We just came back from a two week tour around the Croatian coast! Our schedule was quite action-packed, and I'm not sure we'd necessarily do that again, but on the other hand I'm not sure what I would cut out if I had to, everything was so beautiful. Here's the journal pages for our trip! Enjoy!
No words this time around, just some journal pages, style sketches based on people leaving a church nearby, and itchy scratchy insect nastiness.
Last month, I attended a comics workshop in Walthamstow (where I now want to live) taught by the very talented Emily Haworth-Booth. It was a great day and I left feeling incredibly inspired, although not particularly by my own work.
What most stuck with me, is the way Emily taught us to storyboard. I don't usually do longer comics, but whenever I've tried, I started out by writing a script. These scripts would turn out lengthy, too wordy, and I'd have trouble adding images to the text. Emily, instead, had us start out with a picture, think of a story, and just randomly start drawing scenes on frame-sized bits of paper. We could then add text where needed and tweak the order of the story. As I am a very visual thinker, this felt much more natural and a lot less stressful to me! Lightbulb moment!
My story ended up being about my younger brother Rutger (because I miss him) and although I'm not sure it works as a story per se, I decided to follow through and ink and color it nonetheless.
Thanks, Emily, for the great workshop!
If you're interested in taking a class from Emily, there's a section for that on her website right here.
Almost exactly a month ago I went to Elcaf, the East London Comics and Arts Festival here in East London. The festival consisted of a fair, film screenings, tons of workshops, some masterclasses, an exhibit, and a bunch of talks and discussions. I decided to not enroll in any classes or workshops (I hardly have any time to do my own work at the moment), but I did get us weekend passes and tickets to a label discussion about comics publishing, featuring some Sam Arthur (Nobrow and Flying Eye Books), Annie Koyama (Koyama Press), Madalena Matoso (Planeta Tangerina), Ken Kirton (Hato Press) and Alexandra Zsigmond (Deputy Art Director at the New York Times), which was great.
Mostly though, I puttered around the fair looking at the amazing work. There were so many great artists I had a real hard time and I pretty much needed the full two days to decide which books and zines I absolutely couldn't live without. So hard and I wish I could have bought more, but in the end I just decided on a budget and bought whatever I could. Below is what I ended up with and a brief review for each.
Books
Jilian Tamaki - Supermutant Magic Academy
An anthology of the webcomic that has been going since 2010, the book follows a group of mutant teenagers attending a Harry Potter-like high school. The comics are usually one to two pages long and are nerdy, funny, and touching at the same time. I hadn't read the webcomic very much before getting this book, but was familiar with some of the work Jilian Tamaki did in collaboration with her cousin Mariko Tamaki (This One Summer is one of my favorites). The style of this collection is very different from those books - much more loose and sketchily drawn, but the lines are very expressive and really helps you get to know each of the (often grumpy) characters.
Philippa Rice - Soppy
Another webcomic turned book is Soppy, which chronicles UK comic artist Philippa Rice's (known for My Cardboard Life) relationship with her boyfriend. cartoonist Luke Pearson. The book is a collection of sweet, quiet moments. Of efforts made to make a relationship work. And of the slow, life-changing sharing of habits where personalities blend together a little at the edges. In my mind, this book is an ode to long term relationships and I loved it. Almost every other page I recognized situations I have been in when in a long term relationship, but not in a cliché way at all. The drawing style is clean, using only red, white, and black, making me long to try a more minimalist palet in my own work (but who are we kidding). Lovely book.
Tillie Walden - The End of Summer
I was tempted to buy The End of Summer when I passed by Tillie Walden's booth and saw her do the most amazing drawing in the front of a book she'd just sold to someone else. I had never heard of Tillie Walden before, but her drawings are absolutely stunning and they just seemed to flow from her. The book tells the story of a boy Lars and his twin sister Maja who are locked into a secluded castle with their family as they try to survive a winter predicted to last three years. The story features gigantic cats, incredibly detailed backdrops, and tender moments between brother and sister. That being said, I've now read the story twice and found the story kind of confusing at times. It could be that this is intentional as the whole book has a very dreamlike quality to it, but I found it a little frustrating nonetheless. Am curious to see what Walden will do next!
Zines
Grace Helmer - Small Hours Part One
Lovely, colorful zine from Grace Helmer about the summer after graduating from college and trying to make it as a freelance artist. Love the art here.
