Anyway, here's a few pages I've scanned in for you to enjoy.
Tuesday 17 July 2012
Holiday diary: Anubis and Jack's view
Recently I returned from a relaxing ten day break in Looe, Cornwall. I decided this year to keep a visual diary of my exploits, reflecting on each day that we visited a particular sight. Being a bit of a comics nut, I decided that the best approach was to do this as a comic strip with my two current characters from my short Graphic Novel that I'm presently developing, Anubis and Jack, as stars.
Anyway, here's a few pages I've scanned in for you to enjoy.
See you soon.
Anyway, here's a few pages I've scanned in for you to enjoy.
Monday 9 July 2012
Jus' an ever lovin' blue eyed possum
I've said quite a bit about some of my favourite British artists over the past few weeks and now I want to start to widen the scope of this blog to look at some other artists that have influenced me or made me smile.
So I've decided to look at one of my all time favourite artists: Walt Kelly. Kelly is best known as the creator of Pogo, the American comic strip which revolutionised the form in the 1950's and 1960's. Mixing whimsey and cute animals alongside biting satire and clever wordplay, there probably has never anything like it before or since.
I'm very lucky to have bought the first volume of Fantagraphics reprints of the Pogo series, which I purchased straight after release earlier this year.
Kelly originally started out as an animator for Walt Disney, joining in 1935. His credits included Bambi (1942) and Dumbo (1941) among others. He left during the 1941 strike. He would then hone his artistic skills working for Dell drawing many of the Disney characters. Later he would create an alligator named Albert and a possum named Pogo.
Pogo centres around the possum of the same name, who along with his friends such as Albert Alligator, Churchy La Femme (a turtle) and Miz Mam'selle Hepzibah (A french skunk).
He was also an accomplished satirist, mocking figures of the time such as the fiercely anti-communitst Senator, Joe McCarthy, showing him as the Wildcat, Simple J Malarkey. This was quite close to the bone for the time and Kelly took a significant risk in satirizing such a powerful figure.
For me, the magic of Kelly was in his inking. For me, there is no one better able to illustrate fine detail with a brush.
His animation training also showed through, particularly with regard to pose and expression. Not to mention his skill as a painter.
Walt Kelly died on October 18 1973.
For more information on Walt and his fine body o'work, head on to these great sites who really do him justice.
http://www.pogopossum.com/index.htm - the official Walt Kelly website, still under construction but with an excellent biography.
http://whirledofkelly.blogspot.co.uk/ - the best blog on Kelly and Pogo - lots of strips and regular updates.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Walt_Kelly - A useful biography of the man himself.
Next time - George Herriman and Krazy Kat.
So I've decided to look at one of my all time favourite artists: Walt Kelly. Kelly is best known as the creator of Pogo, the American comic strip which revolutionised the form in the 1950's and 1960's. Mixing whimsey and cute animals alongside biting satire and clever wordplay, there probably has never anything like it before or since.
I'm very lucky to have bought the first volume of Fantagraphics reprints of the Pogo series, which I purchased straight after release earlier this year.
Kelly originally started out as an animator for Walt Disney, joining in 1935. His credits included Bambi (1942) and Dumbo (1941) among others. He left during the 1941 strike. He would then hone his artistic skills working for Dell drawing many of the Disney characters. Later he would create an alligator named Albert and a possum named Pogo.
Pogo centres around the possum of the same name, who along with his friends such as Albert Alligator, Churchy La Femme (a turtle) and Miz Mam'selle Hepzibah (A french skunk).
He was also an accomplished satirist, mocking figures of the time such as the fiercely anti-communitst Senator, Joe McCarthy, showing him as the Wildcat, Simple J Malarkey. This was quite close to the bone for the time and Kelly took a significant risk in satirizing such a powerful figure.
For me, the magic of Kelly was in his inking. For me, there is no one better able to illustrate fine detail with a brush.
His animation training also showed through, particularly with regard to pose and expression. Not to mention his skill as a painter.
Walt Kelly died on October 18 1973.
For more information on Walt and his fine body o'work, head on to these great sites who really do him justice.
http://www.pogopossum.com/index.htm - the official Walt Kelly website, still under construction but with an excellent biography.
http://whirledofkelly.blogspot.co.uk/ - the best blog on Kelly and Pogo - lots of strips and regular updates.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Walt_Kelly - A useful biography of the man himself.
Next time - George Herriman and Krazy Kat.
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