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Epic Oil Paintings Depict a Superhero in His Elder Years

Meet Superfly: faster than a speeding flyswatter. As agile as a sexagenarian.
All images courtesy of artist

Even for the most glamorous cultural icon, the everyday routine still exists; even for the valiant, the humdrum still lurks up out of the corner of a consistent schedule. For Swedish artist Andreas Englund, the appeal of the everyday becomes slightly more bearable when your fictional protagonist is a superhero. With a collection of paintings featuring an elderly and caped Robin Hood character named “Superfly,” the painting series is a new take on the average life of a hero. The hilarity of a man, slumped from years of crime-fighting, waltzing through a normal day in stretchy suit paints a picture that could not be farther from comic book lore. In each animated oil painting, Superfly struggles through a buttoned-up dinner to avoiding the pesky presence of one of his own—a tiny fly.

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Englund tells The Creators Project about his work, explaining, “The name 'Superfly' has a dual meaning. I like to portray everyday situations with a twist. In this case with an old superhero. [Superfly] is anonymous but still very familiar. I can connect with him since, in my mind, he can any character I would like him to be.”

The artist works with oils, aquarelles (or thinly-applied watercolors), lithographs, and prints. The Superly series varies along three different themes, spreads across several settings, and expands with each new showing.

Superfly began showing June 17, 2016 at Ramhuset, a specialty crafts boutique in Falun, Sweden. It runs for less than a month. See more of Andreas Englund’s work on display and for purchase, here.

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