Brillustration take Marksbury Road!

On Saturday morning a crack squad of Brillustrators turned up at Marksbury Road Library to set up our 'Brillustration Saturday Scribble'..but conditions was icy, so it was anyones guess as to whether anyone would come.  

So did they?  Blimey..yes they did!

The next 3 hours were a frenzy of drawing, cutting out, story telling, badge making, clandestine biscuit eating and even snowman making.  The library reckons we had about 70 'paying punters' (50p each with squash and a biccy chucked in can't be bad!), and it felt like all of them got stuck in.

There was the normal riot of colour, cool pictures and requests to draw dinosaurs (you know who you are!)...

....and we also managed to jazz up the (already pretty snazzy) kids area, with a rabble of cut-out characters parading all round the tops of the bookshelves.

Sean Julian explains how he always likes to get into character before drawing a bear.

Some kids deciding to 'go 3D'

A MASSIVE THANKS to the Friends of Marksbury Road Library and library staff for inviting us, making us feel so welcome and putting in a considerable amount of legwork themselves.  

HATS OFF also to Brillustrators Sean Julian, Lauren Tobia, Paula Bowles, Rob Starling, Sam Church and Louise Cunningham, and all the kids and parents who turned up and drew like fiends- YOU ARE ACE!

AND REMEMBER KIDS - USE YOUR LOCAL LIBRARY!

Movember field report

A quick field sketch of a guy who walked past me in the bar earlier - rocking a quality mo, but he didn't seem to have quite settled into it yet and was looking slightly defensive.  Not that I am one to talk - I alas am prevented from growing a full on mo by a rare genetic condition that causes my moustache to grow ginger whilst the rest of my hair is dull brown...makes me look like an 80 a day roll-up smoker, and stops my other half from talking to me.

Gallery of Mo

Just for a giggle, and to raise money for cheridee, I have signed up to be an artist on the Gallery of Mo website.  It's very simple - you donate some money and I (or one of the many other talented peeps involved...including the ever glamorous Dave Smith and Lauren Tobia) draw you with a rather charming tash.  Ah ye will...

Zooage and Sewage!

Variety is the spice of life.  This week I have done a fun but slightly odd poster for a Bristol Zoo sponsored walk...

... and been informed that I will shortly be receiving copies of a book about (hem hem) plop that I did the cover for some time back for the nice folks at A&C Black....

To round it off I have just completed a surreal Department Store scene (aren't all Dept Store scenes surreal..just slightly?) for an American kids' magazine - more when it's published, but rest assured there will be bears...

And finally apologies to all those waiting for their latest slice of pen nerdery.  I have all the ingredients in place for my ink making jaunt, except perhaps all the oak galls.  They are in my local oak tree in abundance, but I was having pangs of guilt about boiling them up before the tenants had left..wasps that is, I don't have lodgers... There will be an update soon!

A Little Bit Bunny

A while back now I joined an ace blog called "A Little Bit Bunny": it's pretty simple ... each month a different animal is picked and the illustrators involved submit a picture to do with that animal. I have been meaning to add something to the site forever.... I think I got round to it before the road to hell was fully paved!  Here's one of 'em - for the other you'll need to Bunny it up!

More dinosaurs!

These (and the recent maracca shaking Steg) are from a raft of pics I did for Bristol Zoo's kids party room..an extra fun zoo job as it allowed the pictures to be as bold and silly as I liked (no-one could complain that the partying dinosaurs aren't 'accurate'!!).  Suggested names to the usual place.  Please note that i have already dibbsed 'Discostuosaurus'.

That it should come to this...

Here's me at my kids' school fete, sticking my head through one of my own creations (..and how many people can say that?).
I am dazed from standing in the sun for 3 hours manning a badge making stall, and am slightly worried I am going to be on the receiving end of another volley of wet sponges.  Welcome to middle age Mr Church!

All joking aside, a very good day was had! Oh and keep looking over your shoulders sponge throwers...

Redressing the balance

It occurs to me that being as I work as a children's illustrator, this blog is often maybe a tad:
a) monochrome
b) not of children's illustration
c) too wordy

Here is a picture of a dinosaur playing maraccas.

In a devil of a pickle (or maybe a jam..)

This weekend was ace on a number of fronts. Friday night me, my lovely other half Mel and our good friend Lou Archell put up a bunch of our stuff for exhibition at The Bed Workshop in Bedminster as part of the SouthBank Arts Trail  (it's a bit of a link frenzy this isn't it...sorry, it's going to get worse).
I'd like to particularly thank Mel, as she got me to do this when there was a large cloud of 'not sure I can be bothered' looming on the horizon.  In the end I put up pretty much every passable King Lear sketch I had and was well chuffed with the results.

Now I don't have many pictures of the exhibition without these guys in front, but that's okay as they were the main reason the weekend was ace.

