More MONGREL

The February number of MONGREL was adorned with a potplant going up from 3 to 2D.

The March cover, featuring a truncated container.

Local subscribers should be receiving their MONGREL 3s today or so, and international subscribers next week. Many grateful thanks to Susan Bamford Caleo for helping out with the last two mailouts.

It is tremendously satisfying making these comics pamphlets, and it's been great working at them in various places - at home in Northcote and Phillip Island, at Pat Grant's in Austinmer (near Wollongong) and researching number 3's locations in Adelaide while I was there in March performing the show Faraday's Candle. I also did a little bit of work on number three up at Chugnut a couple of weeks ago. What all this means is that for me, each of those pages has a certain association with people and spaces

I am currently working on number 4.  The last five pages are pencilled, and with the arrival of a bunch of reference photographs of the mean streets of Soho (thank you Luke Caleo), the pencilling of the first three pages can begin. Every number thus far has become print-ready via the magic hands of Justin Caleo, to whom also thanks.

Below, an earth-bound Port Adelaide tug that didn't make it into the comic, but I include it here as a gift for the dedicatee in number three:

Kamishibai, out and indoors

So I've talked a bit about kamishibai, the Japanese art of paper theatre, elsewhere on this blog. Above, the inestimable and highly esteemed Bruce Woolley and I rehearse the story, 'A Very Kamishibai Christmas', which we co-created and first performed in December 2010, and here are getting ready to perform it at Chugnut in March 2011. Chugnut (a weekend away for cartoonists of many stripes) this year, as last, was held at Camp Eureka near Yarra Junction.

One of the distinctive things about 'A Very Kamishibai Christmas' is that there is no narration or dialogue (well, okay, there's two words - yelled), and so the attention of the performers - and hopefully audience - is even more directed at the rhythm of the reveals of the cards. The music of comics, kids.

Of course such playing with the kamishibai form wouldn't even occur to me without the fine guitarship, and even finer friendship, of Bruce Woolley.

(Chugnut photos by Anna Brown, whose astonishing gallery of Australian comics volk, paired with their drawn self-portraits, is called Light vs Line.)

After 'A Very Kamishibai Christmas', I performed the kamishibai produced by Jo Waite ('The White Crow'), Ben Hutchings ('Jupiterian Brain Theatre') and Chris Downes (MR James' 'The Mezzotint') for the 2010 Melbourne Fringe Festival Paper Theatre exhibition. Bernard's t-shirt also by Jo Waite.

A month or so later, on April 11, just before Bruce returned to Berlin by way of Sri Lanka, he and I performed the new epilogue to our 'Miracleman: the two man show' at Fleur's place (thanks Fleur!). This epilogue of course incorporated kamishibai, and attempted to bring the incredibly complex questions of ownership and copyright of 'Miracleman' into our show. Later, from Dohar, Bruce sent me this doctored picture, which I think is an excellent title and image:

In case you're wondering: yes, Bruce IS playing the iPad piano and piano accordion simultaneously. And for a closer look at what's on the teevee, go here.

Next post: more kamishibai.

Footnote: for Free Comic Book Day 2011, the Chugnutteers, under the expert guidance of Mister Anthony Woodward, have produced an online book chock full of fine work, findable here. For FREE.