Excuse me, sir.
Would you like some tea or coffee?
Sorry. What?
Would you like some tea or coffee, sir?
Hm... Yes?
Tea or coffee?
chapter one
Once you step on it, you realize...
The far away is also touchable.
It would be like walking into an image. But besides the visual, the mind also creates the sound...
the cold...
the smell...
Excuse me, how can I get to Molenstraat?
Even so, somehow you know...
that it’s all your imagination.
Molenstraat 36
As soon as I got in house, I already felt some kind of nostalgia.
Some charming empty spaces,
ready to be filled up with memories,
waiting for a happy end and sad goodbyes.
ved ys lo a w l ea s. I hav se light e th
was The table an ever. cleaner th
There is something about this moose...
But who are you?
I am the spirit of your house.
I am Mr. Molenstraat.
Did you hear it? Your new housemates are coming.
Yo! Nice to meet you!
I’m Chris.
Try to hold it like this, you see?
E! Y HOUS ! M N I SE NOT MY HOU NOT IN
Pedrooo, you’re the boss! Look at your jacket!
We’re family, bro.
Pedro, need to talk to you. I always li ke your advices.
Dope! I knew she would say yes!
You’re like the guru of the house.
Do you smoke weed?
KNOCK KNOCK
Hello!
I’m Tom.
That is me? That’s great, Pedro!
You know... I think Silva asked me out on a date.
Don peop ’t you e ve le my r to use r push d oom ! He rugs on ar m e?! no way, There’s on leaving dude. I’m uary. Febr
The way you tr eat people, you’re so democratic! “You’re only allowed to read it after I leave.”
Nice to meet you, dude!
e First tim in Europe?
Pedro, you’re t? from Brazil, righ
How come you got to Den Haag?
How it works there?
What kind of ar t do you do?
What’s your favorite kind of music?
When they ask too many questions...
Pedro, we have no sugar, ok?
ke Yes. My tea, I li . se ea Pl r. ga with su
And you don’t even know the right answers...
It is like starting out of nothing.
sugar No man, the gar! su is over! No
I can be whoever I want to be.
ows Nobody kn me here.
No fear of changes.
Maybe let the beard grow.
My head looks different
I hope it is not only appearance.
This is the fundamental concept of the sign. The sign for Peirce is anything that is another thing to another something or someone.
So the reality is what would be the final representation of the object set of all representations of those who share the meaning.
The reality is a social construction.
The reality is necessarily a process of abstraction. It can only be described after compliance with the logical process of abstraction through mainly the sharing of meaning.
Individually we do not have the ability to produce abstract knowledge sufficient to ensure a representation of reality. We need a set of united interpretants in the same experience based on aesthetics, emerging from a common sense of convergence.
And so from this common phenomenology of the world we share and communicate our findings and building a knowledge that will gradually approach of what we expect, one day, to be the reality.
“It’s only a hope.”
You see?? You got t he Zeus sign !
WTF?!
A yo re u Pe ok dr o?
Where is the party?
How d id get ho I me?
mI Fuck! A gh? still hi ve What ha I done?
Fuck! Am I thinki ng in Englis ho Portug r in uese?
ck! Fu t’s ? a Wh ning e ] p hap can’t ! I nk thi
“Peirce says that there is no single truth. The truth only has real value if it is a collective construction.”
“Individually none of us can be sure if we are dreaming or living reality.”
“If we are hallucinating or awake.”
Am I still here?
chapter two
In the same way I was free to be whoever I wanted to be, I was free to do whatever I wanted to do.
So Pedro, what're your working on?
Since I got here, I've started this project called Sketch Diary, where I tell my exchange experiences.
Well, I'm really interested in comics and graphic novels.
It's like everyday I try to draw what happened in the present day.
Then every two months I have a short comic book that I publish online.
You should bring this into your work here in the studio.
Yeah, I was thinking about that. But I'm not sure.
I think it would be too much... Narcissist, you know?
Welcome everyone. My work is kinda of single pages comics stories.
They are mostly about short moments, about people, about storytelling...
