Holy whale

Drew a little friend in my friends studio during his exhibition to keep him company

AWOL Studios, London! Liverpool and Ralph Steadman

Apologies my little flock, I've been very quiet on this here blog lately, but that's only because I've been super busy in the big wide world. I've done a load of travelling around Manchester, Liverpool & London during the past few weeks and haven't had the time to get online and update anything.

I'm feeling motivated, inspired and positive having taken the time to explore some of the art & culture that's right under our noses yet often ignored in the UK. I don't think people realise how much stuff is going on outside their front door and how cheap and easy it is to go out and see it, it's good to get off the computer sometimes you know :)

MANCHESTER .

Awol Studios Exhibitions

A little open day at my mate's block of studios, it was a brilliant event where everyone who owned their own space opened up their doors to all the other artists, designers, photographers, tattooists, printmakers, etc and let them all wander around each other's studios having a nosy at their work and drink free beer. Some of the artwork on display here was incredible.

LONDON .

Every time I visit London I fall back in love with it. That sounds completely cheesy and lame but I stand by it :) There's so much cool shit to do, everyone's so diverse and interesting, and it only costs £7.50 to get around on the old toob, bargain! 

Originally I planned to just go down to see the Ralph Steadman exbo at the Cartoon Musuem, but I ended up sneaking an obligatory peak at the National Portrait Gallery and the British Museum as well.

A nasty lady at the exhibition kept telling me not to take pictures so these are were taken very sneakily ;) Ralph is now my new favourite illustrator / cartoonist / inspiration / guy on the planet.

Famous illustraion accompaniment work for Hunter S. Thomspon's Fear & Loathing in Las Vegas

"Authority is the mask of violence"

British Museum 

my best mate Napoleon 

Uncle Ben's Rice

LIVERPOOL .

I went down briefly to visit my girlfriend in scouseland (she's in one of the pictures making friends with ET) and see a bunch of arty things I've forgotten already. Liverpool's lovely, but it rained the whole time.

reading material

I've been reading a couple of new books recently to get the creative juices flowing.

- How To Draw Manga (Male Characters, Occult & Horror, Compiling Characters, Compiling Techniques)
- A few issues of Juxtapoz Magazine
- Manga
- The Illusion of Life, Disney Animation
- The Animation Bible
- The Art of Pixar Shorts

Plus a couple that I don't have the physical versions for, but I've been reading on my ipad dropbox

- BCA Flash Animation by Adam Phillips
- The Animator's Survival Kit by Richard Williams
- Elemental Magic
- Elemental Magic Volume II