Barney Bubbles – Page 10

Designs on Doctor Dee

Some work news. I finished this CD design last year but, as is often the case with these things, it’s taken a while to make its way into the world. This was the final piece of the Mindscape of Alan Moore project and it’s probably the last thing I’ll do which makes use of the famous Sigillum Dei Aemeth of Doctor John Dee (1527–1608), wax versions of which can be seen in the British Museum. Alan Moore is a great Dee aficionado and since the sigil appears in the DeZ Vylenz documentary it made sense to use it for the DVD package and interface. This led in turn to a new poster design for the film (below) and—eventually—the soundtrack CD. The latter should be shipping shortly from Shadowsnake Films.

Lastly, and also design-related, the New York Times this week had a short piece about designer Barney Bubbles based around Paul Gorman’s Reasons to be Cheerful book. My quote about Barney’s Hawkwind work being “cosmic Art Nouveau” was borrowed from the book’s text and the piece features one of those slideshow selections the NYT does so well. Once again it’s great to see how Paul’s book is stimulating new interest and appraisal of work which was neglected for far too long.

DVD menu.

Continue reading “Designs on Doctor Dee”

New things for December

Lord Horror (1997).

Time for an end of year news round up.

• As mentioned earlier, issue 11 of US horror magazine Penny Blood features a look at Savoy Books and David Britton’s Lord Horror mythos. The magazine is now on sale and includes comments from Savoy’s Michael Butterworth and myself.

• I was interviewed last month by Creative Review, the UK’s leading design mag, as their January 2009 issue includes a feature on Barney Bubbles. This is also now on sale although I’ve yet to see a copy so I don’t know how much of what I was saying made the cut. I did finish by calling Barney B a “true pop artist” and I see they’ve used those words as their sub-heading so that may be one contribution.

• Back in the USA, book chain Barnes & Noble have licensed my 2004 Cthulhu Rising picture for an HP Lovecraft reprint. Not sure when that’s appearing yet. The same picture (which is also my most popular print) was licensed earlier by a Romanian publisher for (surprise) a Lovecraft collection. I’m told that volume will be published in May 2009.

• Finally, the recent Steampunk design which Modofly are now selling on their laser-etched Moleskin books will be appearing shortly in a surprise location. More about that later. I’ll probably be doing some prints and CafePress stuff with this picture eventually but for now Modofly has the monopoly.

Posting here may be rather sparse over the next couple of weeks since I’m very busy work-wise just now. So don’t be surprised if there’s a long run of picture-only posts. December and early January are often slack and moneyless so it’s good to be busy.

Who is Heeps Willard?

In which Christmas arrives two weeks early…

It was nearly two years ago that I wrote “We’re overdue a decent book-length examination of his work and his influence” at the end of the epic Barney Bubbles post. Today I finally got to sit down with a copy of Paul Gorman’s wonderful monograph about the man and his work; if only all wishes were fulfilled so swiftly and completely. This is a really excellent book but then I would say that (even without being mentioned within) seeing as I’m among the target audience. Gorman’s text is light but anecdote-rich which is what I would have preferred, leaving plenty of room for page after page of incredible visuals. The heavy design analysis can wait, for now what we’ve required was a book to set the record straight (as it were) and tip the balance in Barney’s favour after years of neglect. This is that book.

I’m actually knocked out more than I expected seeing so much first class work brought together in one place. Barney’s early work throws light on his later evolution while the later material—as BB collectors Rebecca and Mike have noted—contains many traces of his earlier obsessions. Add to that the pages of sketches (!) and layout drafts, some truly stunning late paintings, furniture designs—including the electric plug table which Rian Hughes mentioned—and you have an essential purchase.

It’s worth mentioning again that Paul generously let me run an extract featuring some exclusive pieces that didn’t make the final cut. Paul also has further page samples at his site. As to who Heeps Willard is…that would be telling. You’ll have to buy the book if you want to find out.

Previously on { feuilleton }
• Reasons To Be Cheerful, part 3: A Barney Bubbles exclusive
• More Barney Bubbles
• Reasons To Be Cheerful, part 2
• Reasons To Be Cheerful: the Barney Bubbles revival
• Barney Bubbles: artist and designer

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

Reasons To Be Cheerful, part 3: A Barney Bubbles exclusive

Or why Barney Bubbles rules… The Rumour were a Seventies band I never had any interest in, being part of the Stiff Records’ pub rock axis along with Nick Lowe and others; not weird or noisy enough for petulant moi. This is a shame since the Barney Bubbles design for their albums shows him at the pinnacle of his powers with an integrated, multi-media approach to packaging and advertising.

The pictures and text here have been very generously supplied by Paul Gorman whose BB monograph, Reasons To Be Cheerful: The Life & Work Of Barney Bubbles, is now on sale. This is an expanded extract from part of the book with the NME ad and Vinyl Factory graphic being exclusives to this posting. If you need to know why we keep raving about the man, simply scroll on down, bearing in mind that this was only a clutch of releases from a single band. Barney was pulling together work like this all the time for a host of different artists.

For more BB goodness there’s my original, sprawling post, further samples from Paul’s book at his site and also David Will’s blog which features all manner of rare historical material, including a feature about the Brian Griffin book referred to below.

Over to Paul…

An important yet overlooked Barney Bubbles design project of the post-punk period sprang from an unlikely source: the album with the unprepossessing title Frogs Krauts Clogs And Sprouts, released by Graham Parker’s backing band The Rumour in March 1979.

The pre-PC name took its cue from the album track Euro. Bubbles chose a less prosaic route in realising a remarkable and thematically-linked design package predicated on the ceremony and colour schemes of EEC officialdom. This was very much in the news in 1979, ahead of the first European elections held that summer.

Continue reading “Reasons To Be Cheerful, part 3: A Barney Bubbles exclusive”