Fragments before Summer's dog days Number 1: Interesting Times

After last year's very successful publication 'Long Live The Art School!' by the Graphic Design BA (Hons) course at University of the Creative Arts in Epsom (one of my parallel careers exists therein) there will soon be a sveldt new tome to add to the shelf.
Course Leader Luke Pendrell thought the title 'Interesting Times' entirely appropriate for these days that we live in.

My own response to the theme is here. Do click to make image larger should you wish to feel the benefit of the details.

Two years old but – after a weekend of June gales, downpours and flooding – well worth the wait.

A genuine fragment for your delectation.

There's something beautifully-rounded and elegant about this.

UPDATE/CORRECTION

Sadly the St.Bride Event – as publicized at various points of the virtual compass, not least here (see below) – has been postponed until later in 2012, and so the new blog connected to it will thus appear as  the season of mists and mellow fruitfulness wraps its cooling arms around the post-Jubilee, post Olympicballs nation.

Attached here - a fragment from a parallel universe where this image publicized what was a fabulously popular event in mid-June, cracking open the much-misunderstood activity/profession/mindscape of illustration.

NEW THINGS - SOON!

Amidst the final heavy marking period – in my role as 3rd year Tutor at an institution of Higher Learning – I just wanted to say that there will be a new raft of material here shortly.
I will be revealing unseen images connected to the preparatory process for the Living Well With Dementia project featured recently (and also covered in Design Week and Creative Review blogs) and ushering in my role as 'conference illustrator' at an event at St.Bride off Fleet Street entitled 'Making Pictures'.
The latter has just been featured on the Eye magazine blog - take a look at

http://blog.eyemagazine.com/?p=12764

Incidentally, I will soon be creating a new bouncing baby blog nearby this old war-horse to offer parallel material and host the record I create, in drawn form, from that day.

You have been warned.

The next post will contain a genuine fragment which I have meant to include here for a very long time.

And - while you're waiting - here's a superb speech delivered by a certain Neil Gaiman at the graduation ceremony of a London-based university related to 'the Arts'. It's not far away. . . in The Land of Vimeo

http://vimeo.com/42372767

LIVING WELL WITH DEMENTIA?

I am very happy to say that my recent work with the esteemed Why Not Associates can be revealed.

I have provided illustrative line work for 6 films conceived by this company to reflect a Design Council initiative called 'Living Well With Dementia' which launched today at their central London base and online at www.livingwellwithdementia.com
Click on the image here to see greater detail from the homepage.
The site showcases the work of 5 teams from across the UK that have created design-centred strategies to ease the burden of both those who have dementia and those who care for them.

Working with WNA designers Clayton Welham and Sam Williams – as well as company co-founder David Ellis – I talked through the concepts and possible visual elements that might best complement the separate projects, and these were then layered into the deceptively complex final film pieces you can view at the site. The subtle film sequences within which my line moves were created by photographer Julian Germain.

I'm grateful to WNA for championing the Ensixteen style they have enjoyed as long-term readers, and it's particularly important to me that I was able to contribute to what I feel is important work.
All too often design merely complements the market forces of our culture, the throw-away surface values, whereas work like this shows that design can help lives and not just help sell things.

I will post material from the developmental stages of this project here soon.

Past, Present and Future

It's been a fascinating and busy period of late.

As well as revisiting my past in terms of TV storyboarding (see recent posts below), I have been working on a large illustration project for the esteemed Why Not Associates.
I will post more detail in due course on this (it's still in the developmental stage) but suffice to say it will see my humble line reach the world of on-screen moving image, as part of a typically rich mix from this influential studio.
And for a very pertinent and life-affirming cause, to boot.

Also upcoming is the marvellous chance offered to me by designer Becky Chilcott to be a 'Conference Illustrator' at an upcoming event at the hallowed halls of the St. Bride Foundation, just off Fleet Street.
What is a 'Conference illustrator', you may well ask?
We shall see what we shall see. And draw what we shall draw, too.

More soon on that as well.

Finally - here is a fragment from my freshly-completed 'bio auto graphic' edition: 'On The Margins'.
A copy is winging its way across the cold seas to Jutland even as I type this, to be included in the exhibition of that theme at the 4th annual Doverodde Book Arts Festival and Symposium (at the atmospheric Limfjordcentre, by the twinkling fjord waters). There it will be in the safe hands of my darling Dane, Mette-Sofie D. Ambeck, who is the event's organizer this year.
Good luck, sweetheart.

And so.
The analogue signal begins to die today.
The withering attack of Paxman vs. G. Galloway Esq. on Newsnight – and some fascinating documentary on the Wikileaks mallarkey – being the last of that channel to squeeze through the modest aerial into my televisional box.

So - having done nothing about swapping to the World of Digitalis, the question remains:
Do I stay or do I go?

I will leave such thoughts until after Easter.
Damned if I can get too excited about it right now.