'Hedebyxorna', a parody of the popular Swedish TV series 'Hedebyborna', from the Swedish version of Mad Magazine, issue #5, 1982.
Torvald Sundbaum was a Swedish comic artist, best-known for his work for the Swedish edition of Mad Magazine from the 1960s through the 1990s. Other work includes 'Buster Perk', which he took over from Göte Göransson in Dick vid Radiopolisen between 1954 and 1956. He also made a celebrity comic based on Gunnel Linde's radio series 'Osynliga Klubben' in Åhlén och Åkerlund (1959).
'Osynliga Klubben'.
Early life and career
Torvald Sundbaum was born in 1928 as Sven Sundbaum in Linköping, in southern Sweden. He enjoyed drawing from a young age.
Dick vid radiopolisen
In 1953-1954, Sundbaum was assigned to draw a Swedish version of the popular U.S. police comic series 'Sgt. Pat of the Radio Patrol' by Eddie Sullivan and Charlie Schmidt. This local version was released under the Swedish title for this comic, 'Dick vid Radiopolisen'' and serialized in Serieförlaget.
Buster Perk
In 1954, Sundbaum took over the 'Buster Perk' (1953-1956) comic from Göte Göransson. Göransson had launched this detective comic in Buffalo Bill in 1953, featuring the adventures of journalist Buster Perk who, together with his sidekick Plåt-Pelle, solved crimes. When Sundbaum took over the pencil, 'Buster Perk' had just moved to the landscape format-shaped comic book Dick vid Radiopolisen and its successors Mysteriemagasinet and Stjärn-Magasinet, all published under Bonnier's Serieförlaget imprint. It also inspired its own "Buster Perks Deckarklubb" ("Buster Perk's Detective Club"), which had 35,000 members at the top of its popularity in 1960. The club operated as a general detective fiction fanclub, since at this point the 'Buster Perk' comic had already been canceled. The final 'Buster Perk' comic ran in the 19th issue of Fantomen magazine in 1956. It was replaced by the American comic 'Jet Scott' by Jerry Robinson and Sheldon Stark, which, ironically enough, kept continuing under the title 'Buster Perk'.
Osynliga Klubben
Sundbaum subsequently drew the comic based on the radio series 'Osynliga Klubben' ("The Invisible Club") by Swedish children's author Gunnel Linde. It dealt with a group of kids solving crimes and also spawned a series of children's books. In 1959, Bonnier (previously Åhlén & Åkerlund) released a magazine based on 'Osynliga Klubben', complete with, of course, a humorous comic version of the popular series, drawn by Sundbaum. But the magazine only lasted six issues.
Mad Magazine
The Swedish edition of the American satirical comic magazine Mad was launched by Rolf Janson and Williams Förlag in 1960. Besides material from the American original, "Svenska MAD" also ran humorous work by local artists in order to satirize typically Swedish phenomena. Sundbaum was present from the first issue in 1960, and remained a prominent contributor until the end of the magazine's original run in 1993. Among the other local cartoonists were Bowen, Bengt Sahlberg, Alf Woxnerud and Folke Hallin, who were later joined by David Liljemark, Daniel Ahlgren and Johan Wanloo. Sundbaum also designed a Mad-themed board game, 'Götebörsen' (1976), spoofing Monopoly, with references to Swedish culture. The game was released as a supplement to Svenska Mad issue #4 (1976) and later re-released as a supplement to Svenska Mad's stora julpajare (1982).
Graphic contributions
Sundbaum illustrated the cover of Rickard Fuchs' book 'Fy skäms så uppför man sig inte' (Helsingborg, Allerbok, 1981). Another recognizable image to tourists of the 1960s is the 'Scandinavia - Your Vacation Playground' poster, which Sundbaum designed for Scandinavian Airlines. It depicts various picturesque images of Swedish people, designed in the shape of the Swedish map. As an advertising artist, he designed the mascot of crisps company OLW, a wolf named 'Olwen'. During the 1980s, the canine appeared in many ads and also on the crisp bags themselves. Sundbaum also drew a food piramid where every ingredient was anthropomorphized.
Sundbaum was also active as an album cover designer. He livened up the covers of the comedy compilation record 'Sveriges Roligaste Skiva' (1979), the musical album 'KENT - En Musical För Folk' (1985) and Kjell Swanberg & Bengan Wittström's live comedy album 'Knattetyder' (1986), based on the popular radio show 'Plattetyder'.
FInal years and death
In 1990, when Rune Andréasson, creator of the popular Swedish children's comic 'Bamse' retired, many writers and artists applied to take over the series. Sundbaum was one of them. Interviewed in Bamse issue #31, Sundbaum revealed that it was more complicated than he thought. He managed to crank out five stories before throwing in the towel. The series was simply too far removed from the kind of comics he was used to making.
Torvald Sundbaum passed away in Stockholm on 25 January 2018, at the age of 89.
'Osynliga Klubben'.