Fleet Street Rag

I've completed my strip, Quadlock: Same-Sex Marriage & Places of Worship, for Solipsistic Pop Five. This issue is somewhat different to earlier editions - all the strips are reportage pieces about the UK in 2012, with a small group of artists (including sterling creators such as Darryl Cunningham and editor Tom Humberstone) producing longer works than previously. Mine is eight pages long - this is an image from the foot of the first page: 

I've produced some non-fiction comics before - autobiographical, anecdotal and historical - but journalism in this form was a new challenge for me: my working process changed appropriately, and my area of focus narrowed on a specific sub-topic. It was interesting to ponder the jurisprudential niceties of the proposed legislation (in light of developments abroad), and I learnt far more about marriage law than I ever wanted to know in the research process.

I plan to elaborate upon the experience of creating this strip closer to the time of the book's release later this year. Before then, I recommend having look over at the website of the anthology/publisher. Edward Ross also posted a blog entry about his contribution, at which you may like to have a gander.

The Parchment is Hairy

I'm currently lettering my contribution to the fifth issue of Solipsistic Pop. At more than two thousand hand-lettered words across eight pages, it's probably hitherto my most textually dense strip.

Jon Chandler pointed me in the direction of an entry at Brain Pickings about monastic scribes' marginal lamentations. I love illuminated manuscripts and have been fascinated by the history of monastic book production for years - and one is brought very close to the life & sorrows of the monks by their quotidian complains.

One of them perfectly sums up my feelings this weekend: Writing is excessive drudgery. It crooks your back, it dims your sight, it twists your stomach and your sides.

A text box from 'Quadlock: Same Sex Marriage & Places of Worship'

Although the lettering in this my SP5 strip represents my most clean & consistent effort so far (I think), I'm still dissatisfied with its somewhat whimsical 'cartoon' style. I'm considering taking a calligraphy class in the hope that I'll be instructed in a hand with more gravity. (I'm also hoping to find a nib with which I'm comfortable, as there is little character in the even lines of Isograph pens.)

The last quotation from the Brain Pickings article speaks of the inevitable fate (& likely oblivion) of the artist & copyist: This is sad! O little book! A day will come in truth when someone over your page will say, 'The hand that wrote it is no more.' It's similar to the thoughts I have when watching early cinema footage: "All of the people in this frame are surely dead."

Music to Watch Pigs Fly

Since 2007, I've been a member of the band Decadence in Berlin, playing bass (and occasionally guitar), shouting & songwriting alongside my pal Graham & sister Lucy. Since Lucy & I moved to Manchester, the act's settled into a largely dormant state, getting together only for one performance up here, and another in Telford to 'promote' the release of our retrospective tape cassette album, Setbacks (released by Graham's record label, Distorted Tapes).

I designed a simple black-on-yellow sleeve intended to be reminiscent of cheap punk gig flyers. We've only produced fifty of them, so if you're interested, pick one up while they're available. Each unit comes with a unique download code for those of you without the obsolete technology necessary to use the tape itself. (Of course, I'm opposed to absolute exclusivity of content, so it'll also be available in a non-physical digital version soon.)

(The title of the blog post is my fanciful title for the album, at which Graham baulked.)

EDIT [21:11]: Apparently the digital version is already available.

EDIT [05/01/2013]: You can now purchase the tape from the Shop page.

Devon Knows I'm Excited

In my bid to exhibit at as many different comic conventions as often as I can afford and/or be bothered to, I'll be heading 'dawn sawf' again, hawking my rags in historic Exeter at the Comic Expo on 23rd September, which is taking place in the Rougemont Thistle Hotel.

© Fantasy Events

I've never attended this con, and so it'll be yet another fresh experience. (Considering my day-job in intelligence, I'm a bit lax with recon.) Mike Allwood of Fantasy Events UK tells me that they've been attracting an increasing number of small press exhibitors each year, and so I'm hoping to be part of a diverse occasion. (I think they're big into cosplay - perhaps I'll set aside my usual curmudgeonly ways & dress up as David Boring?)

