{magazines} – Page 84 – { feuilleton }

Mixed blessings

Arthur #32 is now out with a great cover. As usual you can download it from the Arthur site. Unfortunately that’s the only way you’ll be able to get hold of this issue since the paper copy won’t be printing. Arthur still needs your support, however, via subscriptions, donations and/or advertising if you haven’t wasted all your money helping investment bankers hang on to their bonuses.

On the upside, Jeff VanderMeer notified me that Shriek: An Afterword, the novel of his which I designed earlier this year, has arrived from the printer and should be shipping forthwith. Read more about that (and order a copy) here.

Previously on { feuilleton }
• Fungal observations

The Sonic Assassins

Searching through discs for scans of Jim Cawthorn art turned up this comic strip curio from a November 29th, 1971 issue of UK underground magazine Frendz. Cawthorn and writer Michael Moorcock present rock band Hawkwind as musical superheroes and although this is done largely as a promotional piece for that year’s new album, In Search of Space, the Sonic Assassins tag was one which stuck, becoming almost a secondary name for the band in later years. The name Void City also recurred later as the name of a track on the Choose Your Masques album. It may have been around this time that Cawthorn painted special T-shirt designs for Hawkwind; up to 1980 Dave Brock was still wearing his Baron Meliadus shirt on stage.

Previously on { feuilleton }
• Jim Cawthorn, 1929–2008
• Design as virus #7: eyes and triangles
• Barney Bubbles: artist and designer

Fizeek Art

Baccant (1956) by George Quaintance.

Fizeek Art Quarterly was an American magazine of gay art and erotica which ran for 26 issues from 1961 to 1969. Artists included Tom of Finland and—as can be seen above—George Quaintance. The Fizeek Art Weblog continues the tradition of the magazine by posting extracts from old issues as well as more contemporary material (below) in a similar vein. “Vein” is perhaps an apt choice of description given the quantity of tumescent penises on display. Most of the images are quite gleefully hardcore (and often deliciously silly with it); as usual, if that’s not your thing then don’t look. Perfectly fine for the rest of us, however.

Virgo by Kit.

Elsewhere on { feuilleton }
• The gay artists archive

Previously on { feuilleton }
• Let’s get physical: Bruce of Los Angeles and Tom of Finland
• Philip Core and George Quaintance

Cocteau’s sword

Jean Cocteau looking nothing less than fabulous in what I guess is 1955 since the writer is sporting his Académie française medal, an award bestowed upon him that year. The ceremonial sword is his own design, needless to say, and the curiously-tinted photographs are by Frank Scherschel for LIFE. The colours and lavish decor—those metallic palm trees—aren’t so far removed from the photographs of James Bidgood although the milieu certainly is. I doubt Cocteau would mind who the photographer was if Bidgood’s favourite model, Bobby Kendall, was in the picture with him.

Elsewhere on { feuilleton }
• The men with swords archive

Previously on { feuilleton }
• Cristalophonics: searching for the Cocteau sound
• Cocteau at the Louvre des Antiquaires
• James Bidgood
• La Villa Santo Sospir by Jean Cocteau

Steampunk Horror Shortcuts

Time again for some work updates and other news. I mentioned in August that this Steampunk design—created to illustrate a formula definition of the genre by Jeff VanderMeer—was originally going to be a T-shirt. That idea fell by the wayside when an opportunity arose to submit it to Modofly who were asking for Steampunk-related work for a new line of their laser-etched Molekin books.

I’m pleased to announce that the books are now done and on sale at the Modofly store. These are available in two sizes, large (5.25ins x 8.25ins; 13.3cm x 20.9cm) and small (3.5ins x 5.5ins; 8.9cm x 13.9cm), $36 USD and $22 USD respectively.

Next up is issue 11 of Penny Blood, an American horror magazine due out shortly which includes a feature on David Britton’s Lord Horror character and runs through the often tormented history of Savoy Books. Savoy’s Mike Butterworth and I were both interviewed and the piece should also include some comments from Keith Seward whose Savoy title, Horror Panegyric, examines the Lord Horror mythos. They don’t say yet when the magazine is out but it’s available for pre-order now.

While we’re on the subject of his lordship, I recently updated my pages for the Reverbstorm comics with a lot more samples taken from the re-scanned and re-lettered artwork. Work is still progressing on assembling the definitive single-volume edition of Reverbstorm as time permits. I’ve finished work on all seven published issues and am now engaged with the eighth and final section. More about that, and Reverbstorm itself, at a later date.

Finally, there’s another new CD design out, my fourth this year and there are more on the way; I’m starting to feel prolific. As can be seen from the cover, this was a very minimal job. A Made Up Sound is a pseudonym of Dave Huismans, aka 2562, whose excellent Aerial album I also designed. Shorctuts is a collection of electronic sketches and Dave took the moodily anonymous photographs himself.