A few weeks back I got into a conversation with Paul Gravett and Karrie Fransman about 3D comics, and the ways they can take on different forms. Karrie is in fact having an exhibition on the subject called Experimenting with Comics at the great Orbital Comics shop in London, starting Thursday 21 June.
It got me thinking that while I’ve experimented with different forms of paper comics, particularly with my Mini Comics box set, I hadn’t tried to make any others in 3D. Then it hit me… way back when I was studying Ceramics at Camberwell College of Arts, (back while they still had a Ceramics degree) I did make something along those lines. A fair few actually…
This piece with 4 ceramic shapes linked by string and wire, tells the story of a boy’s journey where he meets a Messianic cat.
4 Piece Comic Story, Ceramic, Wire and String
At my graduate show I placed all my work in a space extending the imagery of the ceramics themselves. The relationship of an object and it’s environment is really interesting.
Exhibition, Camberwell College of Arts
Two sides of the same object. Fun mixing ceramics with contrasting materials like yellow fluff…
Fluffy Yellow Thing, Ceramic, Fluff and Wire
This is my fave. It’s a poem, ceramic sculpture and story all in one. There’s me playing a keytar while my parents ride in a spaceship near the mountain top.
Mountain Piece
This one was called Mouse Between Heaven & Earth. ‘Nuff said.
Mouse Between Heaven & Earth, Ceramic and String
This little guy was kind of like a puppet. I liked making toy type things from a completely inappropriate material.
Pode Me Ajudar, Ceramics and String
Sometimes the comic imagery would exist in flat pictures, giving new purpose to my 3D shapes…
Phoenix, Monkey and Baby with powers, Ceramics and String
Ceramic is great for making very naturalistic shapes as well as clearly man made forms. I like the contrast of this organic looking shell with the cartoony looking god on the inside.
Shell god, Ceramic
This was stupidly huge and heavy. Having this flat image on a big ceramic wall does affect the way you look at it though…
The Eye of the Needle, Ceramic
Ceramic Tiles. Spot the Buffy one.
Tiles, Ceramic, Fluff
The cool thing about making each tile a panel is you can rearrange their order to make different stories.
Freeing the Magic Goose, Ceramic
For more ceramic comic ideas see my post on City of Mouse.
I’ve also added a Ceramics section to my online portfolio here!
And here’s the colours planned out before adding texture and tone.
And here’s the inks before I coloured it.
And here’s the pencils from before I inked it.
So there.
