True Believers Comic Festival

The Re-Emerge

| rozihath

Good afternoon all!

I’m back!

That’s right; just like Leo in The Revenant or Michael Myers in Halloween, I have returned. Though luckily for me I haven’t been mauled by a bear or shanked by a rather upset Ripley… though sometimes the morning commute sometimes feels like a combination of the two. It’s been a while since my last post, and although unintentional, sometimes life just gets in the way and something has to give. And, seeming as my blog doesn’t have a deadline attached, this is the one thing that had to go to the bottom of the pile for a while. Alas, I’m back with you for the long run with a lot of exciting news, so without further ado..

Last time I was filling you all in on my upcoming plans with Cheltenham True Believers Festival, risograph printing and writing the rest of my short stories. Well, a lot has happened since then, and in the interests of efficiency I’m going to break it down, as otherwise this will turn into a thesis-length blog which no-one will want to read. Woo, efficiency! Here it goes.

THOSE COMIC FESTIVALS:

Five-and-a-half long weeks ago was the fairly fresh-faced OK True Believers Comic Con held in my old stomping ground of Cheltenham, at the infamous Cheltenham Racecourse. It was the first con of the year and I had the pleasure of squeezing on the end of the Good Comics table with Dr Paddy Johnston and Samuel C. Williams; although it was a fairly quiet day trade-wise, it was great to have a weekend away and spend a load of time with some comics people. And.. we got to play with a risograph printer on Sunday which was pretty excellent. And when I say we, I mean Paddy and I stood watching whilst Sam and his buddy Mike did all the work. Thanks guys!

I also joined in the fun at Sheffield Zine Fest on Saturday 25th February on the Good Comics table with Paddy, because.. why not? Sheffield Zine Fest was held in the Students Union and had a really nice down-to-earth and homemade feel to the event, suiting the Good Comics releases and my kinda work a lot more to the ground than the more commercial-based events like Cheltenham True Believers and the MCM events. It was also great to hang out and push other people’s work rather than my own, and there was burritos involved which always makes for an excellent day.

Next up on the festival calendar is the eagerly awaited Leamington Comic Con, held at the Royal Spa Centre on Saturday 25th March. It’s going to be a fantastic day, and with tickets still on sale online you should definitely come hang out and say hello! I’ll have my own full table situated next to the Good Comics gentlemen, which is handy because 25th March is also the release of…

ANNOUNCING: COSMOS AND OTHER STORIES

That’s right! My comics collection I’ve been working on since November is finished and off to print, ready for launch in a week and a half. Cosmos and Other Stories is a collection of short stories exploring humanity and loneliness; packaged up into a lovely 36-page face-strokingly-soft matte laminate product of love, Cosmos tells the stories of different people dealing with the different ways we all feel lonely in this big ol’ world. The book was formally announced on the 24th February via the Good Comics press release;

Good Comics is delighted to announce that we will be publishing a new collection of short stories by award-winning cartoonist and illustrator Rozi Hathaway, winner of the Broken Frontier Breakout Talent Award for 2016 and author of The Red Road, Njálla and Ø.

Cosmos and Other Stories examines themes of loneliness and longing, with Hathaway’s uniquely expressive and dreamy paintwork taking the reader on a journey through various cities, towns, bedrooms and celestial realms. If you’ve ever been lost in a crowd, stayed up all night to talk to someone long distance, or felt the ache of an absent love, then this collection will speak to you.

Cosmos and Other Stories will debut at Leamington Comic Con on Saturday 25th March 2017, and is available to pre-order from the Good Comics online store now!

You can read the full press release here! It’s been a whirlwind four months of writing and drawing up this collection, and although I always put everything I have into my stories, this one is particularly close to my heart. Plus, Sam from Good Comics has been an excellent and supportive yet critical editor, and really pushed me to make the best work I possibly could.. So with all that in mind, I really hope it goes down well otherwise I might just crawl into bed for a while to recover. Pre-order Cosmos and Other Stories here, and even more exciting, every pre-order gets an A5 print of artwork from the book with their order.. So act quickly and get that pre-order in!

A5 Print from Cosmos & Other Stories, now for sale on Etsy.

 

I quite literally have just finished up the book, with the files being sent off to Rich at Comic Printing UK on Monday night before I crawled into bed. Tuesday evening was (am) spent writing this gem of blogging genius for you, so I am finally going to celebrate finishing this book by drinking a large glass of wine and collapsing in a corner (I’m lying, I started the wine before I even started typing. YOLO!). I will be back in the normal swing of things next week with the pre-con post about Leamington and everything it has to offer, so keep an eye out for that! And until next time.. have a good week all, and thanks for being patient!

 

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First of the Season

| rozihath

Good afternoon happy campers!

So, it’s almost February! Which means that even though there’s some sort of ominous freezing fog loitering around parts of England at the moment, and many of us get to partake in the good ol’ icy pavement dance in the mornings, the days ARE getting longer and the very beginning signs of comics festivals is on the horizon..

First festival of the year is going to Cheltenham’s True Believers Comic Festival next weekend, on Saturday 4th February! I’ll be there on a table with two of the micro-publishing mega-team Good Comics, Dr Paddy Johnston and Samuel C. Williams. Propped up on caffeine behind table #L4, Good Comics will be selling an array of their recent publications including Robin William Scott’s beautifully engaging autobiographical Every Life I Ever Lived, and the delicate yet entertaining Tales From the Nonniverse #1 by Faye Spencer. Both of these I picked up shortly after Thought Bubble, and both of these you should get your hands on if you can. I’ll also be there with a my usual suspects  Njálla and Ø, and talking to anyone who’ll listen about the work I’ve been doing for the new comic collection Good Comics are releasing in Spring.

Those Good Comics gents, Paddy and Sam. Photo credit: Good Comics.
Table #L4

If you’re in or around that area of the world you should definitely pop along and say hello! Adult advance tickets are £10, with child tickets being £5, and you can pick these up from the website here. In case you missed it before, you can find 5 questions with Good Comics from the True Believers team on the website here. Good Comics are also releasing the third volume of their anthology zine Dead Singers Society at True Believers (which I have a one-page comic in, as I mentioned last week), and if you can’t get there to check it out the pre-orders are available on their website here.

I’m really exited to be behind a table again, with the last tabling adventures of Thought Bubble in November feeling like a very long time ago. Equally exciting is a small side project in the form of playing around with a risograph printer (thanks to Hato Press for the handy guide!) for the first time next weekend, so I’ve been able to take a break from some serious writing to draw up a short wordless comic to play about with in this totally new (to me, at least) way of printing. But more on that as it happens.. Here’s a peek of the inks I’ve been working on, for said short wordless comic:

In other news, the night before True Believers is my good friend Naomi has her first private view and exhibition at the Stantonbury Gallery in Milton Keynes! I’ll be going along on Friday night for an exclusive view of her incredibly life-like artwork on show. I’m always blown away at the detail she manages to get into her illustration work, and if you’re a fan of beautiful artwork you should get yourself there whilst her exhibition is on.

The exhibition itself will be open from Monday the 30th January till Sunday the 19th February 2017 (Monday-Friday from 10am – 10pm, Saturday-Sunday from 10am – 6pm) and you can find full details of the private launch on Friday 3rd February on the Facebook event page here.

NRJ Art Solo Exhibition at the Stantonbury Gallery

And that’s about it for now! I’m still writing and drawing away for the next of my short stories along with writing for a top secret project that will be revealed in the coming weeks. It’s all go here at HQ, so I’m looking forward to a break next weekend! Until then, think of me banging my head against a desk whilst I try to get these damn stories finished off.. See you next week!

 

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