Package from Henry Flint

Nice package of art from Henry Flint for our joint exhibition at the Pure Evil Gallery next January. There will be original art from elements of the artwork for my album plus drawings from his book ‘Broadcast’ as well as limited full colour prints, photos, a sound installation and other treats I’m working on. I might break out some of my original comic art collection too…

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Secret Oranges blogspot

My good friend Steve Cook has been going through his drawers and cupboards (and believe me he has a lot) and finding loads of ephemera from his days working as a designer for 2000ad, Dr Who, Starburst and many more. I know for a fact that he’s got tons of other interesting bits and bobs in his collection so take a look if the miscellania of comic history is your bag. The Secret Oranges title is a play on the Secret Origins series’ so beloved by comics publishers.

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70’s Sci-Fi logos and magazine design

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Going through a couple of recently acquired Mediascene magazines today from the late 70’s and I was struck by how much more imaginatively designed the headers on some of the articles were. A lot of them riffed off of film or comic logo design of the age but were mini works of art in themselves. I’ve included various shots of comic logos from ads in the mags too.

 

DC Fifty-Too

If you pay even the remotest attention to the comics world then you’ll know that Sept 2011 is the month that DC reboot their entire line back to Issue 1, sweeping away all continuity, history and character development from years gone by. Jon Morris started a spin off site called DC Fifty-TOO! and asked artists to provide their own  interpretations of DC titles they’d like to see redone. Unfortunately we’ll probably never be able to read some of these treats, I picked some favourites but there are loads on the site, complete with artist commentaries.



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Hellboy – The Fury

Just finished this and I waited until I had all 3 issues before reading any. Absolutely amazing, the sense that England is being destroyed in an end-of-the-world scenario is very well done by artist Duncan Fregredo. I’ve been scooping up all the Hellboy books this year and reading one a month to play catch up as I stopped buying it years back, well worth it.

Even more exciting is the news that series creator and original artist Mike Mignola is going to be back drawing the comic again after years on just writing duties, also that the book he’ll draw will be called ‘Hellboy in Hell’.

 

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Henry Flint x Strictly Kev limited print #1

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Here we have what I hope to be the first in a series of limited edition signed prints of the work by Henry Flint that’s adorned my record sleeves over the last 2 years. The first one is ‘Life Cycle of a Machine’ that featured on my ‘The Shape of Things That Hum’ EP in late 2009 and was originally a B&W line drawing that Henry did which I have digitally coloured.

The giclee print is 64 x 47cm on 300gsm Somerset Photo paper which is 100% cotton and I can attest that the print is very high quality indeed. All will be signed by Henry and myself and will be available from Scraffer.com, sent rolled in a study cardboard tube. If these sell well there are plans for a further three prints featuring artwork from the album and EPs in the same format.

Fantastic Four #1 cover homages

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Comics fans will be familiar with the cover to Fantastic Four #1 whether they read the book or not, Jack Kirby‘s classic image of the Mole Man’s monster emerging from the ground, reaching out to grab Sue Richards whilst the rest scatter around him.

It’s been revived and parodied several times. both within the FF universe and by other titles, the latest being X-Men‘s Marvel 50th anniversary issue (I think, I don’t read these kind of comics).

A quick search, after seeing the Monster substituted for Galactus, revealed quite a few variations on the original, most cribbed from an existing article here on Comic Coverage. Thanks to Megatrip for pointing out extra homages too.

 

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Red Skull Incarnate by David Aja

Love this Red Skull cover, don’t know who it’s by it’s by David Aja (thanks JB) – check his blog here for more.  Here are a few more things from him in a similar vein. Nice to see comics quietly catching up on the graphic design side of things. I just found it whilst looking for something else, hmmm, 3 skulls in the last five posts.

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Artifacts #3

Alternity cover‘Alternity’ comic issue No. 1,  finished copy of the aborted UK comic from the makers of 2000ad, 1992. Includes stories and artwork by Dave Gibbons, Carlos Ezquerra, Colin MacNeil, Brett Ewins, Jamie Hewlett, John Wagner, Mark Millar, Pat Mills and Clint Langley.

Never officially published, this is a revised version of the ‘Earthside 8’ comic with one new story, most were pulped.

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Brian Lewis

Until recently I knew very little of Brian Lewis’ work, but the handful of pages I did know are etched in my brain as some of my first ever sci-fi comic experiences.

In 1978 I was in a newsagents and spied a comic called 2000ad, it was into its second year and the issue was no. 61. On the cover was their most popular character, Judge Dredd, roaring towards you on his bike, guns blazing. Lucky for me I’d stumbled upon the very issue that the comic decided to begin the first ever ‘epic’ in Dredd’s world – ‘The Cursed Earth’ – now, quite rightly, considered a classic. Opening the cover however, the first strip I was confronted with was an updated take on the old Eagle character Dan Dare. More so than the front cover, the page set fireworks off in my eight year old brain as a spaceship happened upon a huge space monster, the likes of which I’d never seen before. The detail was incredible, every tiny pore of the beast and panel of the ship was rendered meticulously. I’d only read ‘humour’ comics and some of the UK Star Wars weeklies up until then and I couldn’t believe this kind of art existed in a kids comic. I was sold and asked my mum if she could buy it, showing her how amazing it was (to me – I doubt she liked it very much). I loved this comic so much, I even took it to school and showed everyone who would listen how amazing I thought it was, it was ragged and ripped in a very short time but I still have it in a box somewhere.

Around the same time, issue No.1 of Starburst magazine arrived, a new monthly title concentrating on sci-fi in the movies, heavily capitalising on the previous year’s Star Wars fever and sporting an eye-catching wrapround cover of said film. Being mad on SW I picked it up, inside it was very text heavy, which, for an eight year old, was a bit of a no-no but the cover was so beautiful I had to have it. This time I pestered my dad (who was a much harder sell than my mum) and finally got a copy after a number of attempts. On the inside cover was a weird little one page strip where an astronaut is wandering about outside his ship in space, he hears a rumble and flees back inside, desperate to make it as quick as possible. The last panel sees him hooked up to a toilet in his suit, relieved to be relieving himself. Juvenile, sure, but beautifully drawn (and written) – by Brian Lewis.

A recent urge to revisit this issue (long since binned or given away) had me hunting around on eBay and a few days later it popped through the letter box. Most of the magazine was as fresh in my mind as when I’d read it years before, the cover still as great, Darth looking a little tired and droopy-mouthed in this rendition. Then I noticed the signature on it, L E W I S, my god, he did the front cover as well! You’d never know this from comparing the two, one being black and white line work, the other being fully painted colour using photos as reference. Doing some research online I found that he was one of the old school and had been in his prime in the 60’s and 70’s drawing Gerry Anderson comics and later Hammer House of Horror strips and covers for Dez Skinn. He’d also contributed a couple of covers to 2000ad as well as a three part Dan Dare story – you guessed it – the one I saw when I first opened the first issue I bought! How I’d never linked this with the Starburst one-pager I’ll never know but the similarities are obvious now.

Sadly, at the same time I was experiencing these revelations, Brian’s time was almost up and this was some of the last work he did, he passed away in 1979. There are a few pockets of information on him around the net but he’s not remembered as widely as the younger artists who were just starting out when 2000ad was the new comic on the block. He was very much the old school passing over the baton to the new, fresh-faced upstarts like Mike McMahon, Brian Bolland and Dave Gibbons. To me his style is very British, very considered, not overly flash but hyper detailed. Even though I only know a few pieces of his work I’m sure they will stay with me forever.

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