Sunday, November 25, 2012 Ceramic heads / processes

I've been having weekly sessions in a ceramics studio the past few months, getting to grips with what I want to make and the best ways to do it. I had just figured this stuff out at the studio I went to in Brooklyn, and then I went and moved to London and every studio has totally different glazes as materials that all interact differently... so it was back to square one! Most of the glazes they have are wonderful textural, dynamic colours which are totally unpredictable every time, and not great for adding illustrative detail. So I've been working on combinations to try to get the little bits of detail i want (but I'd never want anything tooo clean now, would I).

Here's the results of some of this experimentation - a whole group of candle holder heads. You may remember the first one I made in NYC from this post. She's the one on the far right in these group shots.

Second from the right is creepin' me out allll daaaay evvvverryyy daaay.
And the second and third from the left have their faces painted with the exact same thing - but the white glaze underneath is different. It changes the result so much! Something to do with their chemical makeups. I like playing with this stuff. And oh yeah, how great is that turquoise that's inside some of their heads? I love that colour.

Ok, so now I've figured these out a little better, I can start making something that actually looks how I planned. Hopefully. Ace.

Friday, November 23, 2012 Comics Sketchbooks

Well this is exciting. A couple weeks ago I got a very nice parcel in the mail, containing this book. That would be good enough, but the best bit about it is: I'm frickin in the book. The legendary Steve Heller asked me to send him some sketchbook scans and final pieces for this project a couple years ago, and I'm amazed and happy to see that they made it into the book. Look at this!

Uh, yeah, that's my name in the contents page in some pretty intense company - Charles Burns?! Robert Crumb?! Ben Katchor?! Not to mention my ol' man. So rad.

And that's one of my two spreads.

I cannot express how flattering and great it feels to be in this most excellent book. Time to knuckle down and make all those comics I keep meaning to make. Huge thanks to Steve Heller.

Monday, November 19, 2012 Garden days

A few photos from a roll of film that's a couple of months old. Back when it was warm and we could sit and work in the garden. It's a funny little garden with not much to be said for it but we enjoyed working to make it nice. The cat loves the garden whatever it looks like. Everything in it is so fascinating to her. In this photo Lion is pulling up one of the many bricks we found buried in the earth. The cat can't believe it.

That picnic table is our pride and joy. Thanks, ebay. We ate many nice breakfasts at it before it got too cold. Now for a few months the table will be used only by the fatty little squirrels, while we're busy clinging to radiators inside.

Sunday, November 18, 2012 Hairbrushing

Sunday night drawing.

Tuesday, November 6, 2012 IVs

I did a drawing for the NYT letters page yesterday. A heavy subject - the debate around assisted suicide. It was an interesting one to work on, and good to finally do something with Alexandra Zsigmond for the letters page, after being foiled by timing a few times before (these drawings have a super speedy turnaround!). So here it is.

And you can read the letters on the subject here, if you didn't catch them in yesterday's paper.