Month: May 2015

Må Kraften Være Med Dig

| rozihath

Good evening faithful readers!

Well, what a week it’s been. With the new job and extra overtime last week, it feels like I have absolutely nothing to show for myself tonight. Which, is pretty right. Laters!

…..

Nah, I’m only kidding. It was a tough week, but I have been busy thinking and planning away for a few upcoming projects. Unfortunately for now, they have to remain top secret.. But all will be revealed soon!

One thing I can talk about (which I didn’t manage to cover last week), is that mid-month I decided to take it upon myself to force my drawings into people’s homes. How, you ask? Well! My other half’s brother and his wife have brought a new mini Star Wars fan into the world, yay!

Some of my more retro followers may remember a previous birth-announcement style original I made for a friend back in 2012. Well, almost three years later (wow, times flies…) I decided to give it a go Star Wars style;

Pencils into ink…
…and turning ink into paint!

 

Having my other half as a huge Star Wars fan, and his family too, I didn’t have to do too much research into this piece – which is always nice! Plus, it was a lot of fun for me to draw, as who doesn’t love Star Wars, right? The theory behind it is that Tatooine makes sense as the background setting, as that’s where Luke Skywalker grew up. Without going into too much background detail I still needed it to be obvious, so the two suns made that nice and easy. Out of all the characters to interact with I didn’t want to do anything cheesey like a Death Star toy, or heaven forbid Jar Jar Binks, so I went with R2-D2. I may be a little bit biased, as y’know, R2-D2 is the best character, but my reasoning is that all of the droids are age-less so the piece doesn’t conflict with anything (the in-depth workings of huge fans is not something to be messed with). So, yes! I’m really happy with the piece, and as it was a surprise it was really nice to see how happy it made the new parents to young Luke! I believe Luke’s older sister Isabel is a huge Frozen fan, so I may see Olaf and carrot noses in my future..

Anywho, a short and brief update is it for now, I’m afraid! I’m hoping I can start to reveal my secret plans soon, if not I’ll find something to start talking about.. I promise! Oh, and Må kraften være med dig (May the force be with you)!

 

A Bit of Undigested Potato

| rozihath

 

A Bit of Undigested Potato edited by Keara Stewart..
“Locomotion”

A Bit of Undigested Potato

A bad dreams and nightmare anthology, edited by Keara Stewart

Contributions by Alex Potts, Abraham Mann, Andy Poyiadgi, Annabel Dover, Cathy Lomax, Corinna Spencer, Danny Noble, David Robertson, EdieOP, Ella Dawson, Elizabeth Querstret, Francesca Cassavetti, Gareth Brookes, John Riordan, Justyna Burzynska, Karen Rubins, Karrie Fransman, Keara Stewart, Kelly Froh, Kim Clements, Martin Eden, Mary Blomley, Matilda Tristram, Mike Medaglia, Nick Soucek, Paul Shinn, Pete Hindle, Rachael Ball, Richy K. Chandler, Robert Wells, Rozi Hathaway, Ruth Collingwood, Sally-Anne Hickman, Sean Azzopardi, Steven J Harris, Tim Bird, Tom Ryling, Una, Viviane Schwarz and Wallis Eates.

Cover by Gareth Brookes.

On sale now from Keara’s webstore, priced £5.00. Also reviewed by Andy Oliver on Broken Frontier.

“Noble is, of course, one of my ‘Six UK Small Press Creators to Watch in 2015’, as is Rozi Hathaway who, once again, lives up to that designation with a desperately touching, panel-bursting short.”
-Andy Oliver, Broken Frontier

Second Year Round-Up

| rozihath

Good evening happy campers!

So, after my first week of semi-freedom I’m feeling somewhat rested and ready for the next row of challenges. It’s looking to be a pretty busy summer, so I’m enjoying some breathing space whilst I can. Saying that, I’m really excited to get started. As mentioned last week, I shall cover some of the projects from the last 6 months which I haven’t previously covered. Here we go..

First up is four pieces from a brief that was focused on the Anomalous Psychological Processes department at University. Although contact was limited with the department aside from an initial tour, I created these as a reflection of the studies they research. The first image of a hand holding a brain is a general reflection, secondly the female face is a representation of the Ganzfeld experiment. Thirdly is the telephone telepathy experiments and finally the fourth image is of twin synchronicity.

