A Perfect Day

Four original artworks from my Nobrow published book 'People I've never met & Conversations I've never had' are to be shown in the excellent group show 'A Perfect Day' in Amsterdam which opens today. The show is the continuation of the Apexart exhibit 'Lots of things like this' that took place in 2008 in New York and which was curated by author / publisher / artist man Dave Eggers. A perfect day carries on with the original exhibition's focus of drawings that mix text and image and the funny and it looks like a winner. I am pretty darn excited to be showing my work alongside such greats as Glen Baxter, Chris Johanson, Raymond Pettibon, David Shrigley, Simon Evans, I could go on. Ok, Saul Steinberg, Royal Art Lodge, Jeffrey Brown, Mr T from the A team. Ok the last one I made up but still I was impressed. If you find yourself in Amsterdam due to a holiday or because you live there then you should go and then you can let me know if I'm really in the show with those guys or if they've just put my stuff in a toilet or something.

A Perfect Day.

The Maestro's Loss

Normally at this time of the year (the start) I would post all the things I forgot to post during the last year but instead I thought I'd start as I mean to go on and post something published in 2012. This Illustration was for the Observer and came out on New Years day which also happens to be the first day of the year. The drawing accompanied a short story by Hari Kunzru called 'The Maestro's Loss' and was / is a great story to try and Illustrate. Go read it over here. The Cembalo Scrivano that the story has at it's centre is a fascinating contraption and you can really imagine a writer having to push down hard on those thick wooden keys.

As you can see the piece was printed up nice and big which was pretty exciting when I opened up the paper on Sunday, though perhaps others were probably cursing me for getting newspaper ink all over their fingers and elbows. 

I also got to include a few chalk drawings of the typewriter as a spot. Noice.

V&A Friday Late and Collectionistas.

I am involved in some things this weekend that should be brills. Firstly this friday evening 25th November I will be at the V&A as part of Friday Late - No Strings. In the words of the people form the V&A who wrote this -

Friday Late No Strings explores the world of contemporary graphics, typography and illustration through the lens of independent publishing. Collate your own zine with Publish and Be Damned or illustrate a 1-page comic with Nobrow. Witness 150 pages being read aloud in the Visual Editions Mass Reading Event and enjoy talks by Simon Garfield, Elias Redstone, Tom Keeley and friends of Eye magazine. Take part in screen-printing and bookbinding workshops and enjoy the sounds and visuals of DJ/VJ combination David Wilson and Sam Potter in the Grand Entrance.

I will be there as part of Nobrow who are taking over and curating the cafe. I will be tattooing people with an image of either an Animal, Vegetable or Mineral. There looks like lots of good workshops, talks and things to look at as well as me scribbling on people's arms. It's on from 6.30pm-10pm and it's free. More info here

The second thing is Collectionistas a Risograph print exhibition at The Mill co Project on Vyner st.

The exhibition curated by Kavel Rafferty is all about collecting and I am one of 25 artists / collectors who have created an image for the exhibition. My print is called 'Things in Bottles that aren't ships' and shows the future of my current collection 'Things in bottles that aren't ships'. (Above is a crop.)

The private view is this saturday 26th Nov from 12 - 7pm, where there will be refreshments and real records played by real record collectors. The prints (printed by Hato press) will be for sale at the very reasonable price of £15 and at limited edition of 30. The Millo Co Project is Here.

Perhaps see you at one of these!

Handmade and Bound 2011

Yo! I will be sharing a stall with the stupendous Mr Sam Rees this sunday at Handmade and Bound. The book art and zine fair has moved from to the new location of St Brides near Fleet st. As the above poster says it is open 12 - 6 and should have some fine folk selling super folded-paper based artworks.

K.K.II + Lmnop Q&A (The Alphabet post)

This saturday sees the second Kibbo Kift event held at The Victoria in Dalston in London. It is a night of musical music spoken spoken word all done by people who normally draw instead of these things. I will be playing some hastily made up songs and then watching proper bands Glow Wing and Fever Dream show me how it's meant to be done. The night is organised by the whirlwind that is Supermundane and features Will Edmonds and Nic Burrows (two thirds of Nous Vous) as well as Sarah Lippett (half of Crayon Legs) and Adrian Fleet (100% percent of Adrian Fleet). There will be a set of limited edition postcards by the performers and a badge for the first 100 hundred peoples.

More info here but not here. Do come it'll be fun.

In more work related news I did a Q & A with the fine people over at the LMNOP Shop who have a lovely shop in Brighton and great online one too. If you want to hear me chat about collecting, artists that I like and other ramblings head here but not here and definitely not here or here.

Supermarket Sarah Wall!

I was asked a wee while ago to curate my own wall for the website Supermarket Sarah so I said 'Yeah, sounds swell.' As mentioned before Supermarket Sarah is an online shop whereby you create a wall in real life, take a photo of it, upload this to the internet (not real life) and you can click on the items to buy them. (I really don't need to explain this stuff to you as I know you're smarter than the average bear and know how clicking with a mouse works.)


Anyhoo. It was fun to do and I managed to get a load of great work from talented buddies like Mr Ben Newman, Signore Rico, the amigos from Nous Vous, Monsieur Sam Rees, Herr Florian Kremb, Señor Paddy Molloy and Master Tom Hicks so there's plenty of stuff to take your fancy.

There's a whole lot of stuff to buy like prints, framed original art works, ceramics, fake tattoos, books zines. I also made some bits and bobs specifically for the wall like some screen printed tee shirts and bags.


As well as this hand painted plate. I think perhaps you should go there now and buy some stuff for birthday presents or something.

Tee Shirtsssssss and A.P.F.

My agents Heart have released their very own clothing label called 'Heart Editions' where surprisingly enough, they are getting their very own artists to design tee shirts. I am one of the five artists to be in the first round of editions along with Tom Gauld, Marion Deuchars, Jason Ford and Shonagh Rae.

I have drawn a snake that looks like it's wrapped around your neck because I am clever like that. The snakes' pattern is filled with nonsensical goings on as can be seen above. Head over to the Heart store to procure your very own tee which comes with a tag signed by the artist and where my tee seems to be modeled by some bearded weirdo.

Here's another design that although was not used this time, I hope will be, in the future as there really aren't enough people wearing tank tops these days.


In other news I'll be over at the Alternative Press Fair this sunday at Conway Hall from 10-4. I have finally got round to getting my zine's 'Stuff I found' and 'Never Show Knees In Public' printed up proper so more than a couple of people at a time can buy one. The newer version of 'Never Show Knees...' also has 4 extra pages so comes in at a humongous 28 pages. I'll also be selling new tattoos, prints, cards and anything else I can find that I can sell. I am nothing but a big ol sell out. No, I'd like nothing more than to be a sell out. No, wait It would be nice to sell out, of stuff.