Boogie Woogie time!

I was recently asked to produce some visuals for Eagle Rock Entertainment for an album called the A B C and D of Boogie Woogie - so called because the names of the musicians begin with the letters A B C & D, one of them being Charlie Watts of the Rolling Stones. Here are my covers - unfortunately they decided to go with a photographic solution in the end, but I really enjoyed working on the project and it was great to try my hand at sleeve design, something I haven't done much of before.

Moon Pie

Here is my cover for Moon Pie by Simon Mason, which comes out later this month, published by Random House. It is a children’s book, but the subject matter is quite heavy – it’s about a little girl and her brother trying to cope with their alcoholic father after the death of their mother. Although it sounds like it could be rather depressing, it is actually extremely well written and sensitively handled, and at times quite funny as well as being very moving.

Their brief was to do something typography based, along with any of my own ideas. Here are some of the initial roughs as well as a few colour ideas.

There was quite a lot of to-ing and fro-ing and changes to make until a final consensus was reached. I thought the large moon with a slice taken out of it like a pie worked well, but in the end they decided to go for a crescent moon. The Dad character was difficult to get right, as it couldn’t be too obvious that he was an alcoholic. At one stage he was on the roof, wobbling as if about to fall off, but this idea was a bit over the top! - so he ended up perched on the end of the moon.

Interview in Doll Speaker Magazine

My work has been featured in another Iranian magazine, called 'Doll Speaker', again by Morteza Zahedi. It is their 23rd birthday issue and I'm happy that my work is also on the cover!

Mastermind exhibition

'Mastermind' is a group show of 2-colour risograph prints by 22 artists, produced and put on by Bolt Editions. The show is on at the moment at a variety of venues in Brixton Village - my print 'Elephant Snake' is showing at Italian restaurant Casa Sibilla. There are some great artists involved, including David Hughes, Rachel Gannon and Brett Ryder, so it's well worth a look. The show runs from 16th February until 18th March and prints can be purchased from Bolt editions priced at a mere £23.50 (including postage)! You can find more info and download an Art trail map here.

Interview in Iranian Magazine!

I was interviewed last year by talented illustrator/artist Morteza Zahedi who also art directs two magazines. Here's my work in one of them, Tandis magazine, published in Tehran, Iran.

Work for Valore Alimentare

Here are a few recent images for Italian food magazine 'Valore Alimentare'. Themes are flour, sugar and yeast!

Ilustrarte

Happy new year (a bit late)! I've had a good start to the year, with a recent trip to Lisbon for the children's book illustration biennial 'Ilustrarte' which I am very pleased to have been selected for this year. Three pieces from 'Sixty Impossible things before lunch' were chosen for the show - 'All the people in the world', 'Ice cream on fire and leopard', and 'find the needle in the haystack'. Here's a few pics of the very unusual exhibition set-up - many white chests of drawers with large lampshades above! It looked very cool and rather surreal - you had to open each drawer to view the illustrations. The exhibition is on at the Museum of Electricity until April 8th, after which it will be at the Royal Academy of fine arts in Ghent. More info here.