Katriona Chapman - KatZine Issue One & Two
Stunning black and white zines done in pencil about Katriona Chapman's experiences, memories, thoughts on art, science, and commerce, and love for the natural world. I really felt like I got to know someone a bit better by reading these zines and got smarter at the same time. SO promising and can't wait to see what Chapman will do next.
AJ Poyiadgi - Teapot Therapy
Cleverly done (and folded) story by AJ Poyiadgi of an older lady's tea time habit of cleverly luring people into the house for tea. Although short, it deals with loneliness in old age, but not in a way that makes you pity the main character per se. You admire her strength, while at the same time it illustrates a very real social issue. Very well done and beautifully executed. A real treat.
Poster by Planeta Tangerina
I loved every single thing from this Portuguese publisher (especially this fun and clever book 'Livro Clap', which you have to 'clap' open and closed to make the story work) , but in the end just bought a poster because I was too overwhelmed at the point to make any more decisions on which book to get.
Now this poster hangs in our bedroom and really brightens up the room.
One of the best things about living in a different country from your own is being able to learn about your new home country. In a way, you're getting the best of both worlds. You can learn all about a country and culture from directly from insiders, and experience them as a local would, but at the same time you're somewhat removed from it all and you kind of 'pick and choose' your experiences.
I can imagine if you move to countries very far away from your own that culture gap might be difficult to bridge (or if you've moved out of economic or social necessity, your perspective might be different - I realize we're quite privileged here), but the UK and The Netherlands are close enough yet plenty different from each other for it to be interesting and fun.
This past week has been all about exploring the UK, marked first by a weekend in Edinburgh, Scotland . The cloudy yet magical city was all it should be and I imagined. No, I did not eat haggis, but did try black pudding (for breakfast, no less) and fell completely in love with the tartan outfits, the dramatic history (knights! swords! ghosts!) and the castles. Aye!
Speaking of outfits, the week after was very much focused on outfits (and royalty) as I wore my first (serious) hatted ensemble ever. The hat was really more of a fascinator, but I think it counts. I needed the hat, as well as a dress of modest length, as I was invited along to the first day of the Royal Ascot by my friend and colleague Hannah. Squee!
Hannah is probably the most British person I know - she lives on a dairy farm, bakes cakes for village fairs, and is an excellent clay pigeon shooter person. Her life is pretty magical, is all I'm saying. Hannah and her family were amazingly kind in taking me on for the day and they proved excellent guides into the world of royal processions, horse racing, and gambling. My father-in-law (who owned two race horses in his day) was on speed dial as well, and the whole day was just a fantastic experience. I can get into this British thing, I think. As long as it involves great outfits, some ceremony, and a Prince or two (alas, no Kate this time) - I'm game.
Next up: traditional cream tea. Apparently the question on whether to put the cream or the jam on the scone first divides the nation.
I've spoken about color before, most notably in part two of my Art Journaling tutorial (gosh it's weird to see those old drawings), and I still do love a great color scheme. This drawing of a particularly great Wednesday (I'm a bit behind on my drawings) was inspired by a 1970s stamp from Israel. I found this stamp at Present & Correct (and a few more, but I decided to send those to a stamp-loving friend) and was instantly inspired by the cheerful combinations. Scans to follow.
Question: how is it May already? How is my trip to Singapore only one week away? Time is a weird thing and it seems to slip away from me these days. The only antidote to time slippage is taking note of tiny, lost moments. A man in a pink suit on the bus. A book before getting up and ready for another day of work and email. A well cooked meal for one. A drawing, here and there. You should try it.
Oh what a difference a week makes. From the freezing Brighton beach we went to summery sunny days in London. We've been having a great time exploring this new home town of ours that seems to have finally woken up from its slumber and my allergies are finally acting up. I'm not complaining. Just expressing myself is all. Hope it's sunny wherever you are, dear reader - enjoy!
As perhaps you've seen on Instagram (I am obsessed with Instagram so much, it's like my new best friend), Jochem and I were in Brighton last weekend! I booked an AirBnB for Jochem's birthday as a surprise, but I messed up and totally told him beforehand. I also got him a toaster, though, which he totally didn't expect, so at least there was that element of surprise.
The weather was absolutely terrible, but we still managed to have a very nice time, and it was great for me to see a bit more of this country we moved to, as I'm ashamed to say this was the first time outside of London for me. Shaaame.