As with most University assignments, I don’t really know where I stand (useful, right?) but I’m hoping the overseer of the grades is kind to me! Also, I spent some time before last week recreating an editorial illustration brief I’d previously completed back in October/November time. Editorial briefs (one-off illustrations for magazines, newspapers, that kinda thing) are not something I’m overly good at currently. My brain seems to always work in narrative and give names and faces to the characters, with life stories and emotions. But, y’know.. Editorial will pay the bills when the time comes, so re-working this project was important to me.

First attempt – The Wisdom of Crowds
Final, re-worked piece.

My feedback for the original piece was that the crowd was too defined, not dense enough and not really reflective of the tone of the article (which is just one seriously in-depth analysis of the smaller people standing up to the bigger people). So, I think I’ve corrected all that! I’ve slowly been collecting free magazines to look at the way other people (who actually make money from drawing) do their editorial pieces, so my self-set homework for this summer is to work on improving my skills.

Apart from that, most of the other work for this year at University has already been covered! Mennesker er Underlig, the folding self-reflective zine as covered here, Down to Your Skivvies zine which is on sale via Etsy, the Machines exhibition as covered here and of course, the biggun’ of The Red Road. Although I had to re-do some work and projects before assessment I feel pretty positive about my final work for the year. Well, I’ll see how positive I still feel when I get my grades back..! I think I have around a month until the grades are in, so I shall live in my blissful happy bubble for a while yet.

Speaking of The Red Road, I took a wander through Manchester’s Northern Quarter on Saturday with my better half, and we went past Travelling Man so I could spy on how many copies of The Red Road are left in stock.. And low and behold, I’m in the window! Ta-da!

Anywho, I think that’s enough for now. In the next week or so things will be taking shape for my summer of secret plans, so I may be able to reveal the odd one or two next week! Oh! And before I forget, as mentioned last week Keara Stewart’s zine anthology A Bit of Undigested Potato is out now, and it’s for sale online! To get your hands on a copy, click through here. Over and out!

x

Tales From the First Publication Corner

| rozihath

Good evening dutiful followers,

Well, what a celebratory day it is! Second Year of University is OFFICIALLY OVER, woo! No more redoing work from months ago and tweaking something because it’s out of alignment by 2mm, I can finally breathe and start to clear my head ready for a summer of busy drawing fun. After a hectic 7 months I can now find time to do the fun things in life, like make up new comic ideas and draw whatever I feel like. And it feels gooooooood. But, I have plenty of interesting news to keep you all occupied, don’t you worry! First up..

Alternative Press and The London Radical Bookfair hosted TAKEOVER 2015 this past weekend, on Saturday 9th May at a nice little warehouse on 47-49 Tanner Street just a hop, skip and a jump from London Bridge. What a day! Although there were some early complications – definitely of no fault of the organisers, mind you! – the day was busy and Tanner Street became full of people interested in all the comic, zine and book business of the day! As I mentioned previously, I was accepted to TAKEOVER on the First Publications Corner, a special spot for highlighting the work of first-time self publishers of zines and comics as a way to keep us all together (and out of trouble, I suspect!). I met some fantastically interesting people on Saturday, and walked around feeling like a deer in headlights for most of it, but as my first event I’m sure I’ll feel like a regular by the end of the year! Special thanks to those who made me feel at home in a whirlwind experience; Andy Oliver of Broken Frontier, Keara Stewart, Ricky Miller of Avery Hill Publishing, Alex Hahn, Alexandra Cook and Wallis Eates. You’re all lovely!

I only managed to sell a couple of bits, but lots of lovely people and seeing Danny Noble‘s under-table acrobatics definitely made for a good day. Another awesome part of the day was the creation of a Zine in a Day made by Co-Op Footprinters, who brought their risograph printer down from Leeds just for the event. And I thought dragging a suitcase of comics around London was difficult! The idea was absolutely lovely, and I dutifully took along a prepared image to submit to the zine. Have a look below!

TAKEOVER 15 Zine in a Day!
Better than any fridge magnet souvineer..
My submission!
My original for submission

The day was made even better with the release of Keara Stweart‘s zine anthology, A Bit of Undigested Potato! Featuring the work of 58 artists (including yours truly..) the anthology looks at bad dreams and nightmares from the perspective of the artist (featured at Broken Frontier here). My comic Locomotion is situated in there, but I’m afraid you’ll have to purcahse your own copy to see it all! I read the whole anthology as soon as it was places in my hands, and from the sad, to the scary and the funny, this book really is something special. I’ll definitely cherish it, and thanks again to the lovely Keara for asking me to join in the fun! What an honour, and a privilege to be included amongst such awesome people.

