If Nothing Else can Wake us up, They Can
Most of us know Anders Morgenthaler primarily from his and Mikael Wulff’s daily and indispensable comic strips in the newspaper Politiken. If nothing else can wake us up, they can.
Others – children, for example, are familiar with him from children’s TV and for his animal fables.
And then there are the grown-ups who know him from his two adult animation films “Araki - The Killing of a Japanese Photographer” (2003) and “Princess” (2006) – about prostitution and human trafficking – both of which went as far as being screened at the Cannes Film Festival.
All over the world – including the US – millions of people are familiar with his and Wulff’s comic strips from more than 300 newspapers, and in Kolding, for example, there are people who remember him best from his student days in Kolding – a town he says he loves because it is so damn boring.
- When I was a student and had walked up and down the pedestrian street enough times and said hello to the other people who went the same route, I realised that I might as well go back to the school to learn something, he explained during his inaugural lecture as an Honorary Professor at Design School Kolding in 2014. The journalist from Ugeavisen Kolding, who reported on the lecture, described how Morgenthaler’s attack on the concept of ‘normality’ made his notepad blush. But that same notepad agreed with Morgenthaler’s advice to current students: “Practice being able to take care of yourselves, both through an economic quagmire and when love breaks your heart. The only thing you can count on in life is your good head. So recognise from within yourself what it is you would like to do most of all.”
After his studies at Design School Kolding Morgenthaler – illustrator, interaction designer and filmmaker – graduated from The National Film School of Denmark. He was appointed Honorary Professor at Design School Kolding because the school wanted to strengthen its professional profile in the areas of communication, illustration and interaction design – and also because Morgenthaler reaches across media and platforms with a strong voice that dares to address political issues, at a high artistic and professional level. The official recommendation underscores that he has a nerve and a foundation in his line and in his illustrations that are recognisable in all the diverse products he is involved in.
Anders Morgenthaler claims to have become an illustrator because that was the only thing he knew how to do. His father doubted that he would be able to make a living as an illustrator and wanted him to have a “proper education,” but fortunately he had Grandpa, an ophthalmologist, who was interested in art and who praised him effusively, saying, “This is what you should do”.
In an interview with Niels Thorsen in the Politiken he says that his grandfather became the beacon that set his course. – And it’s crazy that it only takes one person to impact the rest of your life. I hope some of the things I’m doing for children will have the same effect, he says.
He wants children to become involved, and he also wants to make entertainment that deals with existential and moral issues, but also have an edge, even though it is no longer popular to be moralising. – A good children’s film can change children’s perception of life, for God’s sake, or give children a completely different set of values, he says, and also teach them, of course, what he told the students at his inauguration: Practice being able to take care of yourselves.
