The Quick Brown Fox...

Time to show my ignorance again and reveal that I just found out why you'll often see this sentence used to give an example of a font. The reason, for those of you hidden in the same darkness as I am, is because its a pangram and a pangram is a sentence that uses every letter of the alphabet. So there you go.

Fancy That!

The Artist's Guide Vol.2 is now available and I'm pleased to say that nestled between the pages and being kept warm by a host of great talent is a picture by me. Although I have'nt got a copy yet I am drooling in anticipation. Alongside this issue is a right fancy T-shirt and you can get a hold of both right here.

Huge thanks to Sam Spratlin and Matt Cassity!

In other news I have just finished a job, which I am rather excited about, that came as a result of someone seeing the image I made for The Artist's Guide. More about this next Thursday ;)

Green Man

Really looking forward to spending three days in a field in Wales, stuffing my face with pie, drinking some fine ale and listening to some good good music.

Don't let it Bring you Down

Another image where the words came along at the right time. These are from 'Don't let it bring you down' by Neil Young.

A is for...

We Are Normal...

I've been playing around with these words and this image for last couple of days and I'm not really sure if I like it or not. I figured the best way to stop me changing the blue by two percent and shifting that minute speck a couple mm to the left and so on for all eternity would be to release it into the world and have done with it.

Anyway the words are from a song by the Bonzo Dog Band called 'We Are Normal' which was supposedly written in reference to a line in the 'The Red Telephone' by Love. Right? Right!

One Last Kiss

Inspired by the song 'One Last Kiss'. Its really only inspired in as much as i was looking for something to put in the bubble while I was listening to the song.

With My Little Eye

Anarchy in the Kitchen

Mr Owl

Summertime and the livin' is easy

Not sure about your neck of the woods but round here it seems like the sun has got his hat on.

Beach Boy

I was recently given a copy of Dennis Wilson's 'Pacific Ocean Blue'. The album is one that I've wanted for a while but given the price tag of an original copy it looked unlikely that I'd get one unless I was lucky enough to find a cheap copy in the wild. Anyway I'm happy that my good friend Geoff gave me the new Sundazed reissue which comes with bonus material, including the unreleased Bambu recordings. As a result of the three blue discs not leaving the deck for the best part of a week, I made this.

No rest for the wicked

Hot on the heels of what is being dubbed the UK's best festival those tireless Capsule grannies are offering up a tasty slice of psychedelia in form of Acid Mothers Temple and heres a poster what I did done for it.

Student Demonstration Time

I'll be the first to admit that my knowledge about most subjects is lacking any great depth, graphic design and illustration included, as such I only recently found out about Sister Mary Corita and the influential work she made during her time as a Catholic nun at the Immaculate Heart of Mary and the work she made in the years after she left to work on her art full time.

I stumbled across her work after watching a programme about the student demonstrations that happened around the world in 1968. The programme discussed protest art and the posters and banners that were being made by the likes of the French group called the Ateliere Populaire (Popular Workshop).
After watching the programme (which thinking about it was probably shown because 2008 is the 40th anniversary of the demonstrations) I did some light googling and found images by Sister Mary. It did'nt really take much for me to realise that this was an exceptionally talented women who produced beautiful and controversial work (it may seem tame but she was a nun after all). One of the things I like is that she took her inspiration from song lyrics, something that I do a lot of myself.

Anyway I won't pretend to know a great deal more about Sister Mary than i did when i first stumbled upon her, instead I'm gonna just let her work inspire and influence me in the way that I'm sure it has done for many people before me and it will surely do to the many people that have yet to discover it.

As you were x

ows tha doin?

Although I'm a Yorkshire lad born and bred this post has nothing to do with my beloved north. No, instead it's about that other place that has featured heavily in my life, Birmingham. More importantly its about one of the best things to come out of the city in a long time, Supersonic.

The festival is in its sixth year and promises to be another belter. As usual myself and fellow outcrowders will be descending on the Custard factory armed to the teeth with paint and pens. This year we've been asked to paint in the brand new Ideal ramp space (next door to their new shop no less) and if that wasn't enough to get your peepers watering then there will also be work on show by French.

New for this year will be the addition of an outcrowd stall where you lucky lucky people can get hold of some lovely tat to adorn your bodies and the walls in your house.

si thee later, am off fer a bab!