Takeover 2015

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

Interview Business

| rozihath

Good evening, folks and folkettes!

So, another week has flown by and we’re nearing May. Where did the time go? I had a fairly quiet week here last week, recovering from falling down snowy mountains and the prior weeks university stresses. Now I’m back to it, mainly preparing for final second year assessments and finishing off any outstanding work ready to clear my schedule for a summer of new projects and exciting things.

Last week did, however, see the release of my first ever interview! Who would possibly want to listen to me talk even more than I already do, right? It was actually pretty fun to delve into the inner workings of my mind for public viewing. I mean, I talk a lot on here, but more about projects and ideas rather than the deeper digging of Andy Oliver’s interviewing skills. You can read the interview here on the Broken Frontier’s Small Pressganged site, and feel free to comment at the bottom of the page and share your views!

I've been interviewed! http://www.brokenfrontier.com/small-press-spotlight-rozi-hathaway/
I’ve been interviewed! http://www.brokenfrontier.com/small-press-spotlight-rozi-hathaway/

A handful of the other ‘Six UK Small Press Creators to Watch in 2015‘ have already been interviewed, so far with the entertaining Danny Noble (whose new first print edition of ‘Was it… Too Much for You?’ has been previewed here today, and is on sale now!), the graphic medicine focused Alice Urbino, and the epic part one and part two of the lovely Wallis Eates talking about her graphic memoirs. Lots of reading material for you all to work through! So, yes. Thanks to Andy Oliver of Broken Frontier for continuing his support of my work and helping to share it with the world!

In other excellent news, after a long-awaited delivery of a long-armed stapler, the collaborative zine ‘Down to Your Skivvies’ is now on sale via my Etsy Store!

Down to Your Skivvies zine
Down to Your Skivvies zine

Down to Your Skivvies is available to buy here for the grand total of £3, plus £1 postage and packaging (UK). In case anyone missed previous posts, here’s what it’s all about;

Down to Your Skivvies is a collaborative UK illustration zine, created by three illustration students from the University of Northampton. Issue one is covering all things ladies! Focusing on issues of feminism and celebrating women, this A5, 28-page zine is printed on standard laser printer paper with either a pink or purple cover. Because, y’know. Why not?

THIS ZINE INCLUDES:
– Original work from the creators,
– Interview with Jamila Prowse, creator of Typical Girls magazine,
– Interview with Fiona McDonald, fine artist dealing with feminist issues,
– Interview with Hannah Berry, UK comics creator and graphic novellist,
– Article about Sarah McIntyre’s #Nonidentikit,
– Plus more!

So, if you’re interested then head on over and purchase your own copy in a very fetching pink or purple cover shade – BUY ME HERE.
Also, if you happen to be attending any of the events I’ve been confirmed at this summer, I will be selling issue one there also. For clarity, here’s a quick recap of the events you can find me at!

–

Saturday 9th May – Alternative Press & The London Radical Bookfair presents: TAKEOVER 2015 – First Publications Corner – 12-7pm, 47/49 Tanner Street, London. Facebook Event can be found here.

Saturday 6th June – Crouch End Comic Arts Festival (CECAF) – Six UK Small Press Creators to Watch 2015 – 11am-5pm, Earl Haig, London. Facebook Event can be found here.

Saturday 29th August – MancsterCon – 10am-4:30pm, University of Salford, Media City Campus, Manchester. Facebook Event can be found here.

Saturday 14th – Sunday 15th November –  Thought Bubble Sequential Art Festival – Leeds Dock, Royal Armouries, Leeds. Facebook Event page hasn’t been created yet, but you can keep up to date with news via the Facebook page or Twitter.

–

mancsterconpanel

I’m also really excited to have been asked to join the very talented Tom Ward of the Merrick comics, Chris Welsh from WART comics and Andrew Tunney (creator of Girl&Boy, of which I discovered alongside Merrick – The Comic at MancsterCon 2014 – covered in my blog here) on a panel discussion at MancsterCon, regarding working as an indie comics creator! I can’t wait! And I shall definitely be taking notes on what the other guys are saying..

Anyway, I think that’s it for now! Here’s to another week of good news. Peace out! x

 

Fresh Off The Piste

| rozihath

Good evening ladies and gents,

I have returned! And more importantly, I have returned with all my limbs intact! My week of snowboarding with my handsome northerner and a bunch of fun Brummies came abruptly to an end on Saturday evening, and although I’m happy to be back to work at Rozi HQ with some pretty interesting goggle tan-lines, I’m also pretty sad to have had to come back to reality. But on the bright side, I have lots of exciting news!

First up, I managed to squeeze in one more project before I flew off with my trusty snowboard; following the Carrie’s War book cover design award entry I submitted, I decided to give another book cover a go to see what I could do with the knowledge I’ve gained. Now, I did only have about a day to go for it with the piece, but I’d been reading the story of Some Kind of Fairy Tale by the late Graham Joyce and I’d started to get an idea in my head of what I wanted to portray. Unfortunately I didn’t have time to get much further than half way through the book, so I focused on a location mentioned several times near the beginning of the book. Woods with bluebells and a yellow covered rock with glowing bugs is a image, so here’s what I came up with;

Some Kind of Fairy Tale by Graham Joyce - Orion student book cover competition entry.
Some Kind of Fairy Tale by Graham Joyce – Orion student book cover competition entry.

 

The entry requirements didn’t ask for anything more than the front cover – no text or anything, so I just went forth and submitted this. It was a quick ‘un, so it was good practise to work on something short notice. We shall see what happens with the winning entry, I believe it’s announced at the end of the month, so here’s hoping!

In some fantastic news for this summer,  Andy Oliver from Broken Frontier contacted the six of us ‘Small Press Creators to Watch in 2015’ to let us know that he’s been given table space at CECAF (Crouch End Comics Art Festival) on Saturday 6th June. So I jumped on the opportunity to come along too! I’ll be selling copies of The Red Road alongside some of the other six creators, and it all sounds rather fun! You can read about last year’s CECAF festival review from Andy here. And in more wonderful news, I heard back from Alternative Press last week and I have been offered some space on their First Publications Corner (FPC) at TAKEOVER 2015 on Saturday 9th May in London! I shall be there behind the table with The Red Road, or mooching around the other stalls all day from 12-7 in just under 4 weeks time, so if you’re local to the area be sure to pop along and say hi. And, it’s FREE!

 

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

So with these two events, plus MancsterCon in August and Thought Bubble in November it’s turning into a busy year! I decided to do a little administration work today and rearranged my website to have some handy important-person-friendly links underneath my about section! So we now have sections for collaborations, commissions and competitions. It still needs a little work, but it’s mostly ready for now! Commissions side looks a little on the light side, so feel free to hit me up for any commission requests from summer onwards.

Acme Neon, Northampton
Henry Harday Factory

Finally, I also re-listed two sets of the giclee prints I had made a while ago of two abandoned buildings in Northampton! They’re back listed on my Etsy site alongside The Red Road, so do have a look if you’re interested in owning some of my detailed illustration prints from a couple of years ago. I’ll be getting the Down To Your Skivvied zines sorted by the end of the week, so my Etsy store will be looking nice and full soon enough! Keep any eye out for those in the latter part of the week. Anywho, I think that’s it for now! I shall be cracking on with some Uni work for the remainder of the week ready for final assessments, so needless to say it’s straight back to the grind. Have a good week all, excuse me whilst I look at my holiday pictures and sob into some French chocolate bars. Peace out! x