Radio interviews with postmodern webcomic creators, including Paul O'Connell

Panel Borders: Collage and reappropriation

Continuing a month of shows looking at webcomics, Panel Borders examines the work of a quartet of creators whose online strips and cartoons reinvent retro images and iconic characters from film and TV to beguiling effect. In a pair of short interviews recorded at Thought Bubble, Leeds 2012, Alex Fitch talks to American creators Scott C - about his webcomics Double Fine Action Comics and The Great Showdowns -  and Becky and Frank about Tiny Kitten Teeth, cartoons which utilise imagery from toys, cereal packaging and children's literature.

Also, Alex looks into the varying merits of print and web-based comics with British writer / artist Paul O'Connell, in an interview recorded at the University of Brighton. Paul's postmodern fumetti mash-ups mix comedy and horror via strips such as A Muppet Wicker Man and The Seinfeld Matrix, and the artist discusses his collaborations with other Brighton based creators, including Lawrence Elwick on Charlie Parker, Handyman, plus his aspirations for using the medium of online comics to its full interactive potential.

6pm, Sunday 24th March / 4.30pm, Tuesday 26th March, Resonance 104.4 FM (London) / streamed at www.resonancefm.com / podcast at www.panelborders.wordpress.com

Happy Birthday, 2000AD! From artist and fan Paul O'Connell

Name: Paul O'Connell

Blog or web site: 
www.soundofdrowning.com

Currently working on:

Artwork for Future of the Left and stories for The Sound of Drowning Issue 15.

First memory of 2000AD?

I read 2000AD every week from the very first issue when I was seven up until I was about 18. I very clearly remember running around my grandad's driveway when I was seven covered with the cyborg stickers that were given away with the second issue. (I remember the first issue came with a free plastic 'space spinner' frisbee type toy).

Favourite Character or Story?

From the early years I particularly remember liking Flesh and The Visible Man. Later on I liked Nemesis, Future Shocks and Judge Dredd (though more than Dredd himself it was the world of Mega City 1, it's stories and the recurring characters like Walter, Otto Sump et al).

I also liked early Alan Moore stories like Halo Jones and Skizz. But it was all good!

What do you like most about the 2000AD?

There's nothing else like it. It's influenced and fulled the imaginations of generations of readers.

What would you most like to see in 2000AD as it heads to its Forties?

I'm not it's readership any more so I don't feel like it's my place to say.

If you worked on 2000AD, do you have an anecdote you'd like to share about your experience of Tharg and his minions?

I had a picture I drew published in the reader art section. It was a loaf of bread with a judges badge on it - 'Judge Bread'. It was pretty rubbish. I'd sent in a bunch of silly things like that just to try and get them to print one. Someone else had sent in a picture of Strontium Dog, which they also published.

I had just got my first job after leaving school as an apprentice in a graphic art studio. I showed my boss the copy of the comic with my drawing in it.

Unimpressed, he handed it back to me and said: "That's you is it? Maybe we should have employed the person who drew the dog picture".

• This post is one in a series of tributes to 2000AD to mark its 35th birthday on 26th February 2012. More about 2000AD at www.2000adonline.com

2000AD © Rebellion

Private Eye cartoonist Wilbur Dawbarn joins New British Comics line up

The latest issue of New British Comics, edited by Karol Wisniewski, co-creator of the upcoming Harbor Moon graphic novel published by Arcana, will soon go on sale, featuring the work of creators such as Dan White, Paul O'Connell and Lawrence Elwick, who provides the stunning cover featuring "Charlie Parker - Handyman".

Also in the line up are strips by Warwick Johnson Cadwell, artist on Tag Team Tastic for The Dandy, and Wonderland by top cartoonist Wilbur Dawbarn, who has had hundreds of cartoons published in such diverse titles as Private Eye, The Sun, New Statesman, The Oldie and many others. He also created the comedy adventure strip Bodkin and the Bear for The DFC.

As with past issues, New British Comics Issue 3 will be available in both English and Polish.