A Bit of Undigested Potato – zine anthology

So, after the excitement of Saturday and the final push at University I’m feeling rather tired, but from meeting all the wonderful aforementioned people at TAKEOVER my brain is now overflowing with ideas of things to come! Now, secrets are way more fun in this line of work, so I won’t divulge too much, but I will say that you can expect to see issue #2 of Down to Your Skivvies coming out soon.. And maybe a few more things popping up on my Etsy shop! For now, I shall retire for the night ready for the busy few days ahead, but I shall be back next week with some coverage of a few exciting University projects that haven’t been covered in all the madness. And then, let the ideas and exciting things commence! Peace out! x

Takeover and Other Business!

| rozihath

Good evening happy campers!

So, after a brief pause of a week off to catch up on Uni work, I still feel somewhat drowning with a week until final assessment. But I got stuff done! Stuff done is good! Plus, following last weeks news of my interview with Broken Frontier, I bring more good news from the comics universe which I’ll cover later.

Alt. Press TAKEOVER 2015! This Saturday, roll up, roll up.
Alt. Press TAKEOVER 2015! This Saturday, roll up, roll up.

First up, this weekend sees something special, with Alternative Press and The London Radical Bookfair’s  TAKEOVER 2015! With an impressive line-up of attendees and an awesome looking programme of events, it’s definitely going to be something special! As mentioned before, I’ll be on the aptly named First Publications Corner with some very talented folks such as Tiny Noggin, Alexandra Cook and Fang Jui Chang. This is my first of four comics events for this summer, and my first event of this kind of my drawing career so far. I’m really excited to see what the day will bring, and as I’ll only be behind the table on a rota’d basis which will give me plenty of opportunity to wander around and have a look at all the other wonderful creator goods! I need to keep an iron clamp on my purse, mind you..

You can read more about TAKEOVER 2015 in Broken Frontier’s coverage article here

Next up: more zine business! As part of a last project at university before Easter we were asked in a relatively short space of time to create a number of drawings of our thoughts, feelings and observations in every day life. At the time I had a few too many things going on and since this point I’ve been re-working the project to make it shiner and better than before! I present to you.. Mennesker er Underlig:

 

‘Mennesker er Underlig’, playing around with zine shapes and forms.

Mennesker er Underlig is a self exploratory zine that looks at things from my perspective of the world, from making breakfast to walking back and forth. It was pretty fun to make in the end, and after lots of re-drawing from different comics I think it’s come together pretty nicely! Let’s hope University agree. The zine itself is a shallow folded box, inside are 15 pages of my inner monologue… Which is more exciting than it sounds. Or is it? Anywho, as it’s something that I won’t be formally introducing to the world for sale, below is a little gallery of the processes that went into making this, and some of the pages too! As always, please let me know if any of you have any thoughts or feelings about it. Oh! And before I forget, mennesker er underlig is Danish for ‘humans are strange’. Why Danish, I hear you ask? WELL! For the past 134 days or there-abouts I’ve been learning Danish ready for an exciting Scandinavian adventure later in the year. Plus, learning a language as my brain starts to deteriorate seems like a good idea, as well as being something completely separate from drawing that I can do to clear my mind. I recommend everyone should learn new languages, it’s a hoot! Plus hopefully I can make friends with some Danish illustrators and spend lots of time there eating rugbrød and rødgrød med fløde. Fremragende!

Finally, today the interwebs told me that Keara Stewart‘s zine anthology about nightmares has arrived into her hands today, for official release this Saturday at TAKEOVER! A Bit of Undigested Potato has been previewed here at Broken Frontier today, with a lovely interview with Keara herself. Personally, I can’t wait to get my hands on a copy and see what everyone else has made for it, as I definitely enjoying doing my page for it. I recommend you all pick one up! Here’s a reminder of a sneaky-preview I gave you all a few weeks back of my submission..

Anywho, that’s it for now! I started my new part time job last week, and tomorrow is the day of the week that I crawl out of bed at 4:25am, so I’d best go and eat cherry pie in the bath before I attempt to get lulled to sleep by the sounds of screaming children playing outside. Until next week.. Over and out! x