Angouleme again

Another sojourn in the capital of comics.

Cliodnah minds the store.

Mezzo draws to LC Ulmer's blues

Heavenly Crumb Sandwich

Keep on trucking

Tower of pen power

Heading home For more and much better pictures CLICK HERE to Sean Azzopardi's site.

And the second

Two more packages have arrived containing the next issue of Panic Attacks and a selection of Most Natural-themed greeting cards! Woop! Off to see Viv Albertine speak at St Martins this evening with a contingent of original punkettes, along with some of the new generation. Keep 18 February free, London folk, and watch this space - as I will soon be announcing an event.

And again

I have just sent ANOTHER comic off to the printers. I am on FIRE! Part three of Panic Attacks, 36 pages of comicky awesomeness, will be ready in time for Angouleme. Well done me.

Going french

After so many trips to Angouleme I have finally got round to translating a selection of material for the french. ABOUT BLOODY TIME.

Pics from Angouleme

Having recovered from my aprés con lurgy, here are the few non blurry photos worth posting.

Dutch posters were too covered in glue to steal

Sally Anne engages with the customers

Old friends

A big plate of vegetables at Le Terminus

Hugo holds forth

It's over for another year

Sean's got it all on camera

Loitering with intent

Just in case it wasn't clear enough

Sketches from the frontline

I made it home with my sketchbook this time. Unfortunately I managed to leave my copy of Jennifer Hayden's excellent Underwire on the train. You win some, you lose some...

Angouleme was a treat comme d'habitude. Great exhibitions, such as Dreams in Comics, which features plenty of Windsor McKay of course, but 70 other artists are on show. Quite a few strips involve sexual fantasies and neuroses of all sorts (Guido Crepax anyone?) with the odd one covered to shield it from the innocents' gaze. It is always a joy to peruse gorgeous artwork from Hugo Pratt, Fred, Moebius, etc etc – the list is endless. I particularly enjoyed the anxiety dream from JC Menu where president Mitterand comes to visit and he can't find anything to show him. He ends up having to give the first lady one of his rare vintage American comics.

The Willem exhibit was particularly fascinating, I emerged after an hour and a half having only read and examined half of it.

The Dutch contingent who designed and screenprinted posters over the four days were a brilliant idea led by Joost Swarte. I did not regret getting up extra early to catch his joint talk with Willem.

While I was in revelling in the Willemness of it all, Sally Anne was having a Dash Shaw fest with a talk, book signing, and generally spotting him around the place. The social aspect is also important, as we met old friends and acquaintances and made new ones. My fellow Dessinators Sean, Sally Anne and Oliver were once again perfect travelling companions, and my brother Hugo joined our gang for a while.

And to compensate for last year's sad loss, I managed to capture Willem afresh while he drew me an fabulous personalised dedicace.

What we will do

This time next week...

Springing back into action

OK. I'm back. First more Angouleme report: before it all evaporates, I will mention some more highlights. Comes, master of black and white compositions and tales of witchcraft in rural Ardennes, was celebrated with an exhibition and saluted with a standing ovation at the closing ceremony. But as I check the Angouleme website for a link to his artwork, I find that we have just lost another great. There was a fascinating lecture from Jean Pierre Dionnet about mysterious italian fumetto artist Devi, a chance to catch Vuillemin in the flesh being quizzed about press cartooning , lovely nibbles and drinks at the opening of Brecht Evens'La Boite a Gand exhibition, and much hilarity at the polling booth when exercising our right to vote. Disappointments included the Spirou documentary and the Uderzo exhibition ( not enough original artwork among the blow-ups of pages and giant fibreglass models). And I never found my sketchbook. However I will move on. And draw more sketches. Like this. I will be appearing at Comiket next month, and have applied for table space at MCM London, along with my good friends The Dessinators.

Sketchless

A terrible thing happened on the way back from Angouleme. Somehow my sketchbook went missing. I have not entirely given up hope but it is fading fast and I have no sketches to post. This year had been particularly magical as I got the chance to cast my vote for one of my all-time heroes of the pen to be the next President of the Jury, the incredible Willem. And not only had I had the chance to shake his hand, and subsequently have a few beers in his company, he had drawn in said sketchbook, examined it, and I had made several sketches of him. However he won the prize (Hallelujah!) and so he will be back next year. Though in his capacity as King of the Festival he may not be as free to mingle anonymously again.

