This week on(line)...: Making Byzantium / Duplicating (comic) art / LGBT representation in Science Fiction
Alex Fitch
I'm ready for my close-up: Living in Byzantium
In a panel discussion recorded at SCI-FI-LONDON, Alex Fitch talks to producer Stephen Woolley, writer Moira Buffini and star Daniel Mays about the new British vampire movie Byzantium, directed by Neil Jordan, which depicts the back story and current lives of a pair of female vampires living in modern day Hastings. (Byzantium is released in the UK on 31st May).
5pm, Friday 24th May 2013, repeated 8am, Tues 28th May on Resonance 104.4 FM (London) / streamed at www.resonancefm.com / podcast at www.panelborders.wordpress.com
In the last of a series of shows about the relationship between fine art and comics, Alex Fitch looks talks to three artists about their recreations of fine art in comic book pages and vice versa. Simon Russell discusses his small press comics Roy and That's not my Merkin!, Dutch artist Typex illuminates his graphic novel about Rembrandt, and Jason Atomic talks about his contribution to the 'Image Duplicator' show at Orbital Comics which deconstructs the work of Roy Lichtenstein.
8.30am, Monday 27th May 2013, repeated 3pm, Thurs 30th May on Resonance 104.4 FM (London) / streamed at www.resonancefm.com / extended podcast at www.panelborders.wordpress.com
More info at http://www.sciencemuseum.org.uk/visitmuseum/events/events_for_adults/Lates.aspx
Panel Borders: Exhibiting Comics (2013)
As part of Panel Borders' month of shows about fine art and comics, we have our yearly look at how art from comic books is displayed in the gallery space. At OCCUPY MY TIME GALLERY, Deptford, Alex Fitch talks to gallery owner / curator Sue Cohen, and artist Sarah Lightman, about the latter's exhibition "The Book of Sarah", which previews her forthcoming graphic novel from Myriad Editions.
Also, at Phoenix Brighton, fine art lecturer Sue Gollifer, curator Karin Mori, exhibition designer Ben Thomson, and artist Iain Paxon (Hamilton Yarns) talk about the gallery's exhibition of artists' books "Press and Release".
"The Book of Sarah" is on display at OCCUPY MY TIME GALLERY, Enclave 9, Resolution Way, Deptford, London SE8 4NT (Weds - Sat) to 1st June, 2013
"Press and Release" is on display at Phoenix Brighton, 10-14 Waterloo Pl., Brighton, East Sussex BN2 9NB (Weds - Sun) to 9th June 2013
https://panelborders.wordpress.com/2013/05/20/panel-borders-exhibiting-comics-2013/
The Thread: Wrath (of the dead)
In the second of series of eight shows about the Seven Deadly Sins, the weekly discussion show run by PhD students from The London Consortium looks at the concept of Wrath and its connection to zombie culture. Guests include: Dr. Richard Barnett, a Fellow at the Wellcome Trust and host of 'Sick City', Alex Fitch, the presenter of Resonance FM's Panel Borders and an assistant editor of Electric Sheep Magazine, and Dr. Jill Critchley, psychotherapist, member of the British Association for Behavioural and Cognitive Psychotherapies and accredited Cognitive Behavioural Therapy Psychotherapist. Host: Lauren Sapikowski.
https://panelborders.wordpress.com/2013/05/21/the-thread-wrath-of-the-dead/
online magazine:
Electric Sheep Magazine issue 73: Running from the Past - Byzantium, Baron Blood, Mud
From the search for El Dorado in Werner Herzog's Aguirre, Wrath of God, to a cut-throat Mexico in John Huston's The Treasure of the Sierra Madre and Thomas Arslan's Canadian-set Gold, we explore the failed adventures of some of cinema's cursed protagonists in our latest theme.
Out in cinemas this month, there is some dazzling horror on offer in Neil Jordan's Byzantium and Ryuhei Kitamura's No One Lives. In Pedro Almodóvar's latest comedy, I'm So Excited, a plane is doomed to fly in circles above Spain, while a Danish cargo ship is overrun by pirates in Tobias Lindholm's tense thriller A Hijacking. We follow Matthew McConaughey running from the past in Jeff Nichols's Mud, and we also have a review of classic 1970s drama The King of Marvin Gardens.
Out on DVD/Blu-ray, dreams are dashed in Billy Liar, while Carlos Saura's Cría Cuervos offers a haunting reflection on memory, loss and history. We trace the sinister characters in Mario Bava's Baron Blood and Black Sabbath, and take a look back at the Polish cinema classic Illumination and Henri-George Clouzot's The Murderer Lives at 21.
In features, we have a special interview with John Hawkes. In Reel Sounds, Robert Barry explores the music-less soundtrack of Bruno Dumont's Hors Satan, while in our Comic Strip Review we revisit the wildly weird Marebito. We report from Sci-Fi-London and the Istanbul Film Festival, and in Alter Ego author Kate Worsley's filmic alter ego is Commander Ericson in The Cruel Seawww.electricsheepmagazine.com
recommended events
Image Duplicator at Orbital Comics
Pop artist Roy Lichtenstein currently has a show on at the Tate Modern. While the public is intimately familiar with his work, what they may be unaware of is that many of his images were directly “appropriated” from comic artists like Irv Novick, Russ Heath, Jack Kirby, John Romita and Joe Kubert, who received no fee or credit.
Is this an act of brilliant recontexturalisation? The elevation of commercial “low” art to “high” art? Art world snobbery? Artistic licence? Gallery shortsightedness? Cultural annexation? Or something else entirely? This show brings together real comic-book artists and other “commercial artists” – illustrators, designers, cartoonists – to ask these kinds of questions and share their views, via their work.
Each artist was asked to “re-reappropriate” one of the comic images Lichtenstein used: to go back to the source material and twist it into something interesting and original, and in the process to comment on the act of appropriation.
Money raised from selling prints and originals will be donated to the Hero Initiative, which helps down-on-their-luck comic book veterans.
Take Back the Art!
16th May - 31st May 2013, Orbital Comics, 8 Great Newport Street, London WC2H 7JA
More info: http://www.orbitalcomics.com/image-duplicator16052013-to-31052013Gosh! Comics Signings
Jaime Hernandez is coming to town to do a talk at BD and Comics Passion Festival (http://www.bdandcomicspassion.co.uk) — about comics, inspiration, creative process and his punk rock
girls, Maggie and Hopey and the rest of them, from the very excellent,
much-loved Love & Rockets — and Gosh! are feeling pretty lucky right now because he’s coming to the shop too.
For two hours on Wednesday the 29th of May (the day before the talk) Jaime will be signing comics including his latest graphic novel God and Science - Return of the Ti-Girls at our signing table. And you are invited, obviously.
Wednesday, 29th of May, 5pm – 7pm
Gary Northfield not only has a new book out, but he has a new book out about dinosaurs which is even better. You’ll know Gary’s work if you read Derek the Sheep back when he was in the Beano, or maybe you know his stuff from The Phoenix,
or maybe you stared at him while he drew Rupert the Bear in Gosh!'s window
on Free Comic Book Day. In any case, you are invited to drink beer (or
juice if you’re wee) at the launch party of Gary Northfield’s Terrible Tales of the Teenytinysaurs!
Friday, 31st of May, 7pm -9pm
Gosh!, 1 Berwick Street
Soho, London. W1F 0DR
Alex
Programme maker, Resonance 104.4 FM (Arts Council) - www.resonancefm.com
Assistant editor, Electric Sheep Magazine - www.electricsheepmagazine.com