Speedo

I drew this on a card for my nephew Karl's 3rd birthday this September. The gift that I sent over to Berlin consisted of a pair of bright red Speedo swimming trunks and a giant red sausage balloon. Tagged to the balloon where very specific instructions for it to be blown up on the big day.

A short play...The Golden Hour

My partner Andrew Bridgmont is  putting on a play and I would like to sound it out here on the blog. This is the way that theatre practitioners in the industry go about getting their own work a platform, it may be an initial foot-hold before something like The Edinburgh Fringe Festival. He is a fantastic writer (and director), and has been an actor in the industry for 30 years and produced a number of other plays in the past...

To quote Andrew: "I came to the table with an idea based on a short story I had written and we began to talk about ways of bringing it to life in dramatic form. I would go away and come back with a rough draft. The actors would read it and then we would all discuss what seemed to be working and what needed to be looked at. We repeated this process. Three months and numerous drafts later we arrived at this slender 25 minute two-hander. Its next test is in front of an audience".

The play...

Lizzie has just murdered her pimp with a bottle of Moet champagne. Before facing the music she sets out to meet her final client, Frank.  Although it appears that his only interests are tea and the Foxtrot, Frank proves to be more than Lizzie ever thought possible. She is faced with a decision.                                                                                                

This 45 minute two-hander is a funny, erotic and ultimately moving portrait of a woman’s unconventional response to love, sex and ‘50’s Britain.

At:
The Concert Artistes' Association, 20 Bedford St, London WC2
Tues 1st Nov at 4pm and Wed 2nd Nov at 7.30pm.

The Poetry Cafe, 22 Betterton St, London WC2
Thurs 3rd Nov at 4pm and 6.30pm.

Do come along, any of my avid blog readers interested in a fine story told and performed by the finest.

Please RSVP your chosen performance for complementary admission and a glass of wine to: 
andrewbridgmont@hotmail.com or phone 0208 533 3954

Insert 1st Nov 2011: I am definitely planning to be at this show for the evening performances on Wednesday and Thursday, it would be really great to see you...I am looking forward to this!

Domestic Bliss...The Magnum Graphic Opus!

Today, I have gathered some aims. First off, I write this in mind of the lovely people out there who have purchased a copy of Domestic Bliss...we were all left with quite a cliff hanger! 

Will Bliss survive through her first few hair raising hurdles now that she has been left alone in the dark wild forest with nothing but fence-hopping amidst urban back gardens as her credential? She can be quick yes...but we hope not dead. What of the Hobnobs?...How can they cope without their cat in that big modern city? Will they be able to face their dark past now they don't have their pet for distraction?

When I produced the first episode of Domestic Bliss, it was quite high octane, as I was continuing pretty much straight from my M.A. which was intense. I had ignored some other very important things happening in my life, so that I could get the first episode done and flying, life's beginning to peel together somewhat, and only now do I get the benefit of hindsight. I had some confidence and pacing issues last winter, and unnecessary urgency which was destroying my relationship with the characters and the whole project. I had shifted studios and the many shifts took their toll more than expected. It is my first graphic novel, and a joy to learn about how one tackles all the different aspects of its creation let alone the marketing side.

It would be a good idea for me to explain some aims...I was a little myopic during it's launch which I forgive myself for. Vision sees it as unfolding; it's a case of getting the ball rolling and I had kind of imagined a bit of a recession of energies after Hatching the series. This has become a pattern; creations move around on the stove from front burner to back, because once new, it is quite vulnerable and I don't yet have appropriate objectivity. In the meantime I was able to Hatch a more matured project like OUCH!


My mission statement was that Bliss be a pleasure to create in my own time, and to tide over those gaps where one finds ones self in the freelance world ((Insert: 07.01.2012) this may change, though at this stage I won't predict). That has certainly been the case during this summers journey's with her. I might have found that honeymoon feel again. I aim to focus on pages for the next trailer through the winter, which will then involve collaboration. (My aims of getting episode 2 done by now have gone deep down the pan). I am considering a mixture of publishing options for the next one...perhaps print on demand for a while until I get the third...then fourth rolling etc, etc...they can then be priced a little more cheaply too, ((Insert: 07.01.2012) I predict that there will be between 5-7 episodes in total). The beauty of comics is their versatility and freedom. It has become a tendency of mine to work in seven year cycles...it should all turn into a large snowball, and...ROLL!

(As part of her extended launch phase) she is going to get some decent exposure now that a collection of four of the artworks including the front cover has just been published in The Association of Illustrators Annual catalogue: Images 35.

To see all pictures at their larger original size, click on the image once for the light-box.

Summer songs

Well, besides a lovely summer of getting my life into gear, I have had only a little time in between, to do my creative work, which I hope to remedy now that Autumn is in the air.