The full line up is as follows:

• Cindy & Biscuit Save The World (again) by Dan White

• Alfred Hitchcock: Master of Suspense by Lawrence Elwick & Paul O'Connell

• Ink vs Paper by John Miers

• Charlie Parker "Handyman": Animal Magnetism by Lawrence Elwick & Paul O'Connell

• Here Comes The Neighbourhood by Matthew Craig & Richard Johnson

• Better Living Through Distance by Dave Thomson

• The Quiet Burden by Craig Collins & Iain Lauire

• Luvvable Lex: Dirty 'N' Down by Rob Miller

• Wonderland by Wilbur Dawbarn

• Charlie Parker "Handyman": Skyscraper Lunch by Lawrence Elwick & Paul O'Connell

• (crack) by Van Nim

• A Complex Machine by David Ziggy Greene

• Von Trapp by Warwick Johnson Cadwell (WJC)

• For more information and stockists visit: http://newbritishcomics.blogspot.com

Panel Borders chats with Dickon Harris in an Anarchist Restaurant

Comic creator Paul O'Connell drops us a line to say an interview he did with 'zine creator and regular Panel Borders interviewer Dickon Harris will feature on London's Resonance FM tomorrow night.

"The interview took place at the end of this year's London Zine Symposium," says Paul, "and while you might be able to surmise from the interview that I had been drinking a fair amount (it's a very poor coping mechanism I have developed for such events), what you unfortunately won't catch is how the interview took place in the event's anarchist cafe -- and that sitting across the table from myself and Dickon was a man intently eating a plate of felafels and salad and trying his best to ignore us.

"I found the concept of Anarchist Catering curious," Paul adds. (You can read more about his experiences here on his blog). They certainly took a dim view to him trying to liberate felafels...

• Dickon Harris ignores Paul O'Connell is broadcast on Thursday 7th October at 5.00pm on Resonance FM and then available as a Panel Borders Podcast - 'The Sound of Drowning and Gentlemen Corpses' soon after

Build Your Own Miniature Hadron Collider!

Wacky comic creator Paul O'Connell is up to more zany antics, this time offering advice on how to join in with Europe's Mega Science revolution...

Can't wait to find out what will happen when they finally get the Large Hadron Collider working properly? Well, now you dont have to! Simply follow the step-by-step instructions to build your very own Miniature Hadron Collider and in a Flash! you too will be able to enjoy all the thrills and spills of particle science without ever having to leave your armchair... all for just the ridiculously low price of just £1.50!

This sounds like just the kind of title you'd expect to find on sale at Caption next weekend...

Paul O'Connell is a writer and graphic artist whose work has appeared in various international books, magazines and comic collections as well as in his self published comic series 'The Sound of Drowning'. He's often seen working with other crazy comic creatives such as Nelson Evergreen, Alex Sheikman, James Corcoran, Leo Hartas, Faz Choudhury and many others.

To change the way you think about the world forever go to: www.soundofdrowning.com/books.html

Zine Symposium this Saturday in London

The London Zine Symposium takes place this weekend at the Rag Factory in East London.

An annual event where people interested in zines, small-press, comics and/ or radical culture can get together, buy or sell zines and share ideas with each other, the event aims to build a stronger DIY network and community by having people meet up, chat, maybe participate in a workshop or two but definitely have a good time.

Started in 2005 and strongly influenced by the Portland Zine Symposium and other radical and small press events that were happening in the USA, organisers say that whilst London had the excellent Anarchist Bookfair every October, there wasn’t something specifically geared towards small press, DIY or handmade publications in London, or the UK.

The symposium has grown each year as those involved with putting it on learn new lessons. More info on previous years can be found in the archive section.

Among the many attendees will be Lil project creator Paul O'Connell, who'll be selling brand-new hot-off-the-press copies of The Sound of Drowning #14 (pictured): 48 pages of dark comic goodness illustrated by Lawrence Elwick. Also on sale will be copies of Lionfish, another recently completed project by Paul with illustrator Simon Fowler.

"I'll also have with me the last few copies of the second print run I did of A Muppet Wicker Man, which Fangoria described as 'Even funnier than Nicolas Cage in the remake' and Harry Knowles of Ain't It Cool.com thought 'A brilliant work of parody, done to perfection.' and even Robin Hardy, director of The Wicker Man found (bizarrely!) 'quite sweet'."

