The Daily Valdemar No. 50: May 2
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| Valdemar Andersen dated 1910.
Shown with permission from The Centre for Maps, Prints and Photographs, The Royal Library.
I apologize for the poor quality of the photo; it was taken by me for study purposes.
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It marks the birth of a cartoonist witnessed and documented in pencil on paper by another cartoonist, his own father.
The little Ib would have been three years old in 1910 and seems to have been given an (table?) easel that fitted his size. For a child his age he is highly concentrated and seems to have that smile that signifies every artist when the idea is coming alive on the paper or canvas before them. He is in communication with what he is creating and while he may have dropped the brush or pencil at one point, he seems to hold it with diligence in his hand.
His father is trying to catch his every move; capturing him from all angles, how he tilts his head to this side or is looking down at what he is making from another. The top of the paper carries a row of the boy's head again from all angles.
It is a sacred moment of a father seeking to capture not just the essence but every aspect of it, while not disturbing the artist in spe.
