Happy St. George's Day!

One from the vaults.

Zip It

For the past week, I've been experiencing something strange and foreign to me in recent times. It's been a little unsettling; I've not really known what to do with myself. Yes, I have had some Illustration-Free Time. Blummin' 'eck, has it been nice. No rest for the wicked, though, it's back to the grindstone good and proper come Monday, but this week I've been knitting a little, sewing a tad, and trying to get out in the fresh air a bit more now it finally looks like it might be spring.

Inspired by Lovely Annie saying "Gorn, give it a go", and some fabbo transistor radio-printed linen Lovely Sam gave me last year, plus online tutorials on Craftsy, I finally plucked up enough courage to make a cushion cover WITH A ZIP. This is a big deal; I've always chickened out and just gone for envelope openings in the past. But I threw caution to the wind and Just Did It. It's a little wonky at one end, but for a first go, I'm pretty happy. And it looks fab on my Enormous Chair, too:

I can also feel smug that using up the fabric is helping my "Reduce" plan for 2013; more on that soon.

MMA 2013

Back in January, I rashly decided to join in with MMA 2013, in the fanciful belief I probably wouldn't have much on end of Feb/beginning of March and would have plenty of time to devote myself to something. Ahem.

The idea behind MMA, or Mail Me Art, is that you take an envelope, create a piece of artwork using NO DIGITAL MEANS upon it, and post it off. The addition of stamps, post marks, scribbles or dents only increases the appeal of the final art as it arrives (or not, as the case may be) at its final destination.

This is my entry, Parcel (to be pronounced in dubious French accent) the dragon:

Not having access to Ctrl+Z was perhaps the hardest thing I've had to face in my recent career; I'd almost forgotten how to use real paint with a brush! I think he's come out OK, though. I do like using brown paper to draw on, it's a little less intimidating than a big, ol' blank white space, and limiting your palette is always much more fun than using every colour under the sun. And he's up there in my banner, too.

There is going to be an exhibition in London in August and a book of all the entries to follow. Can't wait to see them all in the flesh, but there is an online gallery of those received so far up here.

The Living Wall

These are like something out of Knightmare or The Brothers Grimm. Beautiful, yet just a little bit creepy, but always astounding.

See more at The Living Wall.

Fame at Last!

So now I've had a bit of a breather, it's given me a bit of objectivity to be able look back on what I've been working on over the past couple of months without screaming "NO! NO! TAKE ME AWAY FROM ALL THIS! I CAN'T DRAW ANYTHING ELSE!!!!"

One of the most exciting projects has been some development work for Egmont, in particular, their new imprint, The Red Shed. Here is the Rights Guide brochure they had printed to take to the Bologna Book Fair last month (with lovely cover art by Ben Scruton), and there is lil' ol' me in my spot within:





If you've been popping in now and again, the Red Shed stuff has been what I term "The Goo Project" and it's the Instagram photos of green, slimy crazy professors, bugs (don't EVER Google Image Search an eyelash mite - just don't. You don't want the nightmares), poo, wee, farts, brains, witches etc etc you would've seen.

I'm just finishing off a few bits and pieces of the initial work in time for the London Book Fair next week, then, hopefully, it will become a whole book. Full of farts.

More WIP

WIP

Batemans

Home of Rudyard Kipling, now run by the National Trust.