• The London Zine Symposium, Saturday 29th May 2010, Rag Factory, 16-18 Heneage St, London E1 5LJ (off Brick Lane, nearest tube Aldgate East). More details about the Symposium here: www.londonzinesymposium.org.uk


• If you can't make it on Saturday, Lionfish and the new Sound of Drowning are available to buy online at www.soundofdrowning.com/books.html and you can check out A Muppet Wicker Man online for nothing at issuu.com/soundofdrowning/docs/muppetwickerman

Meet "Lil", the Girl who Left Home

Fans of Brighton-based creator Paul O'Connell's work with brilliant artist Lawrence Elwick may already be familiar with his gentle comic, She's Leaving Home. Inspired by inspired by now-designer Laura O’Callaghan-White's frequent yearnings for what was "out there" as a youngster, the strip has appeared in print and online - and for mobile via ROK Comics.

Anonymous in the strip, the little girl that was the focus of the story now has a name: 'Lil'.

"Lil has caught the interest of independent US production company Spoke Lane Entertainment," Paul tells downthetubes, "who would like to produce a series of childrens books,featuring Lil and have launched a Kickstarter campaign to try and fund the project.

Kickstarter is one of a new breed of indie funding initiatives whereby in return for a small pledge of financial support for a project, backers receive a 'reward'.

For instance, by giving Lil a $10 dollar pledge (around £6.50) you would receive copies of the first two books in the series which would be printed as 5.75" square glossy thick card books. "Which is actually cheaper than if you bought them when they are published!" Paul points out.

"The more you pledge, the better the reward and we have some pretty cool rewards on offer.

"Backers will only be charged for their pledge if our full target amount is raised," he adds. "So if we don't raise the funds, you don't owe a thing - but then you won't get to hold these lovely little books in your paws
either..."

Paul's work as a writer and graphic artist has appeared in a variety of international books, magazines and comic anthologies. As well as self-publishing collections of his own solo and collaborative work under the title “The Sound of Drowning”, Paul's work has also been exhibited in the UK, Australia, New York and Europe.

Lawrence Elwick also lives in Brighton and reads Tintin whilst listening to jazz and avoiding haircuts. He also plays the harmonica and more of his work can be found on his blog at http://elwick.blogspot.com

Laura O’Callaghan-White, who provided the inspiration for the story and who still owns the small red suitcase she used to dream of packing and running away with, is currently a designer of skateboard graphics for Lush Longboards.

• More info at www.worldoflil.com - or go straight to the a Kickstarter pledge page (registration required to make a pledge)

In Review: New British Comics #2

They've been jolly polite over at New British Comics: editor Karol Wisniewski sent me a copy of #2 eons ago (long before Wasted #3, below!) and again, it's slipped through the cracks. Which it really shouldn't have, because NBC#2 is every bit as good as the first issue, released last April (reviewed here on downthetubes).

Not only does it have a terrific line up of creators, culled from indie talent in the UK and Poland, including Dan White, Dave Thomson, Pawel Gierczak, David Hailwood, Tony Suleri, Maddku, Jacek Zabawa, Paul O’Connell and Rob Miller; it also features a great range of strips.

Highlights of this collection, for me, are White's (biographical?) 'Last Summer'; Dave Thomson's phantasmagorical 'Feeding Spiders', worthy, surely of much wider exposure; Hailwood and Suleri's SF shocker 'Spare Parts', first seen in the Temple APA but well deserving second exposure here; and David Robetrtson and Frank Lamour's 'Under the Rainbow: Mercy' a disturbing tale of voodoo. But there is even more to enjoy in this fine mix of styles and genres.

Published in Poland in both a Polish and English edition by Wisniewski, the contents and strips are the same in both editions but the only difference is language. Once again, this is a brilliant project, truly deserving support from the comic community. So, what are you waiting for? (Other than this review, of course...)

• New British Comics is now available through SmallZone's online shop - smallzone-shop.co.uk

• There's now a new web site about the project at: newbritishcomics.blogspot.com


• More information and sample pages visit: www.polygobooks.com/newbritishcomics

• In addition to the book a Polish website dedicated to comics - www.komiks.nast.pl - has started publishing online British comics (click here for these)

New British Comics #2 On Its Way

The second issue of indie anthology title New British Comics, featuring this spiffing cover by Nelson Evergreen, should be published in October.

