In 1986 I moved to London with my then wife, now opera singer Hege Høisæter. She studied musical theatre while I continued my close collaboration with Dag Kolstad, Terje Nordberg and Petter Engbo at the comics publisher Gevion.

To secure UK residence and work permits, Terje wrote an official confirmation to the British authorities stating that the publisher had more than enough assignments for me as an artist.

At the same time, I worked closely with Dag on the monthly humour magazine Pyton, while Terje wrote scripts for several comics I illustrated. We produced many projects, but above all we focused on the Troll albums. It was a literal adventure series in the Franco-Belgian tradition: full-colour A4 albums, 44 pages, four strips per page.

The first album, Sølvskatten, came out in 1988, followed by Urgrims hemmelighet in 1990.

The publisher also released Nissens jul, where Terje and I contributed four short holiday stories: Trolljul (1989), Du grønne glitrende (1990), Den late julebukken (1991), and Som julekvelden på trollkjerringa (1992).

Those rural fantasy stories were drawn in metropolitan London, with Japanese calligraphy pens from specialist shops in Soho and colours bought from Chromacolour near Tottenham Court Road. Even after we moved to Oslo, I kept returning to London for tools, books and inspiration.

Arild MidthunSon, April 2024