Just out today @ http://albyfiggs.wordpress.com/ Alby Figgs in Gravy! Straight up. This time, everybody’s favourite street sage spills the, er, gravy on the innermost workings of one of our best loved (?!) celebrity chefs and his part in his success/ downfall. You be the judge…
Snowgoose, part two in the ongoing saga of Alby Figgs @ http://albyfiggs.wordpress.com/ is now up online, people. This time, Alby shatters the myth of a much loved national treasure.
It’s the latest publishing sensation to sweep the nation; a septuagenarian with a talent for tall tales and constant banter. No doubt, some Hollywood studio will latch on within weeks to the adventures of one Alby Figgs, but right now, you can say you were there first at the birth of a comic legend. Either that, or just pass a minute of your time reading his latest conversational run-ins every Friday tea-time on the train home at albyfiggs.wordpress.com
Back a few weeks now from a great ‘return’ trip to Russia with the lovely people at Respect Comics, this time in Moscow. The artists from the first trip and our Yekaterinburg jaunt all met up for the Kommissia Comics Festival, gave talks and workshops and saw the fruits of our labours printed up and on display.
Also paid impromptu visits to the mini-Bulgakov museum, walked around Gorky’s art nouveau house in felt slippers, saw Lenin and Stalin extolling the free market in Red Square and ate Kasha on the Arbat (just missing Vladdy P doing walkabout and mixing it up with the common people) by a day or so.
Big bear hug thanks to Anna, Olga, Heehus, Nastia, Sergei, Wolf and all other fellow Russian and European Respect artists and organisers who made it such a great trip. Большое спасибо!
Here’s a few random photos…
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I’m very chuffed that DC Vertigo has finally brought together all 16 episodes of Deadenders into one big collected graphic novel, 11 years after it finished its monthly run. The first 4 issues were originally collected in “Deadenders: Stealing the Sun” some years back and there’s been a couple of foreign language compilations, particularly in Spanish, that have collected the whole run, but thanks to some persistence from Ed Brubaker, it’s finally made it into one big bumper edition in time for summer fun reading on the out of bounds beach.
It comes complete with all of Philip Bond‘s originally luverly covers and also includes the Vertigo Winters Edge short not originally part of the monthly series.
On sale May 16th!
I’ll be up in London tonight 19th April at 7.30 pm at Orbital comics to celebrate the launch of Self Made Hero‘s brand new version of Oscar Zarate edited ‘It’s Dark in London’.
Join the shady throng!
I’ll be attending the Illuminate opening evening at The British Library from 7 p.m. on Friday night, March 2nd exhibiting work from the newly polished up version of Oscar Zarate’s “It’s Dark in London” published by Self Made Hero. I illustrated short story The Court written by Neil Gaiman and there’ll be pages from the original and re-edited versions on show.
There’ll be lots of contemporary illustrators, comic artists and cartoonists doing drawy things and showing their ‘stuff’ amongst the illuminated texts and Mr. Scruff on the diskette, apparently. Should be, er, illuminating?
I’ve been very slow to post all this stuff up, so apologies to the ‘fan’, but it’s been a mad whirlwind tour for lil’ ol’ me in the months of September through to early November, spanning two continents and ten time zones and I’m only just about recovered.
Anyway, the main event last month, was my involvement in the Goethe institute and Kommisia Moscow Comics Festival led project, ‘Respect‘ in Yekaterinberg, Russia, alongside a host of excellently talented fellow comic artists from Britain, France, Belgium, Germany, Finland and Russia and some lovely Russian organisers.
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The basic idea, developed after the last Moscow Comics Festival, involves the creation of pocket comics dealing with issues of tolerance aimed at Russian school kids and college students. There’d already been some really interesting results from the last project and we were invited last month to thrash out ideas, give talks and workshops for students, listen on local and national issues and attend a special exhibition of our own, translated work.
The whole week was a great opportunity to meet and work with Russian and European artists through discussion, debate and copious amounts of Vodka, made more enjoyable with my fellow Brit travellers, Rob Davis and Karrie Fransman.
Here’s a link to the project’s website and Facebook page, with loads of piccies from our workshops, meanderings and our sub-zero, freezing our dumplings off tour around the old Soviet city of Sverdlovsk.
Many thanks to Anna Voronkova, Heehoos, Sergei Simonov and all the other Respect team for making us so welcome and introducing us to Russia.
Check this page out soon for sketches and roughs from my Respect project.
спасибо
Those rag-tag, Brighton dwelling brothers of ill repute, Gary and Warren Pleece, once again tread the boards of comic promotionalisation with a lightning visit to the esteemed meeting place of Cartoon County, tonight at 7.30 p.m., upstairs at The Greene Room in The Cricketers pub in Brighton. Hear them talk about their latest books and projects, The Great Unwashed and Montague Terrace, as well as chucklesome reminisces of the Velocity years and what made/ makes them tick in a comicy fashion. Free sandwiches and nearby vicinity to a bar, make this event a must, even if you have to listen to those goggle-eyed bastards blowing their own trumpets!