People ask me about what living in London is like and I'm like 'normal, I guess?'. Yes, everything is expensive and I feel like we've reverted back to graduate school standards where it comes to housing and budgets (, but other than that - we're enjoying it. It's normal, even, in a good way. I enjoy being at home and living my little life here. A large part of that might be that we've actually not been home very much this past month - being home doesn't get boring that way. The title says it all. Ski in Switzerland, work in New York, present in Belgium, and hang out in Holland. Tough times and I haven't done a whole lot of drawing during most of it, but I did some here and there and I thought I'd share. Which almost rhymes. Oh, and I turned 31 last week. Yayzers! Enjoy, peeps.
When I was home sick this week, I finally caught up on reading through my stack of Frankie Magazines (so love that magazine) and came across a hilarious article on how at some point in your late twenties, early thirties, all your friends turn into couples and you all of a sudden find yourself attending dinner parties where all people talk about is mortgages and appliances. My friends are pretty awesome so they also talk about other things (although it has been suggested to me more than once that I get food processor X or mixer Y instead of my 5 Euro supermarket version which I happened to think was pretty grown up already), but it is true in a sense. Adult life can be very boring. Full of chores and boomerang errands where you take care of something, only for it to be followed up by another errand. Have I told you that joke about how the internet was supposed to be installed in my place this week? Oh yeah, they didn't show.
These journal pages are not about any of this, I just felt like stating the obvious above. Also, I was reminded of it because I felt like a real grown up when my new bank cards arrived in the mail. Yay. Bank cards! Bureaucratic hurdle number one has been taken!
Usually, my emotions present themselves right on cue. I bawled my eyes out during my brother's wedding, jumped up and down squealing when I heard I got the job I really wanted, and my voice cracked just the right amount when I read a goodbye letter to my grandpa at his funeral (I could still speak, fortunately). Me and my emotions are like BFFs - we're in touch.
These last few weeks, however, I've just been making other people cry. There were goodbye parties, dinners, meetings, and people have hugged me and expressed their sadness over this mythical event that apparently is happening in four days from now: our permanent move to London. It hits me, sometimes, in a combination of mild panic and excitement, but mostly I'm a little weirded out. Working towards a date on the calendar when this abstract thing will happen to us and our lives will change.
My scanner will be on a truck in two days, so I'm not sure when I'll post next, but follow me on Instagram in the mean time if you're curious as to when those flood gates finally open. Dramatic smudged-mascara-airport-selfies anyone?
In exactly one month, a big truck will pull up to our house, and all of our belongings will be taken away by strong men with boxes. At least, that's how I picture it will go. Because, we found a house in London!
We did a quick trip to London end of October to do some house hunting. Which was exactly as horrid as you would imagine - apartments in London are expensive, tiny, and ugly. At least the first 8 apartments we saw were like that, and some of the more promising ones were taken off the market right as our relocation officer drove us around town to get there. We went through the ghetto and back, to closet-sized apartments on shmansy streets, and waited around for real estate agents who in the end turned out not to have the key to apartments we were eager to look at.
We were about to give up - talking of plans for another round of searching, possibly staying somewhere temporarily for a while, perhaps even looking at completely different neighborhoods, when we visited 'our' apartment.
Bright, not too tiny (still small), cute mixed neighborhood, right near a 'tube' station, perfect. We put a bid out almost immediately. Yes, a bid. I had never heard of it either, but apparently tenants can outbid each other until you put a crazy fee down (which we did).
Fortunately, the bid was accepted after much back and forth, and we spent the next day walking around our new home town and eating Turkish food near our future place. That was probably the last time we'll ever be able to go out to dinner as we'll be poor from the minute we arrive in London, so I'm glad to inform you it involved a very, ehm, motivated belly dancer.
As soon as we got back to Utrecht, we started sorting out our belongings. The new place is about half of the size of our current apartment (and about 2 times as expensive, so it works out in a strange, messed-up way), so we can't bring all of our stuff along. It's a great way to get rid of the junk we've been collecting and haven't looked at for years (college notebooks anyone?), but there also won't be room for some of the good stuff, like my drawing table or any of my studio equipment.
Fortunately, there wasn't much time to mourn our earthly possessions, as we boarded another airplane on our way to Lisbon, Portugal! I'd booked this trip a while back as a surprise for Jochem. Totally irresponsible, of course, and looking at it in hindsight we should have saved our precious Euros, but it was a welcome distraction. Sunny, beautiful, delicious, and relaxing.
The week after, I got a new tattoo! I had decided on the design a while ago and had booked my appointment a few weeks ago, but I was still nervous because that stuff hurts like a mother. I lived, though, and although the tattoo right now is looking scabby and itches badly, it turned out real nice.
