there. However, Future (like all my books) is very different. It’s probably the most complex book I have done. Though I’m flirting with mainstreamish styles it’s not really an easy-read. Though it’s fragmented, it’s a wholesome as well. Browsing through won’t really work so I hope the readers will take their time and focus on what they read and see. Anyway, I hope to visit Spain with Future someday soon. Meanwhile, our second child is due to be born n September which will give me a natural break from art.
How do you work with all the different styles and colours to get the final result of Future as a complete creation? How was this process?
While writing Future 2012–2015 I realized that I would need a variety of perspectives on the very abstract subject. It was also obvious that I would not aim to a linear story but to a range of stories that would somehow connect. In other words (though most of the readers will try to read it linearly) Future proposes the reader many different futures and the reasons behind them. From this fragmented vision came the idea of using different styles inside one wholesome. Before Future I already had history on using different styles in my comics. The idea with this is that the style of visuals and narration is born out of the content itself, kind of wrapped around it. In Future the different styles reflect the times and atmospheres of the storylines, sometimes confronting them – a mainstreamish style might actually reveal something totally different in its message. Anyway, this has been natural development for me as a comic artist. It’s also been my decision to go this way due the fact that it is the best way to have effect on the reader. In Future the styles also reflect our very fragmented and overdosed visual reality of today – the visual world of the generations born in times of social medias.
Anyway, after I made the decision on using different styles in Future I started to develope those styles. Some were familiar to me already but some I developed and trained especially for Future. It was fun as well and I learned a lot myself as an artist. Note that I’m also using styles that I’m don’t particularly like – all of that has a meaning and the ‘disgusting’ style might connect the actual content in interesting ways. Note that different styles also gain attention of different audiences. My background is with art studies and merely improvised ways of drawing. However, I aim my comics usually to ‘everyone’. I also want to effect the readers, their thinking. In order to do that I have to sacrifice my own interests and think about how it all work. Comic book is a real puzzle, always.
If someone discovers your art for the first time with Future, which advice would you give him/her to continue finding the other things you’ve done before?
Well, the first advice would be to read with open mind, take some time with the books. I’ve done around 40 different publications from sketchbook zines to artist books with free images and from comic magazines to graphic novels and art books. There’s quite variety in it all and most likely not everything is everone’s cup of tea. For Spanish readers there are four other books: two silent graphic novels (without words) on Samuel (a ghost-like character wandering in the world ), ‘Sr. Esperanza’ that’s my first graphic novel (telling a small story of retired couple living in rural Finland) and ‘Antología del alma’ that’s more a retrospective on my comics. The last one also include an essay that explains more closely on my vision of ’style’, its meaning and purposes I use it for. Since my background is with underground and fanzines I also sell my those, prints and other things. Just contact me if interested. https://www.instagram.com/tommimusturi/
To sum up we would like to ask you about your personal vision of the comic market: what do you think it is important to change or improve?
As I told, the comics scenes vary a lot in different languages and countries. This also concerns the markets, or actually the markets define the scenes. What’s rather common is that contemporary comics (one may call them ‘art comics’ or ‘alternative comics’) are not so well-known. What’s essential is that new kind of comic narrations present sort of new visual languages that might not be so easy to adjust with. It will take a while for the reader sometimes to really understand these new ‘languages’ that are sometimes more poetic and not story-based. I think the markets and audiences should be more courageous when grabbing something for reading, and also give more time for the learning. There are great worlds to discover and comics as an art form have still a lot of new to offer each year. We’re talking about a rather new art form anyways and there is a lot to discover for the artists too. Meanwhile, support the small press and small special stores instead of big global online players. That’s the way to go.
Altavoz Cultural 