Contributors for the 84-page anthology, which will be published by Karol Wisniewski in both English and Polish, include Dan White, Dave Thomson, Paweł Gierczak, David Hailwood, Tony Suleri, Maddku, Jacek Zabawa, David Robertson, Frank Lamour, Rob Miller, WJC, Jon Edwards, Tony Hitchman, Lawrence Elwick, Paul O’Connell, Leonie O'Moore, Iain Laurie, Craig Collins and Nelson Evergreen.

"I hope I've quietly perverted the idea of 'Britishness' here," says Nelson of his fab cover, "what with the tea drinkers, bowler hatted gent and ominous skies rendered in a vaguely European sort of style and topped off with a decidedly shop-soiled Union Jack."

UK Indie distributor SmallZone is still selling the first issue of New British Comics, which features 13 stories and 17 artists including Dave Thomson, Malcy Duff, Paul O’Connell and Rob Miller. The contents and strips are the same in both editions but the only difference is language.

The comic is also available from Bad Press (UK & Worldwide) and Centrum Komiksu,Imago.com.pl, Incal.com.pl and SklepKomiksowy.pl (Poland)

• Read our review of Issue 1

• Visit the blog about the project at: newbritishcomics.blogspot.com

New British Comics Gets UK Distribution

UK Indie distributor Smallzone is now selling the first issue of New British Comics, an 80-page comics anthology featuring, 13 stories and 17 artists including Dave Thomson, Malcy Duff, Paul O’Connell and Rob Miller.

Reviewed by us here last month, the book has been self-published in Poland in both a Polish and English edition by Karol Wisniewski, the contents and strips are the same in both editions but the only difference is language.

New British Comics is now available through SmallZone's online shop - smallzone-shop.co.uk, and Karol tells us that other UK
shops should soon be distributing the book, too.

The book will be sold at Bristol Comics Expo at the SmallZone stand.

• There's now a new web site about the project at: newbritishcomics.blogspot.com

In Review: New British Comics

Last month we gave a quick plug for the first issue of New British Comics, an 80-page comics anthology featuring, 13 stories and 17 artists including Dave Thomson, Malcy Duff, Paul O’Connell and Rob Miller.

The book has been self-published in Poland in both a Polish and English edition by Karol Wisniewski, the contents and strips are the same in both editions but the only difference is language.

Karol kindly sent us a copy of both editions to review and I have to say that I really enjoyed reading the English edition. (Lancaster has a large Polish community, so we plan to donate that one to the Library here when it re-opens after some Lottery-funded refurbishment -- they have a good comic collection for lendng).

Back in the 1980s, there were numerous independent comic anthologies published in the UK, and the tradition continues with the likes of the brilliant Futurequake and Omnivistascope. But, I'd argue, none of these modern titles have the quirkiness that made long-gone titles like Escape, which was home to creators such as Eddie Campbell, Glen Dakin and Eddie Campbell so distinctly memorable.

Maybe - just maybe - New British Comics will take up the mantle.

Crammed with great strips and a web site to showcase more to back it up, New British Comics doesn't yet have the same voice as Escape - there's no feature material and neither do I expect there will be. But what it does have is a range of challenging, for the most part enjoyable material from a disparate range of comic talents.

I always say this, but an anthology title is never not going to throw up a strip or two that isn't too the reader's personal taste - that's what makes them such a hard sell. But the good outweighs the borderline here, from the opening shot of Brownehayes by Dave Thomson, a bizarre fable about a bizarre prophet; Dan White's illustrated tale, Jackie Goes to Hell, as a girl plunges, Dante-like, into Satan's domain to find her dead boyfriend's soul (the Howling Men are just superb...); and Daniel Locke's woodcut-styled ghost story, No Word of a Lie.

And there's more: Paul O’Connell's edgy one pae strip, The Child Molester and his wonderful creation, Charley Parker, Handyman; Nelson Evergreen's Damieinne Hobbs Reflects, Caroline Parkinson's romance tale, Inner City... the list of notable material stretches on.