I also have my Sketch Diaries, they are drawings of my everyday life. It’s a way for me to enjoy my time here as an exchange student as much as I can, because I can only make interesting drawings if I live interesting stuff first.
Well, I think that's all.
Hope you enjoy it.
Well...
Every artist is a storyteller. When you say that's about storytelling, it means nothing! It also sounds a little bit commercial, too obvious. The viewer wants to be amazed!
Here in the Academy we have a Fine Arts department, not an Illustration department.
No, wait! I do have a point! I swear!
It's better for you to start making a better profit from Fine Arts.
What am I doing here?
I'm no artist.
I'm a fraud.
HELLO THERE!
WTF? Who are you?
I am the spirit of failure! You can't hide from me! I'm everywhere, even in your own house!
There's a lot of me, but you... you're all by yourself now!
C'mon! Tell me.
Are you an artist or a mouse?
! HA! HA! A H ! HA HA!
Of course Pollock is boring.
“I want to merge my life and my art in order to give m y life meaning.�
After they discovered that 2 plus 2 is 4 it became boring too.
My parents watched a vide o in my portfoli o, it was like...
Well, actually... I also don't make this separation.
Ok, I k you don now... 't actu ally get it, right?
An art work speaks for itself, asks questions. An illustration just gives you all the answers. You see?
I dunno... For me it means nothing.
ing, They keep talk a st but it is ju ? ow kn y' , ng painti
Oh sorry. “Shallow” kinda of a is philosoph ical word for “empty ”. Got it n ow?
It pisses me off.
When I think about Plato, the World of Ideas...
Sometimes I can't get them into the real concrete world.
I was presenting my sculptures when ash they looked at a tr pile behind me and were like:
ink they Sometimes I th beauty for don't want “the they make the beauty” so e ugly”. “the ugly for th
“Wow that's your work too? You should make more like this!”. I mean... Am I stupid or what?
Pedro... Monroe.
Your family is coming next week, right?
And how are you ? feeling
Yes.
Michele is not the story that I'm here to tell.
But if this book was a fairy tale...
She would be the fairy.
And Jonas is my brother.
That's all I need to say about him.
And I think there's nothing he would say too.
Jonas, it's weird to see you here.
Y' know? In my own house...
Now I know I am not esquizofrenic or something. This world here became more real in a way.
Let's go?
Eating my food, talking to Tom and Chris. Once you and Michele saw all this, things seem different now.
And sometimes, this feeling, it's not so cool.
In the end, one month passes as fast as four pages.
And two chapters were not enough to live with someone like Tom.
TOM fucking AUSTIN ladies and gentlemen! Can you believe it?
Goodbye mate.
I'll miss you dude.
Thank you!
Thank you.
I never wanted to go back in time. But if I could at least...
make it pass more slowly...
Enjoy this one year in my own time... Giving life a slower and more careful look...
I always loved these lights.
Critical to the success of a visual narrative is the ability to convey time.
But the one thing that you have that nobody has is you. Your mind, your voice, your story, your vision.
So write and draw and build and play and live as only you can. The moment that you feel that just possibly you're walking on the street naked...
That's the moment you may be starting to get it right.
...exposing too much of your heart and your mind, what exists on the inside showing too much of yourself...
It took some time for me to understand...
that making art...
is a sort of narcissism.
RISE!
I am my own God.
HAHA HA!
chapter three
After my last presentation, I've changed my direction a little bit.
The idea was to draw random impressions from my routine.
This way, by using myself as a subject, I hope it's possible to make a visual knowledge out of my life here.
Now I brought the autobiographical issues from my Sketch Diaries into my work in the studio. Then I started to make these big drawings.
I have realized the language of comics has the power to transform time into space. Different from cinema, here the viewer is able to read the sequences of images on his own time.
This table also represents the enclosure of time, when you take an object from daily life and put a frame around it.