At 3 oclock on Sunday, slightly befuddled from attending a wedding the previous day (another good weekend factor!) I and about a hundred other people crammed into the shop to see 'The Blatant Creation of Art' featuring The Bristol Ukulele Club doing 'Four Posters and a Pickle'.

Now this was a rock opera about the devil's efforts to scupper the burgeoning romance between a jam maker and a pickle maker (and also nipping the pickle makers nascent carpentry career in the bud by means of hellfire).

Why?  Well it's loosely linked to the fact that the Bed Workshop used to be a pickle factory..and who knows there may be some other historical basis for it...but for now I don't care!

Hands down the best thing I've seen in ages... funny, well acted, funny, well sung/played, completely unexpected and funny....I'm pretty sure it was all done for the love too.  And for one who's trying to get a handle on rhyming and storytelling, it was properly inspirational....

...my kids have been giving it 'P to the I to the C to the K to the L-E-S to the J-A-M' ever since.

There was someone videoing the whole thing so I'm hoping they'll put it up on their blog or somewhere.  Here's the link just in case.. http://blatantbs3.blogspot.co.uk/

I bloody love Bristol sometimes.

I've Almost Forgotten What You Did Last Summer

Most phone conversations I have will have at some point the phrase 'not much to report really' in them, but actually looking back I reckon I've done quite a lot this year dammit!  And then I've realised that being as it's been a bit of a whirl (and when it hasn't I've enjoyed the break from my computer..), I haven't really told you guys about any of it.

So in small bursts I'm going to tell you where I've been.  There will be MONKS!

TINY DOGS! (larger when I've found the right file!!).....

 MEERKATS (in case you're not sick of them already!!)....

AND A PR PHOTO MASTERCLASS...

I'll bet you can't wait...

A taste of the border..

As you may have figured I've been a tad busy of late.  I'll show y'all the results when I'm allowed to, but in the meantime here's a scribble that I did in the border of the page I'm working on.  Tomorrow, World of Noses!

Another of my favourite things...

This one from my wall.  I love the effects you can get with screenprinting but do get put off by the expense and the chemicals.  One technique I do really like is just using paper stencils on the screen -bye bye expense and chemicals for starters, plus it makes me think about picture-making in a way I never normally do. I was talking to a guy recently who does printing just this way on a table at home.  Hmmmmm.

Filler!

This fell out of my drawer when I was looking for something else...by the looks of it I did it around Christmas time.  Whenever I'm working I always tend to lose one sheet of nice paper when the doodles take over, both of stuff i'm meant to be working on and other random brain rattles.

A little bitta fun..

I recently contributed to a game of online consequences that was started by Frances Cony on the South West Illustrators blog...it was a bit of a rush job but i quite like it.... hopefully it'll take off!

Kizoa slideshow: Consequences 1 - Slideshow

The little black notebook...

Found this on a recent visit to my folks...
there was tattered old note book nestled between books on a bookshelf - in a way that had it been in a film would have screamed that it contained spells, maps or dark secrets. Not quite any of those but a lovely find.

My great grandad I learn was a pharmacist of some standing, and this was his 'formula book' containing all his special recipes for everything from hair restorer to cold remedies. He also kept press clippings and all his old adverts, bottle labels etc. This one here is my favourite, firstly, because anyone who starts their advert "ARGUMENT' is alright by me,
Secondly, it's always nice to see that members of your family were silver tongued so and sos,
and thirdly, it works quite nicely if you replace 'Pharmacist' with 'Illustrator', 'Medicine' with 'Scribbles' etc - indeed I may have to do so and give the result to potential clients...

Good on you Great Grandad

Ch-ch-ch-ch-changes

My girlfriend foolishly asked me to show her some of the different ways you could set up a blog - with the result that she got bored and went and did something else, and I've spent two pointless hours dicking around with horrible backgrounds. And then out of limitless possibilities i chose white anyway... On the plus side I've got a new title bit - enjoy it while it lasts though as it's not staying.....

Self portrait

Whilst trying to avoid the fact that I have a slight idea vacuum for a job I'm working on (see peripheral scribbles), thought I might have a go at a quick self portrait. Quickly realising it was going to be a 'moody' one, I took evasive action and turned it into a doodle instead - the result was a pleasing mix of The Chipmunks and an Empire of the Sun album cover....

Actually think about it, my portfolio's littered with self-portraits I've thought better of - here's one of my faves (though probably just cos I likes the colour!). Apologies, it's dead old...

On the buses Part 3

A bit of nearly asleep bus doodling. As you maybe able to tell I was playing round with the idea of working on some typography. I can pretty much explain why everything is there except the ice cream ( I do like ice creams though - is that a good enough reason?)

An oldie (but goodie?)

Here's one of my personal favourite pics -getting a bit old now but then so am I! One of the reasons I like it is that I'd forgotten doing it and I'm not really sure what the thinking was behind it - it was a surprise when going through one of my sketchbooks. I dimly recollect that it was an experiment in drawing with the lights out.....