In short, if you can track down a copy of New British Comics then buy it. Give this ground-breaking project your support. The fact that this title has been co-published in Poland has helped raise awareness of all these comics talents and fly the flag for British comics on the continent - always something worth doing. Editor Karol Wisniewski has pulled off a remarkable coup in being one of the first independent 'small press' publishers to accomplish something akin to the sort of strip syndication that made giant publishers like IPC, DC Thomson and Egmont so successful. Perhaps others will now take his lead...

• New British Comics is now available through SmallZone's online shop - smallzone-shop.co.uk, and Karol tells us that other UK shops should soon be distributing the book, too.

• There's now a new web site about the project at: newbritishcomics.blogspot.com


• More information and sample pages visit: www.polygobooks.com/newbritishcomics

• In addition to the book a Polish website dedicated to comics - www.komiks.nast.pl - has started publishing online British comics (click here for these)

"New British Comics" Anthology Published

The first issue of New British Comics, an 80-page comics anthology featuring, 13 stories and 17 artists including Dave Thomson, Malcy Duff, Paul O’Connell and Rob Miller has just been published.

The book has been self-published in Poland in two editions by Karol Wisniewski, in English and Polish. "The contents and strips are the same in both editions,," says Karol. "The only difference is language.

"The project sounds a little crazy, but it worked out just fine," he adds. "The Polish edition was a huge success and raised more interest in UK Comics. Now, it's time to present the English edition.

"It doesn't have a theme, Karol continues. "I've gathered great comics from British artists who have trusted me on this crazy idea - and that's the book's real theme. They worked hard on their stories and most of them have even made Polish title pages or handmade Polish lettering.

"The idea was simple: why not publish our stories in more than one language?" he explains of the book. "I can speak only Polish and (so-so) English, but I guess that was enough to make this project work, especially with so many friendly hands that helped me."

He's been greatly encouraged by how the title has come together. "If I can do this, then anyone can," he enthuses. "Even if you know only one language you can always ask your friends to help translate your stuff or make new friends. Either way will work. And it's definitely worth the trouble."

In addition to the book a Polish website dedicated to comics - www.komiks.nast.pl - has started publishing online British comics (click here for these). The first is Paul O'Connell's marvellous short "She's Leaving Home", recently seen in the UK via ROK Comics, and Karol says more are on the way. "Things are getting quite British here," Karol laughs.

• More information and sample pages visit: www.polygobooks.com/newbritishcomics

Brautigan Comic part of new Torpedo Quarterly

2009 marks the 25th anniversary of the death of American writer Richard Brautigan, whose best known works include his 1967 novel, Trout Fishing in America, his collection of poetry, The Pill Versus the Springhill Mine Disaster (1968), and his collection of stories, Revenge of the Lawn (1971).

Marking the anniversary of one of his favourite writers, Brighton-based comics creator Paul O'Connell is one of several contributors to the leatest issue of the quarterly Australian fiction magazine Torpedo, whose latest offering is a special Brautigan themed issue.

Co-edited, and with a foreword, by Brautigans daughter Ianthe Brautigan, the special issue features Brautigan inspired fiction from 30 writers, a section of Richard Brautigans own writing plus a specially designed envelope containing eight full colour A5 double-sided prints featuring artwork based on his stories, one of which prints is a comic strip by Paul using Richard Brautigan's own text, called 'The Library'.

In Brautigan's novel The Abortion: A Historical Romance 1966, the narrator is the sole employee of a library that collects unpublished and unpublishable books. It's sole criteria is that books must be delivered in person. "A chapter in the novel which I adapted into comic strip form
describes a typical day in the life of the library," Paul told downthetubes, "and the many kinds of
characters who stop by to leave their charming, idosyncratic and bizarre manuscripts and books."

"It's a real privilege to be included in this special edition."

Apparently, the idea for the kind of library featured in the novel proved so popular that it inspired more than a couple of actual real life libraries based upon the same principle.

Other contributors to the magazine include Brian Evenson, Ryan Boudinot, Dan Pope and Caren Beilin, an outro by Radiohead illustrator Stanley Donwood and a cover by Los Angeles-based illustrator Kristian Olson.

• Torpedo is available now to buy from the Falcon vs Monkey website
• Brautigan Bibliography and Archive
A bio-bibliographical archive for Richard Brautigan, his life, and writings