“I found it really clever. When you have different frames together you create different layers of meaning.”
imes n somet e h w e k e. “I li he fram t e s o l ng you vanishi e k i l e r They a es.” memori
really “It was ou to ry good fo r. Your ge g i draw b e s expos g drawin f. l yourse more of Bravo!”
hat exactly w “You know t's very clear ing. I me a you're do will beco imes o y that u m o s et ist. But comic art e things a ou to m k y e k i l e w can't do.” that you
“Also I like th e table, it was a good way to bring the enclos ure of time into a 3D work.”
t for Yeah bu ot so is n me this o I have clear. S ing it, do to keep w? n y'k o
Yeah yeah I know... gh. Fair enou
2,50 please.
How much is it?
Yo Mark!
Yo Pedro! How was your assessment?
It was pretty good actually. I think this time I got it.
Now my next and final project will be a graphic novel. It seems like the next step for me.
Dope! About what?
Like your Sketch Diaries?
By the way, I bought the chicken soup you asked me for.
Kind of. But this time in colors and with more pages. I intend to be more psychological too.
Chicken soup? Wtf? Pedro, I had texted you for some kitchen soap, man!
Sick! Can't wait!
Hi Rachel. What'up Pedro?
you I thought k to c had get ba Brasil.
I think I've never totally come back.
My life here was so different. That release from our real life that we feel in our life here. You try and enjoy these last months. For me they were gone so fast.
Yeah... I'm already missing this place.
I don't exactly miss it here. 'Cause everything looks like a dream that I just woke up from. And now...
I don't know exactly where to put these memories in my mind.
And how is your graphic novel doing?
I'm almost finishing it. By the way, do you mind if I draw this conversation?
I fucking love these lights.
Why? That is a good question. Why?
I don’t know. It's... It's the core of doing something like this. It's an...
I'm a writer.
And I want to do it as good as I can, almost at every cost. I mean...
If I could cut my left arm off to do a good novel, I would do it.
Welcome everyone to my final presentation.
This second semester I've done an autobiographical graphic novel, about my one year living here.
Comics language has always been my main interest while talking about time.
Also I made a digital version...
Since my exchange period is coming to an end, seeing myself as a character in a comic book is a good way to deal with my twelve months here.
Then we can read it bigger, at the same time. I'm not sure if we have enough time, but at least the first chapter.
Also some of the originals are on the wall, to show the process evolving.
Finally! Hello, Pedro!
Sit here, we need to talk. I'm worried about you, my dear.
These times I'm feeling a little bit disconnected from you.
Yeah...I know. I haven't drawn you in a long time.
A long time you haven't drawn me? What do you mean?
But it's all good. I'm trying to be more autobiographical now.
Yeah, y'know... One of my old comics characters.
Oh my god... I knew you were going mad. All that messed up thing about merging life and art.
Wake up, Pedro! I've never been a character of yours. It's YOU that are one of my characters.
What?
Yes, my dear. You're sort of my alter ego. C'mon y'know...
I am an old lady, with some regrets. I've created you to live things that I've never had time to do.
Am I not real? Are you kidding me? What about my family, my friends, my graphic novel...
Fuck! Did you also create my graphic novel?
Graphic novel? No! I'm not a visual artist. I'm a writer. And this conversation is the end of my last book.
You're a writer...
So, you're a wrote writer. You is all of th .
Wait!
Everything here is only words, right?
Yep.
ting Even this floa ? light over here Did you also write it?
No no...I don't know about it. I just described “a big dark room full of piles of books�. No details.
Exactly!
We can only see the light because I drew it. I am the one who fills the empty spaces in your mind.
Without me, your imagination is completely dark. If I don't draw, you become as unreal as me.
I see...
Okay, my dear. Perhaps I'm one of your characters too...
Or I'm having a really weird existential crisis here. Actually, I don't care that much. You know that phrase?
It's like “If someone wrote it, it's real.� So in the end... what's the difference?
Well... Okay.
Then... I'm real too. I'm still here... right?
Yes, I'm still here.
Of every reality I could tell, I've chosen this one. And if you are reading it, I can feel a little bit more life inside...
myself.
To my family and friends Many thanks to Jonas, Paula and CiĂŞncias sem Fronteiras
PedroVรณ
PedroVoh