Apart from this upsetting hiccup, the festival was as usual a joyous five days of exhibitions, talks, meeting old chums and new, with a lot of sketching and a bit of selling. And Hugo finally made the trip and joined me for two and a half days of boulimie BD. I will report in more detail in my next post.

Dessinators are go

It's been a while – I won't go in to the events of the last few months, suffice to say, Angouleme is upon us, and we are once again heading to foreign parts to spread the word of the London comics. We are now The Dessinators, a name which I believe will stick. Sean, Sally Ann, Dan, Oliver and I will be manning the table as usual. This year we will be flanked by none other than Paul Gravett, Peter Stanbury and the Comica Festival gang on one side, and the lovely Italians of Passenger Press on the other. Come and pay us all a visit in the Alternative Press tent. I have been preparing for the trip, as my kitchen bears witness.

So much more I forgot to mention

In December, Nick and I had our very own Christmas outing at the Royal Festival Hall where we caught John Waters' Christmas show which was hoot, and prompted me to book tickets for a family night out for my birthday to see Henry Rollins doing his amazing two-and-a-half-hours-without-drawing-breath feat of holding an audience spellbound. The man has matured like a fine tattooed wine into a rich, well rounded and full bodied (still super-fit) vintage.

Angouleme talks also included a very entertaining Eddie Campbell/Paul Gravett interface, which ended bizarrely with the trailer for an as yet not-made TV sitcom starring Eddie as himself, and I did manage to get a seat at the Menu and Pakito Bolino RAW talk, but had to excuse myself half-way through due to a mystery virus that swept through our group. Chance sightings included Menu (again), Lewis Trondheim, Joe Sacco and Charles Burns, Art Spiegelman and Francoise Mouly, one of the joys of the festival being the almost rubbing shoulders with so many of one's heroes.
The sense of camaraderie with all our fellow brits, from Paul and Peter, to Dan Berry, Ellen and Steven, Gary and Lauren, Tony Bennett, the Orbitals Camilla, Simon, and Tom and many more, extends to those from further afield, catching up with old faces (hey Abbie and Xavier!) and meeting new ones like our excellent table neighbours, Tom Scioli and Chris Fitzer from Adhouse Books, and even to Jessy and the gang on the other side (pics above by Oliver Lambden, see more here).

This is me with the wonderful Kivi Larmola and Sanna Karvonen whom I met in Angouleme last week ( pic by Sean Azzopardi, check out his report).

Rubberstamp of excellence

So much to catch up on as there have been no postings since well before Christmas.
Well, there was Duckie, a fairly pleasant couple of days of moderate sales in the foyer of the Barbican. The festive season was rounded up with a few days down in Kent for Nick and myself — we spent a couple of nights at the Linen Shed, a fabulous B&B in Boughton under Blean, just outside Faversham, being spoilt rotten gourmet by Vicky Hassan with her gourmet breakfasts and tempura mattresses. New Year's Eve was Nico and the gang at the Anchor for music and good times.

End of January saw Sean, Sally Anne, myself and Oliver heading back to France for our yearly pilgrimage to Angouleme. This time Art Spiegelman, with Françoise Mouly, curated a smorgasbord of talks, exhibitions and events, which managed a perfect balance between French and American comic history. There was a magically dreamlike Fred display at the Hotel St Simon, and Spiegelman's own retrospective showed the man's achievement in the right (gloomy) light; the tinyness of the Maus original artwork a revelation.

Other favourites were the Sardon rubberstamp exhibit, the party at the Maison des Auteurs and the work on show there, while the big disappointments were Chris Ware's no-show, and not managing to get in to the Charles Burns or the Fred talks.




However Sally Anne
and I did get to meet
Aline Kominsky
and her very cool bag!

