I asked Orjan Gerhardsson, who is behind Bakhåll's John&Yoko publications, about his views on working with Yoko Ono.

Yes, I have met Yoko several times as I have done a number of projects with her -- 2 John Lennon books with bonus CDs and 3 Yoko Ono books with bonus discs -- all of these projects supervised by Yoko. Mostly the discussions have been through her assistants -- I send the material to them and they show it to Yoko when she has the time -- as you kow she is a very busy person -- and they tell me what she said and what to do next, necessary changes etc -- but for the most important things I have met her in person and discussed with her directly.

She is very, very nice to work with. She is such an expert on every level of every kind of project, she knows exactly how she wants things to be. E g: for this new book I showed her six different suggestions for the layout of the cover and she chose one of them in a fragment of a second.

I guess this is part of her greatness, that she has the capacity to be involved with everything from the most important decisions of the huge projects to the smallest details in the smaller projects. How many superstars can manage that? Yoko is the best! And yes, I am a Yoko fan, since long before I had the opportunity to be in contact with her, so this is a dream come true, it's a feeling you have as a fan: that it is impossible to actually get contact, so when it happens it feels unreal!

My favorite Yoko piece? Well I like them all, I like her most heavy strange experimental music pieces as well as her lighter hit kind of songs, and I like her art, and I like what she writes. My latest favorite is the text "The Word of a Fabricator" that ends this new book. I am not sure I understand it, but I like it very much, and I keep re-reading it. I think it is about that there are no truths, there are only "truths", there is always an element of will-power, of subjectivity, even in science and certainly in politics, and we are all fabricators of "truths", we must be, we must all fabricate our "truths" for a better world!

more information

Check out Bakhåll's Yoko Ono / John Lennon related publications
The AIU bibliography: our John&Yoko book guide