Mr Hughes and I were asked to design a bookmark for Writers’ Block (info here). So we did! This is it. We think it is the ideal shape, and that it will look excellent between the pages of your favourite book, perhaps with just the top 1cm sticking out to aid you in finding your place.
If you would like one, simply order a copy of The Story of Grass online.
Or just ask one of us for one. That’d work too.
It’s the exhibition! I am an artist! You will all have to take me VERY SERIOUSLY INDEED now. That includes you, Mr Mahan, my old art teacher. Yeah, you thought I was rubbish at art, didn’t you? Yeah, just because I couldn’t draw or paint which is discrimination, probably, but LOOK AT ME NOW! I WILL HAVE THINGS ON A WALL IN A GALLERY, AND WHERE ARE YOU NOW MR MAHAN? EH? HAHAHAHA. WHERE ARE YOU NOW? AND YOU MR BLYTH! YOU THOUGHT I WAS RUBBISH AT CHEMISTRY BECAUSE I WAS RUBBISH AT IT BUT WHERE ARE YOU NOW?
Ahem.
Anyway AND YOU, MISS PEACOCK! YOU THOUGHT I WOULD NEVER AMOUNT TO ANYTHING BECAUSE I WOULDN’T KNOW PURE MATHS IF IT SAT ON MY FACE AND STARTED BOUNCING AND DOING COMPLEX EQUATIONS BUT LOOK – I HAVE PICTURES ON A WALL. OF GIRAFFES! PURE GIRAFFES! HAHAHA!
It’s no big deal, really.
Mr Gus Hughes arrives in the country today – I haven’t seen him for around a year and a half – in fact it was when we were both at Bristol Encounters festival in 2008 for the launch of our Chad Banger animations with 4mations, and instead of going to see short films and all that we got drunk on free beer and started doodling ideas for a stupid comic, which we decided to call “The Story of Grass” because we thought it conveyed excitement and dynamism and because we were drunk.
I can’t wait to see him again! And then we’ve got 90 minutes to get into the gallery, fling our stuff on the walls and start drinking wine and being sophisticated. That’s art.
It should be fun. Hopefully see you there! BUT NOT YOU MISS WILSON! WHERE ARE YOU NOW? WHERE ARE YOOOOOOOU?
ps It was hard to write this because looking back I rather liked most of my teachers at school and college, and they were all mostly ok with me. Except Mr Blyth. He was a colossal twat.
Well, it’s that difficult sec… er, third issue, and it looks like we’re just about done. I think it’s sent me slightly mental. I spent a lot of yesterday staring at pages thinking “perhaps changing the font will make it funnier”. And do you know what? In a couple of cases it did.
Interestingly, even though hardly anyone knows about it, and even less people actually have a copy, I’m feeling a slight pressure of expectation on this one. I was pretty pleased with the way #2 turned out: it was weird and (I hope) funny and it hit exactly the off-kilter vibe Hughes and I were after – that odd feeling I used to get as a kid reading the Monty Python and Goodies books. Particularly Python – I’d not seen the show or the films, but I knew they were supposed to be funny, and the books were, but they were also a bit disconcerting. It’s not something I can explain. It felt like I was immersing myself in a world that was 90 degrees to our own, and I guess a lot of the humour was going over my young head. But Gilliam’s art, and the weird photos of the cast, and the sense that there was no way of knowing what was going to be on the next page… I loved it but it was all a little disorientating. And we wanted Grass to befuddle in the same way, while also being about my jokes and Gus’ mad art. And, well…
That really is a lot of waffle for a photocopied pamphlet, but I’m proud of it.
Anyway. Grass #3 is finished. I hope it’s good.
Sorry to keep banging on about this, but if we sell another, ooh, 15 copies I could probably buy some new shoes. Nice black ones with big clompy soles. That’s what I fancy anyway. Or some Vans.
Buy The Story of Grass for £3 from this online shop.
Or maybe you like it when my feet look like they’re in their own separate recession?
Mr Hughes made this, as a teaser for June’s show at Peg Powler, and also for issue 3 of The Story of Grass. Just look at the art! That’s what the inside of Hughes’ head looks like.
The preview is running at Peg Powler all month, every Tuesday night. It opened tonight and it was weird and fun watching people look at our stuff.
We spent two days working on this pinboard. Yeah.
And people seemed to like it (especially after I had scribbled out the two c-bombs which had accidentally found their way under a picture of Jeremy Clarkson. Oops. It’s all PG13 now).
Art: pinboards and dogs playing poker up a tree are totally of the now, man. Go and take a look…
This month at Peg Powler Gallery in Stockton there will be a preview of forthcoming attractions. One of those forthcoming attractions is The Story of Grass Exhibition which will be running in June. Mr Hughes and myself are really, really looking forward to seeing it, cos we haven’t got a fucking clue what it will look like. It’ll probably involve pictures and words in some way. We have big plans! We’re going to buy some frames and put stuff in them – that’s what artists do, isn’t it? And we’d like some boxes people can open too. Anyway:
April 13th, 20th, 27th : Peg Powler Preview Show
Find out more about Peg Powler Gallery, hang out, draw, make a zine, meet people and check out our art library over a cuppa.
I will see you there, will I?
Early Henson Workshop design for the popular Sesame Street character Big Bird. 'Yeah, it was rejected for being weird and frightening and making Frank Oz cry,' laughed Jim Henson in a 1972 interview, 'But boy, I tell ya, the kids would have learned to fucking read.'
From The Story of Grass by Harris and Hughes, 28 pages of words and pictures and the spaces between them, coming soon from Aloha Ino Press.
Well… soonish… from Aloha ‘Ino Press.
Gus Hughes and I have found a publisher for our upcoming ‘zine, The Story of Grass – Aloha ‘Ino Press. We like them because they have nice shoes and because they don’t actually exist in any meaningful way.
The zine itself is progressing quite quickly. Just had a googlechat with Gus (he’s based in Dublin so we’re doing everything remotely) about what we still need to do. Best part of the conversation:
today im facing having to draw a woman nailed to a cross behind a desk giving directions james
There’s a man happy in his work. I don’t know when it will be finished; Gus is a very busy man, and I’m very lazy, but every day Gus sends new pages and i’m just blown away by how they are looking.
Need to look into how to sell the thing, I suppose. Anyone out there had any experience flogging a zine?
I’ve been reading Simpsons Confidential by John Ortved. Delving behind the scenes of the making of The Simpsons, it’s absolutely fascinating, particularly when it concentrates on the writers who made the show as funny as it was. Two names stand out: John Schwartzwelder and George Meyer, both of whom stamped their personality and humour on the series.
The book mentions that Meyer produced, and Schwartzwelder wrote for, three issues of a self-published comedy magazine called Army Man.
Sam [Simon] got quite a bit of his writing staff from the list of writing credits in Army Man… In a sense, that little magazine was the father of the show.
– Simpsons Confidential
Quite a claim for what was basically a few photocopied pages of jokes and cartoons.
The only rule was that the stuff had to be funny and pretty short.
– George Meyer
After reading about it, I really wanted to get my hands on a copy. Oh! Thank you internet! You can download the whole thing here: Army Man.
It’s rough, and funny, and weird and well worth a read.
And it’s sparked the idea to do something similar. Well… similarly photocopied anyway. So Mr Gus Hughes and I have started work on our own little magazine, with words and pictures and all that good stuff. It’s looking fine in our heads, but we understand that this isn’t good enough and that we need to get some of it on paper. Wish us luck!
Ramshackle Charm 