Last week, it was back to normal life. Taxes, bills, scary movies. The usual.
But not before I took one more trip to London to attend a few meetings. I decided to fly in in the morning and fly out the same evening, which sounded like a good plan. Until I had to get up at 4 am to catch my 7 am flight. Fun times, but all the meetings went really well, and at least I won't have any trouble sleeping this week.
And then it was today and I'm drinking coffee and reading John Steinbeck before I get started on my work for the day. So. Bye then!
It's been a while since I've posted some journal pages, but rest assured it was with good reason. I was hanging out in good ol' 'Muricah again with some amazing colleagues. But not before I got kind of sick and tired. Not of something. Just a little sick and mostly tired. And paranoid.
Fortunately, I had some great in-flight entertainment to cheer me up during my flight.
I had a day 'off' before work started, and I did some sketching outside in Central Park and the American Museum of Natural History. I also cried during the show on dark matter in the planetarium. Because everything's awesome and big an amazing and people are so smart and I'm a role model to all the 3 year olds who were also crying (probably because they were afraid of the dark). You can be 30 and cry in the planetarium and that's cool because when you're 30 you've got a credit card and you can buy awesome shit in the nerdy gift shop afterwards to make yourself feel better. I bought this hologram thing for Jochem and it's awesome.
The day after, I met up with a colleague to catch a train to Hudson, in upstate New York for a very inspiring offsite event. The days were pretty busy and social, so I didn't do much drawing but I loved Hudson. It's a weird little town, with long streets of colorful wooden houses, great little coffeeshops, and weird backstreets. The train ride up was amazing, too. Upstate New York in the fall is famous for a reason.
The last few days of the week I spent working in the Brooklyn office, more hanging out with colleagues, and maaaaybe some shopping. Also: drawing, of course. I've been so obsessed with drawing houses, lately.
And then I flew back home and slept for five years. Next up: our London house hunting trip! Eek!
September wasn't great, I'm not going to lie. Lots of little things just kept piling on until I could feel stress bunching up not just in my shoulders and neck, but creeping into my toes and fingers. Turns out you can turn 30 and learn a lot about how not to deal with tension, but somehow forget (or actively ignore) ways to release it in a healthy way. Fortunately, you can always count on some Jehova's witnesses to ring your doorbell when the hour is most tense - reminding you to just shut that door and cuddle a cat instead.
This weekend I had another breakdown after we found out some of our winter coats and books had grown some additional fur in the form of mold. My colleague says this house is just bad luck and I'm starting to believe her. Instead of throwing myself a weekend long pity-party as would have been absolutely appropriate I think, I went to the art supply store and got myself some fresh inks, illustrated by exhibit A below.
I remembered this story because that same colleague - I'll just say her name: Ingrid - recently tried to get rid of one of her very own fingertips. I remember this incident very clearly. I felt so sorry for my mom for obviously having the IQ of a doorknob. Fingers clearly look nothing like grass, you poor lady!
Hope you're all having a great start of October so far and I'll be back soon, I promise. Fun updates ahead!
Last weekend I went to Brussels to visit friends for the first time in almost a year. I hadn't been to the city because somehow I just couldn't deal with it emotionally, but now I felt ready and eager to see my friends, colleagues, and the city again. I almost cried of joy, walking out of the station. Which is surprising, because Brussels train stations smell like piss, mostly. Piss and waffles, to be exact. But you know me, I am nothing if not a little dramatic at times - and drama I would get.
After dinner and drinks, my friends and I were having one last drink. I went to the bathroom for a minute, came back, and my backpack was gone. With everything in it. Money, passport, phone, laptop, creditcards, ipod, books, sunglasses, my favorite clothes, makeup, medication, tickets, art supplies, and my journal. This journal.
After hours and hours of waiting and finally being able to leave a statement at the police station, I went to spend the night at my friend D's house. It's a crazy feeling to have nothing on you but the clothes on your back. If you're expecting me to say it felt 'liberating' - wrong blog, dude. I felt absolutely lost and emotional about someone else touching MY stuff with their dirty hands. I told you it would get dramatic.
Fortunately I watched a lot of Disney when I was little and this story ends well, with a knight in shining armor and fruit smoothies.
When Jochem came to pick me up the next day (he drove all the way down here), he had good news: the police had called him to tell him they had found most of my personal belongings in a little park next to the police station, a few blocks from where my backpack had been stolen. Those personal belongings included my journal! We went out for smoothies to celebrate, drove home, and I collapsed and lived happily ever after.
The End.