We all started our final day at the fair with a little cold we hat caught the day before, but we fought bravely against it with a lot of free christmassy tea from the Yogi-Tee booth at the other side of the hall. We had a lot of visitors this day, professional art directors and editors, photographers, cartoon and comic artists and curious people who got interested, because we didn’t show photographs like all the other image agencies around us.
The signing session was not really well attended, mostly due to the fact that we didn’t do much advertisement for it on the fair. It didn’t show up in the catalogue and schedules around the fair – we signed to the fair very late, after the deadlines of all the catalogues, flyers and press material that was printed for the fair. However, many of the little signing sessions and public readings of unknown and popular authors among the fair weren’t popular either. The visitors flocked to the stands as soon as they heard the popping of opened sparkling wine bottles.
In the end of the 3rd and final day at the fair, Nils, Frank and I were exhausted, but content and happy. Personally, I enjoyed it. I have been on several fairs in my life like the automobile fair IAA and the consumer electronics fair IFA, both in Berlin, but the Frankfurt Book Fair was different. It was not about some shiny happy-making flatscreens and video games, not about fast or fancy little cars. this fair presented art, true art.
Of course, there was a lot of business going round there, people in black suits and suitcases making deals and contracts on one side and silly crime and love novels on the other side. But I had a feeling that all those people on the fair shared a true love or at least interest in art, in fantasy or in knowledge. I have to admit that I do not really like Frankfurt (though I just have been there for two times, I’m eager to get convinced of the opposite, dear Frankfurters!) and the way motorists are treated, but the atmosphere was mainly charming.
Nils and I returned to Jan in Ladenburg (where we lived during the Fair) for the last time. We rushed through the county this evening with joy, visited a ska concert (Skall & Crossbone) in a youth club in Mannheim and the 25th anniversary party of the famous drum & bass club “Connection”.
The next day, the three of us and Jan’s housemate drove to the beautiful city of Heidelberg, where we climbed the approx. 300 steps of the stairs to the castle. You have a great vista up there on the valley of Heidelberg and the famous bridge, where, according to a legend, the former federal chancellor of Germany, Helmut Kohl, used to sit on in his student’s ages, eating apple puree. Some tourists from Russia and Japan asked me to make a snapshot of them with their cameras.
In the evening hours, Nils and I got on our 600 kilometers way back to Berlin. We had some great company – the radio stations of Hessia, Thuringia and Brandenburg played some great German folk music and nice Techno sets from the local discos while we flew over the dark autobahn.
we (that’s Nils and myself) just arrived at the Frankfurt Book Fair 2009 after a high-speed drive (medium speed: 140km/h) from Berlin with our fire-red Fiesta (because we couldn’t a-ford a better one). It got a little bit windy and freezy in the valley of Frankfurt, but the atmosphere is charming-warming in the halls of the fair. However, I didn’t prepare our visit very well – that’s why we had some problems to find an appropriate parking lot.
Our PR assistant Frank arrived in the morning from Essen, so he represented toonpool.com in the early hours of the fair. We met cartoon artists Marlene Pohle and Michael Holtschulte, and Michael he agreed to make a signing session at our booth as well (to all of the fair visitors: please consider the signing session of Bernd Pohlenz on Thursday at 4PM and with Katharina Greve on Friday, same time).
Win a day ticket for the Frankfurt Book Fair 2009! Just send an e-mail with the subject “Frankfurt I come” to [email protected].
(Only applicable on Thursday & Friday. Travel costs not included. Any recourse to courts of law is excluded.)
Cheers,
~max
toonpool.com, largest cartoon community worldwide, will present you and your fine artworks at the Frankfurt Book Fair 2009, largest book fair of the world.
Joining the fair with our toonpool.com’s exhibition stand will take place from October 14 to 16.
The Frankfurt Book Fair is a meeting place for the industry’s experts. Be they publishers, booksellers, agents, editors or art directors – each year in October, they all come together and create something new. We expect many visitors from newspapers, magazines, book companies and online media – and we hope to get into many new contacts and cooperations. We already received many registrations for meetings at our exhibition stand by managers from leading book companies, magazines or the Washington Post for example. Some of toonpool.com’s artists will be present at our stand for signing art prints by hand.Location of our stand:
Buchmesse Frankfurt, Zentrum Bild (Halle 4.1 – Q539)
Address:
Ludwig-Erhard-Anlage 1
60327 Frankfurt am Main
Germany
Opening hours:
Wednesday to Friday: 8.00 am – 7.30 pm
Within next days, we will keep you informed about the event in our toonpool.com-Blog with current news. Thanks by heart for joining toonpool.com – we will continue to do our best to perform and promote your art!
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Friends of toonpool who will also be around our booth are Nils Panik, Frank Tölle, Katharina Greve, Tobias Schülert, Marlene Pohle, Maria N. Gatti (Washington Post), Amy Lago (Washington Post)…
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