Abi please give us a description of Doodlezine. How did the idea of this project come up and how has it come along?
I had arranged to pop over to see my friend Desdemona Mccannon for lunch, and sometimes when we meet up we say shall we make a cardboard town, or shall we sew some paper to make masks, and we have dinner and do some making. But on this particular day i suggested making a zine, so we played around with the idea, and thought of doing a joint zine, just for ourselves. I thought it would be simple and fun, and at the time I had been going to an event called Doodleplanet in Chester, which is on every month, and so doodles were an active part of my life at that moment, and a lot of fun, Des had set up a flickr group about doodles, so we just thought it would be nice idea to get a collection of doodles together, i gave out little cards about the idea at doodleplanet, and it grew from there. In this last year we have had submissions from all over the world and receive hundreds of submissions for each issue, its been brilliant, a very lot of fun.
I had arranged to pop over to see my friend Desdemona Mccannon for lunch, and sometimes when we meet up we say shall we make a cardboard town, or shall we sew some paper to make masks, and we have dinner and do some making. But on this particular day i suggested making a zine, so we played around with the idea, and thought of doing a joint zine, just for ourselves. I thought it would be simple and fun, and at the time I had been going to an event called Doodleplanet in Chester, which is on every month, and so doodles were an active part of my life at that moment, and a lot of fun, Des had set up a flickr group about doodles, so we just thought it would be nice idea to get a collection of doodles together, i gave out little cards about the idea at doodleplanet, and it grew from there. In this last year we have had submissions from all over the world and receive hundreds of submissions for each issue, its been brilliant, a very lot of fun.
What are your views on contemporary illustration and young creatives in Europe?
I think that the illustration that i see around at the moment is great, lots of amazing styles, and its great that illustrators are getting more opportunities these days in different sorts of work, such as film, fashion, animation allsorts of things.
If you were given the opportunity to acquire a piece of art – no matter the price – which would you select?
I would buy a huge contraption made by Samantha Bryan, I have always loved the things that she makes. I would ask her to make me a giant flying machine that only Works when i am asleep in the day, and it would be made to help me do all the boring things that i have to do like, cleaning and shopping and the school run.
I think that the illustration that i see around at the moment is great, lots of amazing styles, and its great that illustrators are getting more opportunities these days in different sorts of work, such as film, fashion, animation allsorts of things.
If you were given the opportunity to acquire a piece of art – no matter the price – which would you select?
I would buy a huge contraption made by Samantha Bryan, I have always loved the things that she makes. I would ask her to make me a giant flying machine that only Works when i am asleep in the day, and it would be made to help me do all the boring things that i have to do like, cleaning and shopping and the school run.
What feelings/ideologies/thoughts are you, most commonly, trying to express through your art?
All the things I draw are usually are about the frustrations of when i was a child, and the feelings you have, and difficulties of understanding life, School, people, I suppose its all relevant to being an adult to, fright, stress, communication, except as a child you don't understand what these feelings are, or mean. So its something like that.
Share the top five blogs that you visit more often
This is very difficult, i have changed this list so many times, because i read a lot of blogs each day. So I have gone for these:
Bobby Dazzler
Sally Illustration
Robert Rubbish
Good Grief
BFRmag
there's so many, that was hard!
Describe your vision of a perfect studio / workspace
A very old caravan that lives in a forest , and it has has been emptied out, and refitted with all my favourite sorts of things, like a grandfather clock, a piano, and old rugs, a grey rabbit who lives there, and a giant white fluffy cat, a big table for all my bits, and a view of a forest, and of course a giant coffee machine.
Any more ‘secrets’ you would like to reveal?
A secret!
Children’s picture book project, with Seb Cazes
That is a huge secret!!!!
sshhh
A secret!
Children’s picture book project, with Seb Cazes
That is a huge secret!!!!
sshhh