Days that I have managed to steel away to create have been spent in my new work space. A shed in the back garden (thanks for help from my father). 

I like to call it a "Chalet" of course...it's very exciting...a sort of 'Summer House' with a little veranda that you might imagine Huckleberry Finn to be sitting on in a rocking chair...(a bit older though, with a Jack Daniels and perhaps a guitar)...(and a fag). Inside, I aimed to keep furnishings minimal, so it kind of looks like a nunnery/school room, it feels quite colonial. 
It is a massive 2 by 2 meter square inside, and just the right size for my small table, a good chair, my old gas heater from the last, but one studio (Roger, you know them well), a nice rug, and lastly, a favourite framed original etching of mine from childhood, hung beautifully on it's own upon the white gloss walls. A green stain on the wood has made up for it's 'shed' look.
Andrew and I needed to re-sew a lot of grass which is now growing; much like my vigour.

Here is the table and my drawing board, and here she is at night...a little glowing light.
No more cellar (the place I have used to work in for some years on and off), goodbye depths, and hello garden!

My music inspiration this time is Meat Loaf. Oh, and Kate Bush too....just the kind of Beauty and the Beast scenario Meat Loaf might have imagined. I call them Kate Loaf and Meat Bush.
Below I share some wonderfully awful videos of Mr Loaf...
I wouldn't generally do this on my blog...I don't think... (who laid down the blog rules?) I simply must share a couple of examples from YouTube. Bat out of Hell goes without saying...

Modern Girl
Aside the even more awful recording where the sound falls out of sync at the end making it more like a badly dubbed B movie; here is the first of my inspirations...I reckon I may have pencilled the sheer vibe of this harmonious cocktail (not the video as much as the music and please note: the ferociously 80's looking, and extraordinarily choreographed women).  



                                                              

I Love it!

Dead Ringer for Love
Here we go, its Cher for this one,...pure unremitting SASS! (Definition: Ungodly amount of cool) = THE duo.                                                                                                           

I am all set with these tuneful comrades, I swear to God that listening to this stuff improves the work by half. Of course the space one works in makes all the difference and this...after years, has now become just how I like it.
My parting recommendation would be album collections: 'Piece of the action, The best of Meat Loaf' and 'Kate Bush, Hounds of Love'.

Rock and Roll.

A.O.I. Images 35 Exhibition...

I shall be exhibiting an illustration (Dawn in Darlesville) alongside selected illustrators for The A.O.I. Images 35: at The Bankside Gallery from the 25th of August to the 2nd September. For full details, follow this link 


This promises to be an illuminating show!

New online portfolio...

I have had some changes made to my website recently, and taken away all the past theatre examples; it is now purely a portfolio of my illustration work. Again...only in retrospect do I realise how helpful it was to air the theatre / Creative Partnerships educational work from previous years; online for a certain and relatively brief period of time; helpful for me and everyone. The reason why they had a brief stint is due to the data protection of the individuals and young people in the photographs, good for an inspiring boost but I would have to seek permission from each party in order to show them online.

There are some additional new illustration pieces in the simple-varied section, click here for a peek...

I am showing one of my theatre design commissions here on this website.
(29th July...retrospectives): The Miracle is a play (by Lin Coghlan) about a series of strange but profound events that take place amongst the community of a supposedly insignificant satellite town...
Designing The Miracle at Watford Palace (close to where I grew up), was like a rewarding tip of the ice-burg to some considerable years of feeling around in London within the sub-levels of cultural existence;...like an invention that has to be right, this show made me shiver as though something had been expelled. The show was performed for three nights (a common schedule for youth theatre).
I remain very proud of the work created by those involved in this production, it felt good to take leave for other re-inventions on such a high note. (It has been such an experience working with different directors on many new writing projects, I am so fuelled by it).

Fish puppet: two were made to be operated together during the play.

(The puppet's head comprises of two Balti dishes and a couple of small sieves).

An article worth looking at...

My brother just sent me this link to an article in the Guardian about regarded graphic novelists, and their appreciation of various contemporaries.
Thanks Simon, this is very much of interest.

Glorified Blog Doodles...

Grey areas 

Places where my mind wonders 

Then comes back

Two by Two

The Gas Tower Image has enjoyed life as a screen print short series made in 2006. The initial photo of a Gas Tower was taken on 2001 at Kings Cross, where quite a few of these (I feel) majestic Victorian structures were still standing, dotted about, rising out of the ground like bold yet fragile Halos. The photo was used to paint a backdrop for a youth theatre production that I designed: Electric Halos, written by Helen Adams performed at The Blue Elephant Theatre, produced by Antonio Ribeiro. The prints have homes now, (July 2013).

To see all pictures at their larger original size, click on the image once for the light-box viewer.

Two