Angouleme Comics 2011

My second visit to Angouleme was a more relaxed experience than the first.
For starters I knew now that spending six days with my chosen companions would not ruin our friendship. This year, Dan Lester, Sean Azzopardi, Oliver Lambden and myself were joined by Sally-Anne Hickman and Rob Jackson. Though quite a large crowd to squeeze behind a table, we rubbed along fine, wandering off at will to check out the rest of the festival. Our spacious lodgings meant we could chill out by the fire and play pool when we had tired of the frenetic bar-hopping and party-seeking. Having scoped out the layout and the town previously made it easier to plan my sorties and hone in on the bits I fancied seeing. And not being so overwhelmed by the whole hugeness of it all made it easier to take in.
There were familiar faces – it was lovely to catch up with Abby Denson, Tim Fish and Xavier Lancel back again on the LGBT stand. Sally Anne and I popped over to the theatre where they appeared on a panel alongside Fred Harper and Charlie Adlard.
This time I checked out the permanent collection at the museum as well as the excellent Parodies exhibit, while Baru's wall of artwork was pretty humbling.

We made the effort to get to the Castro Building on Saturday morning where Dash Shaw, Marc Bell and John Pham gave a most entertaining and informative talk.
There were more brits than last year: the Nobrow group and Pittville Press were also exhibiting, Karrie Fransman brought a delegation from the London Print Studio and Dan Berry was teaching at the Maison des Auteurs. Let's not forget Ellen Lindner, gamely touting the Comix Reader, who could be found recovering in Le Chat Noir alongside Stephen Betts, Cliodnah Lyons, Tanya Meditzsky , Patrice and John Aggs and Gary Northfield. We even bumped into Alex Potts of Turd Party fame.
We had some fantastic neighbours in the tent. Adriano Barone and Christian Marra of Passenger Press were unfailingly warm and their sense of humour was as off-colour as ours.
Now home and suffering from a mysterious virus, I am working my way through my bunch of swag. Wednesday's official Comix Reader launch party helped to alleviate the withdrawal from 24hr comic immersion, and most cheering was a favourable mention of my contribution in this review of Solipsistic Pop 3

Hiatus over

Angouleme is fast approaching and I need to get my act together. Like last year a contingent of B.A.S.T.A.R.D.S, will be heading down to South West France to represent the British Independent Comic Scene. This time our numbers will have swelled to six with the addition of the gorgeous Sally-Anne Hickman and the brilliant Rob Jackson. I am really looking forward to the trip; knowing what to expect removes any trepidation about whether the table will be big enough or the accommodation suitable – one does feel a certain responsibility as organiser . I can relax and concentrate on making the most of the experience. Plus we will be travelling on my birthday...
Christmas and New Year went by smoothly. Andrew came over and helped Granny move into her appartment, in time for Lucy to reclaim her room on her return from Quebec.
Life is gradually settling back into some kind of normality, I produced a review for Electric Sheep last week and will soon get back to the comic I was temporarily stuck on.
2010 was a tough one. Bring on 2011, I am ready!

Striptacular 2

I did it!
A brand new comic for your delectation, hot off the press, will be available from moi at the UKWebcomixthing tomorrow for the modest sum of £3.00.
Come on down to Mile End and grab yourself a copy!
There will be stickers too, and if you come later on, the Schmurgencon 4 awards are at the Globe, from 4.30 until closing time, just down the road. Uncompromising fun!

Angoocomic

I seem to be making progress.
Slowly.

Angouleme report

A week ago Monday I returned from the amazing 2010 Angouleme Comic Festival, but more pressing events quickly took centre stage .
Tragically, my father in law's health had taken a downward turn over the last month, and by Wednesday, a good and kind man had left us for good. Both Nick and his brother were in attendance, but the speed of Arthur's demise still left them reeling from the actual realisation that they were truly grown up. They wouldn't be able to ask Dad for advice... It's been a steep learning curve but things are now taking their course, the organising and sorting helping to channel the grieving process.
I won't be writing a full report on Angouleme, but have posted pictures on the B.A.S.T.A.R.D.S. site as well as on facebook
The whole shebang was totally awesome, I saw the likes of Robert Crumb and Aline Kominsky, Sempé, Moebius, Fred, Willy Lambil, Lewis Trondheim, Blutch, to name but a few, and even handed over comics to Ivan Brunetti and J-C. Menu. There were exhibitions, a museum, talks, we were interviewed for Chilean TV, consumed a lot of pizza and wine. We stayed in a lovely house and didn't fall out. We met some wonderful people, especially the lovely Abby Denson and Tim Fish who had come all the way from the States to the LGBT stand. Not only does Abby write and draw great comics, she's a punk musician, and writes a blog about cake!

angooblog

Some sketching on the train, including some(unfounded)worries about what to expect.








Saw Ivan Brunetti and Robert Crumb