Stickers

This is the second week of my blog and today was quite a good one, as I just got the preview copy of Emma Calder's Moody Days. It looks just as I planned and the printing is pretty good. I was so lucky, to be able to design and draw every single element of my book including the type faces and the bar code. (Except I did steal one or two drawings from my children and popped them in here and there). It is rare these days to have the creative say on things, without the money people stepping in and trying to interfere. I have to thank all the people I was involved with at Thames and Hudson, for being so good to work with and professional. 

Apart from being excited, I am also a bit scared, as soon the book will be out there, exposed and ready to be taken home. But, back to the events and work leading up to Moody Days.

After I had my second child and both my parents had died, I became very ill and unable to work for a while. Having spent years making short animated films for people like the BBC and Channel Four and yet still struggling to get funding. I found myself in an impossible position, no time, no money to make films but, tons of ideas. I was deeply frustrated. I wanted my work out there, being seen, making a difference.

Southwark Street London 2005

One morning on the way to work, I was overcome by one idea, it just popped into my brain. “STICKERS”.
  
I was suddenly over come with all the possibilities.

Emma and Ged 1994. Photographs by Richard Keith Wolff

When I got to my old studio in Sly St, East London, I found some old address labels and I got started immediately. This was the studio that I used to share with fellow animator and co Pearly Oyster Productions founder Ged Haney.

These were the first sticker sheets that I did before I had really worked out what I was doing or why I was doing it. They used some of the button/sewing stuff pictures, that I had been making after my mothers best friend died and I'd inherited her button collection. 

Button Pictures 2004

Initially I had made the button pictures because, I had wanted to use up all the buttons, to dispose of them in an artistic fashion, but then I just started buying more and more lovely buttons. So that plan failed along with the film idea, which I never completed. 

These button pictures are not in Moody Days, but I did end up using three of my original pictures in the book. I won't show you those now as I don't want to spoil the surprize.

This little picture was made as a present for my partner, from an old regency buckle I bought on Bermondsey Market. It's a terrible joke!


More next week.