If all goes to plan, I'll be releasing Killjoy #2 at the event. The second issue is going to comprise a number of short strips, rather than the issue-length narrative of the first - pursuant to my plan to alternate between the two practices for the first few issues.

The Con Artist

Being a Report of the Comica Comiket Spring 2012

21/04/2012: I woke up at a monkish hour to catch a coach to London. By 8.30am I was dazedly wandering the streets of Victoria looking for a place to acquire a score of pound coins for a float and a high-caffeine energy drink to shake off the lethargy following a sleepless 200-mile motorway journey. Then, off to Liverpool Street, towards to the location of the weekend's great cartooning event - the Comica Comiket.

The Great Hall of the Bishopsgate Institute is a lovely location for a comix fair - a pleasing balance of ornament and simplicity, big enough for festivity without the characterless enormity of a commercial convention centre. From the stage, Paul Gravett, the co-organiser of the event and its tireless MC, announced that it would be an event exclusively for independent material, intentionally free of superheroes and cosplay (although theoretically allowable if you really wanted them), stripped of all the extraneous bits of popular culture that are frequently bundled in with 'sequential art', focussing on the best aspect of comics: "comics."

Fake aloofness is cool, but evidently I'm not. Photo  © Camila (Orbital)

I had booked a third of a table, and was (rather self-servingly) pleased to find a little exam desk bearing my reservation card rather than a portion of space to be politely divvied up with strangers. I set up my wares much as I had done at the Thought Bubble Festival last November - for I had nothing new to show. (My table was marked for 'Pygmy King', my occasional alias; I'm not sure whether or not to stress the use of my birth name, but in this instance it didn't matter much.)

It was my first solo convention adventure, and I was lucky to be situated amongst a bunch of lovely creators/publishers - shout-outs to those sharing my modicum of aisle-space, Clíodhna 'Ztoical' Lyons, Robin 'Mogzilla' Price, and Ash Pure, and the two ladies across the thoroughfare, Jenika Ioffreda and Sarah Herman. I couldn't have asked for nicer neighbours. Thanks, too, to all the visitors & fellow exhibitors, fresh and familiar, who came over to chat and buy books. Of the latter concern, I was pretty happy to make enough profit to cover the cost of the table and travel - although probably not quite the food & drink, too. The money doesn't matter but getting the comic into more readers' hands is - well - 'what it's all about'.

Aside from the exhibition tables was the Drawing Parade, for which the stage was set up with a camera balanced above a draughting table, streaming the live sketching of name cartoonists. They were also asked to provide musical accompaniment for their 'performances': the first of the bunch, the esteemed Tom Gauld, chose Leonard Cohen's new album Old Ideas. A couple of my aforementioned comrades weren't happy to start the day with a soundtrack by the 'Bard of the Bedsit', but opening the day with Laughing Len's growl raised my already high spirits and seemed to deliver part of the promise that it would be a unique event in the Brit comix calendar. (Later, by contrast, there was a playlist of classic Eurovision entries - great fun!)

Clíodhna with the ears, me behind her. Photo © Ash Pure

Without a co-exhibitor to share the burden of commerce, I couldn't bring myself to have a proper look-round the hall, and bought only one comic, by Clíodhna. (As you can tell by the pedantic accent on the first vowel, I'm copying-and-pasting her name as I can't spell any appellations that aren't drab English standards.) Dan Berry suggested allowing for an 'exhibitor's hour' (my parlance) during which the creators could browse the other tables before the visitors' opening time; I'm not sure how viable this would be, but it would certainly give sellers a chance to experience all the new material, and meet/catch up with peers without the guilt of missed trade.

A few people asked me when to expect the next issue of Killjoy. Darryl Cunningham asked, and I said I'd have it done in a few months. Paul Rainey asked, and I said perhaps summer and almost certainly before Caption. A couple of other people asked later in the day, by which point August, initially a vague estimate, had become an official release date.

So, yes - August. Or perhaps July. Probably August. (Or later.)

[Thanks to brilliant people Camila & Ash for photographs. A compact camera is at the top of my shopping list.]