PON illustration Kymintehdas

P.-O. Nystrom (1925-1996) was a graphic designer and illustrator, who signed his work with his initials PON. Starting from the late 50s, he drew more than 10,000 editorial illustrations for Hufvudstadsbladet, the leading Swedish language newspaper in Finland. PON's cartoon work might be described as steinbergesque, his line was very simplified and his concepts rather more aphoristic and metaphorical, than built on straight-forward punchlines. Thus finding these landscape illustrations of the Kymintehdas paper mill in Kuusankoski came as a delightful surprise to me - I hadn't seen his work in this style before. This drawing is made directly with a ballpoint pen, with no visible layout or construction lines. The confidence of the sketchy, Henrik Tikkanen -inspired lines is a delight to look at, and show a flashy flair that to me marks this as a work of a commercial illustrator rather than a so-called "fine" artist.
For his dayjob, Nystrom worked at an ad agency in Helsinki for forty years. (Some of his commercial posters are included in the collection of MoMA in New York). This drawing is marked on the back as a gift from the company's director, dated October 31, 1972. Paper companies used to be very important big clients for ad agencies, their annual reports alone were often big, lavish productions. That makes me think that these drawings were actually illustrations done for some such purpose, rather than mere landscapes to be displayed on a wall.