The Adventures of Tintin and Nat: OPERATION CERBERUS

The Adventures of Tintin and Nat: OPERATION CERBERUS, originally uploaded by Nat Hansen.

A Tintin cover, featuring me (firing the Oerlikon cannon), as imagined and executed by my dad.

The description on the back of the painting reads:

Operation Cerberus, 2009
Gouache + ink on canvas

"Operation Cerberus" was the codename for the German squadron of ships which broke out of Brest to Germany via the English Channel. Also called the "Channel Dash".

Tintin pilots the Vosper MTB while Nat fires the 20mm Oerlikon at one of Gallano's famed "Yellow Noses". Captain Haddock brings another 60-round drum magazine to Nat.

Scharnhorst, Prinz Eugen and a destroyer evade the onslaught of the MTB.

Homage to Hergé and Nat.

(Compare the water in Operation Cerberus to the water on The Red Sea Sharks.)

A couple of years ago, he asked me for a list of potential custom Tintin scenarios to illustrate. Here is the list I generated:

1. Climbing up side of a Mosquito in flight suit, or running across an airfield towards some 1950s British jet fighter, or a souped-up Hawker Tempest or Sea Fury

2. Pushing through a secret door in a big library (like in the Black Island), revealing a storeroom full of crates of ammo and Schmeissers (or equivalent)

3. Firing a Bofors on the deck of a sub or destroyer, with the spider-web like gun sight, with big shell casings all over the deck

4. Being chased by a tank while driving an MG or an Austin-Healy

5. Driving a LRDG Land Rover with a bunch of Vickers machineguns,
maybe firing one with one hand at a runway full of parked Ju-88s