Visual Poetry

Now in slightly old news I’d like to announce that my ‘random poems’ have been featured in an online magazine, Tip of the Knife, in their most recent issue. The magazine celebrates visual poetry in all its forms, and it was an honour to be asked to contribute.

What is visual poetry? It is a poetry and art hybrid in which words or letterforms are used to create an image. Both words and image combine to create meaning, that may or may not make sense in the common parlance of poetry. It is related to concrete poetry, and was heavily influenced by Fluxus. It is also known as ‘vispo’ – a horrible abbreviation, ironically unpoetic, that you will never read here again.

My own influence came from the Dadaists, although I had to do a project on concrete poetry when I was in my first year of art college. I recall creating an image using strips of words cut from magazines, but that piece has long gone to the recycling plant and been turned into cardboard boxes or something.

Check out Issue 12 of Tip of the Knife here. You can also view a gallery of my random poems. I’ve been working for the past few months on a new series that is quite different stylistically, so keep your eyes peeled for that! 

The 7.30 Edition

Some of you may recall my breaking news back in June: the children’s books I had been working on for a year were published at last. Bridget Cull, the author, has been busily promoting the first two books, and this lead to a couple of newspaper interviews – one for each of us.

A few weeks ago, a reporter from the Stonnington Review came to chat (a surreal experience) and a real live paparazzo snapped me in the street where I live. The paper was published the week before last, although I had to wait for one to be mailed out to me.

One of my favourite scenes where the Yucky kicks the dog into the airThe environmental tales tell children all about The Yuckies – small dirty smelly creatures that live in our rubbish dumps and create havoc in our neighbourhoods. Sometimes they hitch a ride on cars and go further afield to pollute our lakes and rivers. It’s a great, entertaining way to teach children about our effect on our environment. I had a very entertaining time illustrating them, and creating some very yucky effects in watercolour.

The Yucky Adventures are digital storybooks and are available to purchase through iTunes, and you can check The Yuckies out on the Facebook page. You can read the full profile on me here.

Another scene that makes me chuckle: the fish are truly aghast

Yucky Adventures

Our hero Yucky, (on the left), is joined by his ‘beasties’After more than a year in the making (which is pretty quick, I’m told, in the digital book publishing world), the Yucky Adventure series has been launched into the world!

The Yuckies, horrid, dirty creatures that live in rubbish piles and fart and burp a lot, and get up to all sorts of mischief, nevertheless have an environmental tale to tell.

It gave me great pleasure to bring Bridget Cull’s words into technicolour – or rather, Windsor & Newton – life. One of the most fun aspects of illustrating these little beasties was creating their scaly, warty skin, using salt dropped into puddles of watercolour. Salt crystals have a magical effect on the paint, soaking up the liquid and concentrating the pigment to form misshapen lumps and bumps. It was a perfect technique to capture the crusty Yuckies. As for creating the animation out of traditional watercolour illustrations – well, that’s a tale for another time.

There are five stories in the series, and the first two are out now as apps (for iPad) with iPhone versions coming soon. Visit the iTunes App Store and search ‘The Yuckies’. And check out our video on YouTube now – I absolutely adore the cheeky music! 

And PS, they might be gross and live in rubbish dumps, but they’re totally tech-savvy – find them on Facebook too.

This cheeky Yucky resides amongst the garbage pile, and loves his morning mud pieOne of my favourite scenes from Book 1: the Yuckies’ late night revels in the local park raises all sorts of dust and rumpus!There is a way to stop them – can YOU figure out how?

Video Stars

It’s been a year in the making, but the two children’s book apps I have been working on are nearly finished! We’re ironing out the app of the second book in the series, and I have just a few more bits and pieces to finalise.

On Saturday we shot the promotional video, with my client – Bridget Cull, the author – and I working at our desks. They were not really our desks, and Bridget was not actually writing rhymes, but I really was demonstrating some illustration techniques live on camera. (Demystifying the trade – eek!) Later, Bridget demonstrated the various aspects – fairly simple animation – of the app.

The video was shot by Adam Perry and is being produced by Liz Re. We can already tell that working with professionals – as opposed to muddling along with amateurs wielding a DSLR – will make a huge difference to the marketing campaign Bridget is planning. (I was, however, disappointed that the hair and make-up artists were inexplicably not in attendance. I am sure I put in a request for them.)

Hopefully we will be launching the video on YouTube and the apps in the iTunes store in May, so stay tuned.

Out the Door

Cover illustration by Nellie RyanSo this is my last issue of Outline magazine as editor. I feel regretful to let it go, but it must be done. I have too much work on, and need to concentrate on building my illustration business, although I still have the part-time graphic design gig (that pays the bills).

It’s been a privilege to run the whole show, and getting to know quite a few Australian illustrators in the process – not to mention learning a lot from them. Obviously I love to write, although being a managing editor is a little different from writing blogs or other personal stuff. It has its own challenges, planning and researching each issue, wrestling with headlines and standfirsts … but it is very satisfying once an issue is wrapped and delivered.

This last one was themed on surface pattern design, and I interviewed three illustrators who incorporate pattern into their work, two of whom design their own. I also wrote a story about creative block (and enjoyed putting together a little collage to illustrate it) and a very ‘timely’ (considering how stretched I’ve been in the last six months) story on time management. And when it comes to pattern design, how could I go past the great and bold Florence Broadhurst for the Nostalgia page?

Profile on ‘start up’ illustrator Bronwyn Seedeen The Blank Page – what to do when you have creative blockTime Sucks – tips on juggling that most precious commodityA mini profile on the inimitable Aussie icon Florence Broadhurst