Wotcha!
Hello, friend
Not to be rude, but why are you here?
You may be visiting for boing (illustration and graphic design for positive businesses & charities) or you may be here for Simon Russell (comics and art) ~ so please choose from the links below and you won’t have to look through all sorts of irrelevant webpages… or, if you fancy a read, scroll down this page for some recent(ish) posts
SIMON RUSSELL art & comics
BOING design & illustration
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What AM I up to?!?
A large part of my freelance portfolio has been devoted to work for sectors that have been devastated by the effects of Brexit and Covid. Luckily for the family finances, I was overworked in 2019/20 so the drop in commissions was mostly offset by the SEISS grants and the opportunity to sleep from time to time, but it’s really maddening to think of the impact on so many clients and friends who were running lifestyle businesses that have now been kneecapped or worse by the actions of politicians.
My blood boils on their behalf, as well as my children’s.
Faced with the new (ab)normal, I’ve resolved that 2022 is the the year I’ve been promising myself for a decade now ~ time to focus more on the illustration side of things than I have been able to in the recent past.
Plans are afoot for a couple of group events; three self-directed projects are bubbling away; I got my extended DBS certificate made portable, so I can work with more groups in school settings… and I joined the local illustrators group: Brighton Illustrators Group.
There are some very interesting members in that group with a good range of styles, so if you’re looking to commission some imagery, but not my sort of imagery, head over and take a look at the portfolios (mine even has images that I’ve not yet found a home for on the boinggraphics site).
I’m told there are plans for the group to emerge from all the Lockdowns with a very active presence again, so I’m hoping to get involved and make some new friends.
Because everyone needs new friends from time to time, even us inky hermits.
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FREE ‘BANNED’ COMIC:
THAT’S NOT MY MERKIN
That’s Not My Merkin
is a full-length parody of the ubiquitous That’s Not My… books that every new parent is buried by. Withdrawn from sale after legal threats from the humourless Usborne Books ~ so if I’m not going to sell this, why don’t I let you read it for free?
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Check the SHOP to buy my comics
The third and final new title from me is a handmade zine of automatic and accidental drawings ‘made’ by different sorts of transportation and offering a ‘story’ that will take you somewhere unexpected.
Check the SHOP to buy my comics
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So… why is that picture there?
Well, none of my comics look like this NOW.
The image above is part of a page from a Work In Progress – my first (and probably only) narrative graphic novel, codename: Moon Book.
I drew the second draft of chapter one pre-Lockdown and then the sudden constant presence of my kids around the house meant there was no time to think and plan refinements before writing the final two chapters.
In that time I’ve not felt the urge to carry on… you know why? It’s not how I draw when left to my own devices.
It may not look much like it to anyone else, but I realise now that I was second-guessing myself in an attempt to draw comics the way comics are traditionally drawn for Graphic Novels or Industrial Comics’ product.
There’s nothing wrong with that style (even my clumsy approximation of it) and I have enjoyed thousands of comics made that way in my lifetime. But it’s not how I draw naturally and in my efforts to sit down and make ‘proper’, serious (commercial!) Graphic Novel I was grinding my teeth.
Moon Book will be completed (in 2022 if all goes to plan), but it will be true to my own interests and passions in picture-making.
There’s precious little money in comics compared to the time it takes to make them, so if I only find the energy to make one, it had better be something I enjoy making!
Meanwhile… please do enjoy the short form projects below and in my shop
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NEW COMIC :
QUESTION MARKS #5: appropriation
This issue is dedicated to collages made from my poor comic collection… will you click the link so they didn’t die in vain?
Check the SHOP to buy my comics
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NEW COMIC :
PAINFUL: a kind of reply to Pannonica 2
(aka Question Marks #4)
When a master of kitchen sink comics like Mr Prollix turns his hand to abstraction, there’s always a nervousness that the results could feel like Nigel Kennedy playing Jazz. I should have known better! Pannonica 1 & 2 were proper experiments with the sort of marks and language Nick can’t usually work with in his exceptional comics.
Pannonica really felt like he was building up some momentum in a new strand of work (I didn’t want the others to stop, because they are of a rare and precious quality, but I was delighted to see him flex different chops at the same time) – and then the time-suck that is 2020/21 hit. No new works from many parent creators. No Pannonica 3. Yet. We live in hope.
Question Marks 4 was meant as a fast and friendly reply to P2 – I had planned to make the same limited number of physical comics and share the pdf freely as Nick had before Easter 2020. Maybe someone else in the comics community would pick up my version to draw over for their own? This could have been a chain comic that went in strange and unpredictable directions.
But… 2020/21… need I say more?
So here is QM4. Late but i hope deserving of your attention.
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Meanwhile… you may be visiting for work purposes? For boing (illustration and graphic design for positive businesses & charities) or you may be here for Simon Russell (comics and art) ~ if so please choose from the links below and you won’t have to look through all the comics chat…
