The Compass of Lunacy

Wowzers! I can't believe I forgot to post about this. The Compass festival has been a regular Bristol occurrence for five years now and each year it just gets better and better. This year's theme is 'Lunacy' and the festival is taking place in the Old Coronor's Court, Stokes Croft, Bristol. Events range from spoken word evenings, burlesque performances, DJ nights and film screenings. I went to see Ingmar Bergman's horror film 'The Hour of the Wolf' on Sunday and it was amazing. Next Sunday, 31st October, they will be screening Jan Svankmajer's adaption of Alice in Wonderland which I'm super excited about as it's been years since I last saw it. For more information about the festival and it's events click HERE. At the top of this post is the front cover illustration for the event programme and the back cover below. I wonder what theme I'll be illustrating next year?

'Journey to the Centre of the Page' Screen Print

This screen print is now for sale on my online shop! All 50 of these one colour puzzle prints have been lovingly solved individually by me. Yes, I sat and drew the route out of the maze by hand with a red chinagraph pencil fifty times and amazingly managed to go the wrong route on a few. Each print is also hand number and signed by me. They are approximately 45 x 32cm big and are available for £35 each, you can purchase them HERE.

Dicephaly Brothers SOLD OUT!

I'd like to say a big thanks to everyone who bought one! Very kind of you and I hope you enjoy having it in your home.

Self Portrait

Frigo Fingers: When the Apes Met.......Jazz

I'm currently exhibiting a piece of work in the "When the Apes Met..." exhibition, curated by the Frigo Fingers Expo, and is taking place in both the Joker Gallery, Bilbao and the Vertigo Gallery, Mexico. The theme for the show was to take the characters from 'Planet of the Apes' and place them in unusual pop culture settings. I went for a Jim Flora homage and drew them as if they had released an album. I don't have much information about the show as I can find very little in English about it on the interwebs but there are heaps of great artists and illustrators taking part in the show and you can click HERE to see more.

Rockus Bockus Wine Label Design

At the end of last year, I had the pleasure of being asked to design a wine label for a company in San Francisco called Gundlach Bundschu. They wanted to create a wine so great tasting you couldn't believe how affordable it is.

Jeff Bundschu, the president of the Gundlach Bundschu, wanted to take the god of wine, Bacchus, and re-invent him for the modern day. Hence the birth of Rockus Bockus. I'd like to say a big thank you to Jeff and Susan for being such great people to work for and for choosing me to work on this project as I've always wanted to design a wine label.

Bento Bestiary Update Part Three

I streamlined Jorogumo for the new Bento Bestiary and I'm really pleased with the results. I was originally going to keep the colouring the same as the 2009 version but while tweaking the print layers I accidently ended up with pinks and purples, which fit the feel of the character better than the original. She sure is sexy!

New Website!

Head over to the brand new bennewman.co.uk. It's dead fancy like!

Only 2 Dicephaly Brothers left!

Only 50 were made and now just 2 are left of this double headed treasure! Get it while you can by clicking HERE.

Snap Mini Print for Sale Online

My screen print for the SNAP mini print show is now for sale on the SNAP studios website for a steal at £25. The full size of the print is 21cm x 21cm and if you click HERE you purchase this geometric treasure.

Bento Bestiary Update Part Two

What a difference a year and a half makes! Similar to the last post, the image on the left is from the original Bento Bestiary in early 2009 and the image on the right is from the new edition due October 2010. I feel very lucky to be given the opportunity to revisit an old project and tweak it. It has been a real eye opener to see how much my ability to draw has developed since the original.

The original was silk screen printed in 3 colours. The new edition will be litho printed in 4 spot colours.

Bento Bestiary Update

(Left) Original Inugami used in the Limited Edition 'Bento Bestiary, which came out in early 2009, and was silk screen printed in a run of just 100.

(Right) New Inugami that will feature in the all new, mass produced, hardback edition due out October 2010 and will be printed in 4 spot colours.

All That Dreams Matters

Excerpt from my 7 page contribution to the 'Graphic Cosmogony' that will be published by Nobrow later in the year. Thanks to Bjorn Lie for his incredible technical advice and tips on this project and Tom Frost for his help checking back through my work and being an awesome studio buddy. Cheers, chaps.

Stay Loose Business Card Design

A long time ago, Matt Brown from Stay Loose contacted me about using my 'Charley and the Birds' image for his website. Matt enjoyed the birds so much he recently asked me to design him a business card similar to an image I designed for 'Kindred' a while back. It was great to be able to revisit a picture I designed very quickly and improve on it. Cheers then.

Geometric Love

I managed to squeeze in some print designs over the weekend so that I can spend a couple of evenings screen-printing in the SNAP studio basement. I'll post photos of the prints once they are finished.

Shape-o-lio-lio

Mini-print Design for SNAP

Just finished this design for the SNAP studios mini-print show that starts on the 6th July. The private view will start at 6pm on the 8th July and includes a stellar line up of illustrators which you can see by clicking HERE. The artists taking part are donating a print each to help raise money for SNAP and all the prints will be on sale for a very affordable price. Toodles!

Plone Conference 2010 Logo

Netsight Internet Solutions contacted me a few weeks back about designing a logo for the Plone conference they are hosting in Bristol. Netsight are a Bristol based company and as the hosts they wanted the logo to incorporate not just Bristol landmarks but also the city's quirks and cultural identity.

I tried out numerous compositions ranging from very busy and cluttered to minimal and spacious. One of the things I really enjoyed about this job was that the client wanted the icons and graphics to be a little rough around the edges so it was great to loosen up and relax a bit. You can see how the logo was used for their website by clicking HERE.

Interview at Sooner Than Now!

Howdy Folks! Simon at Sooner Than Now asked me a few questions the other day. You can read my verbal wibblings HERE. Enjoy!

Journey to the Centre of the Page

I created this map for fellow Pocko illustrator and all round good dude, Adam Hayes and his fantastic maps project. You can read more about this map HERE and find out more about Adam's exciting project by clicking HERE. DO IT!