25th Nov

I’ve been listening to a lot of Nick Cave recently, the sound of the Proposition soundtrack in particular is so ominous and as a soundtrack seems to fit the road movie/desert setting of my strip. Also his murder/mayhem songs definitely evoke the same melodramatic tragedy I want. While there’s isn’t an obvious application for this music, I think it’s useful to think cross disciplinarily for idea generation. Also would be great to have It playing in a space where the images where displayed or used in an animation.

also I've been listening to a Velvet Underground song i hadn't heard before called Sad Song, to me it seems be about living in a bit of a fantasy world and the (minor) sadness that accompanies a return to reality. with this in mind I've been imagining a comparison of the biker murder with petty everyday incident, kid on bike etc

today I had a tutorial, was shown the work of Phillipe Guston which was a really good visual cue in terms of textural qualities and a cartoonish style made serious. Also encouraged to extend the narrative, world creation is definitely something I’m interested in as far as narrative fiction is concerned. In inventing a scenario you can control everything that happens regardless of convention.

Exhibition went really well, the palettes fitted into the space fine and channelled people just as we’d hoped, I was pleased that we had a lot of work to show and auction as well, as I think it’s nice to give people something to pour over rather than expecting them to look at a few pictures for ages

23rd Nov

The work I’m making now reminds me of yoshimoto nara a bit, I want to emulate the way he paint’s very simple forms very deilicately, with the images I’m making now the temptation is to make the more complicated/detailed but I think refined simplicity is best. Also the soft diffused light he gets from paint

also relevant are Emory Douglas and Barry McGee, both use beautifully sculpted black line and a limited palate. Also Margaret Kilgallen.

today me and max also spent a bit of time finalizing our crate sculpture/walls, we put it together and it seems sturdy enough, tonight the wood is drying out and tomorrow night we can move it into the venue for construction. The wood is definitely quite rough but it’s texture and physical presence is really dramatic.

21st Nov

Grid finished and painted, I really like the size and format, I’ll go over them agin to refine the linework and darken the black and maybe make the faces more realistic. I think the narrative holds together and is paced well. The motif of the wall, road and mountains are good. While a good composition perhaps the action scene should be revised as it is a big energy shift, maybe a more subtle or quiet visualization. Also his journey is quite short, I’d like give an impression of real distance covered.

If developing the narrative I need to decide whether I flesh out this bare bones story, or make companion pieces that link.

20th nov

went to Boscombe and got a load of coloured papers and inks, I was going for pastel shades but I saw one massive fluro orange sheet like the ones used for UK garage and hardcore fly posting and couldn’t resist getting that too. When I got home I was trying out a big biker face in ink and brush on some newspaper and while trying to capture the slightly miserable look he had in my sketchbook I realized rather than having a gang of rowdy bikers I’d perhaps rather have one lone rider I think this figure will work somewhat better with landscape pictures and will help establish consistency.

Still playing around with thumbnails and layout, I think I’ll just made a simple grid painted on newspaper to get a version finished.

19th Nov

I’ve been trying to finalize a layout/format for my final images,


Option 1: a series of A4 portrait images presented in a book or in sequence on a wall. I think this approach will give the narrative a solid drive and steady pace, I like the simplicity of turning the page every time you want the next instalment rather than manouvering your way down a page or across a wall. Many of my favorite comics utilize a very steady stream of panels which allows for the convincing passage of time.
Option 2: a sporadic wall layout utilizing different sized papers and a quite irregular layout. This approach allows for a more complicated narrative structure, e.g. the positioning of characters above or below an event, or just placing an image of a landscape or other non essential narrative elements adjacent to the action. (the Maakies strip uses small topper, this could be used to tell a simultaneous but separate narrative). On the other hand I think it has a tendency to compress the time frame of a story, somehow everything seems to happen simultaneously. Also a book is a product which can be bought, sold, disseminated, read on the bus or kept in your house far more easily.

17th Nov

A good day of character development and technique experiment. I spent some time checking out old café racer pictures of UK bikers in the 50’s and 60’s as while I will use some American biker imagery Id like to add a new visual spin to a really saturated and widely used concept. While I am using bikers as shorthand for danger/freedom etc, this doesn’t mean I have to use the same handwriting. Besides, Café racers are much cooler than hells angels. I’ve also (I think) finalized the technique I’ll be using in my final pieces, I’d like to use coloured pencils on coloured paper, this is a simple way of injecting loads of colour into images which can still be planning and conceived in black and white, Hopefully I can use diffent colours to clarify elements of the narrative too, for example showing the bikers and the kappa in opposing colours, at least at first to give them some group identity.

15th Nov

Marcus Oakley tutorial, I showed him my big plan drawing of the motorbike story and my previous non fiction images. Marcus said he though i should try and put down a solid sereis of images then experiment with working in different scales and with colour. Up until now i have been letting my search for a final medium hold up finalizing a narrative. I've always worked in different ways so it'll be nice to embrace a range of methods.