Awesome Robots in Leeds!

WE MADE FIFTY ROBOTS! And I had no time to photograph them all, but other people did, so I will post more soon.

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UPDATE: HERE IS A LINK TO ALL THE ROBOTS!

Robot Interview

I'm in Leeds to run a robot workshop, and I gave a crowdsourced interview for the occassion.

Do Robots have a gender? (From @Imran)
We may decide that they do, but unless we do that, or unless they get clever enough to decide for themselves, they don’t.
If we or they themselves decide that they have a gender, it might not be male or female, but any number of genders, including some that do not exist yet. Maybe there will be five different kinds of thinking robots that all work together to reproduce, and they will refer to themselves as having five different genders, possible none of them male or female. Or maybe they will decide that gender in robots isn’t anything to do with making new robots. Or maybe they won’t bother at all.

Click through for the rest. (I should have said "self aware" instead of "clever" there. Sorry.)

MAKE IT THEN TELL EVERYBODY podcast!

Here's me on the MAKE IT THEN TELL EVERYBODY podcast.
The web connection was quite hissy, and I pretty much forgot to plug any of my recent work, but it was brilliant fun. We talked about pencils, hospital clowns, ex boyfriends, art, more art, character design, book making, dog paddling and other things.

AWESOME ROBOT WORKSHOP IN LEEDS

Hey Hey Hey bring your family to my AWESOME ROBOT WORKSHOP in Leeds!
THIS FRIDAY!

LET'S BUILD STUFF TOGETHER!

It's part of Playful Leeds, and there will be all sorts of other great stuff going on.

Here's a lovely video to cheer you

This has nothing at all to do with me, but I love everything about this video. So I'm sharing it with you on this lovely Summer's day. DANCE DANCE DANCE

Anklebiters // Paramore // Official Video from Jordan Bruner on Vimeo.

Dinner with Daisy

Here's something to put in your diary:
on the 18th of August I'll have a stall at the wonderful Dinner with Daisy night to draw people's portraits as cats.
It will be a delightful evening of music, art and film in Limehouse. My favourite art pop band French for Cartridge will be one of the bands playing. I can't wait!!
Here's the Facebook link.
Come have a beautiful Summer evening!

Book the Third

Check it out! I brought home a fully assembled proof dummy of IS THERE A DOG IN THIS BOOK?

is there???

THERE IS!!!!

Morning Maneuvers

An old story, often been told, but not by me.
(They did all of these this morning.)

Pamphlet Stitch

If you don't already know how to do a pamphlet stitch, you should learn it because once you know how it's a much better way of making a booklet than stapling it (unless you have an industrial long-arm stapler).

(Video not by me, I was considering making one and then found someone else had done a great job aleady.)

Interview with Sally Brammall

Sally Brammall, who is a journalist for the Big Issue, interviewed me on her blog ALTERNATIVE ROOTS about story writing, nightmares and such. I really enjoyed this interview, I think it came out well.

The first question I ask myself when thinking about what book to make next is: when I was a child, what book did I want? And there is quite a list of them. I had a lot of questions, problems, interests, and was always hoping to find books to help me with those.
I was a very small child, quite clever, with a lot of nightmares. I loved making things, and my favourite toys were kites, my electronics kit, a big box of lego, art materials.I wanted to learn about the world and make things happen. I wanted to create robots and animals, build theatres, make puppets and perform my own plays, I wanted to be a detective, inventor, scientist, make books, cook, make clothes, build a car. I argued and questioned and made a mess.
My parents handled it all well, and I remember a lot of the things they taught me – rules about using tools and other dangerous things, but also how to deal with nightmares and fears. They were very supportive.
So now I am making books that I would have liked then, using the things I learned, and I am making an effort to keep learning and to understand what other children need, and how to encourage them.
That’s always the start: let’s make a book about bullying that might actually help to make things better. Let’s make a book for parents and children to help them set up a workspace where they can experiment, build and invent things. Let’s make a cat-simulator for children who can’t have cats. The design follows the purpose, so that it becomes like a house that will invite the right characters… and then I invent those, and their story.

-Read the rest at: http://alternativeroots.net/?p=316

Housewarming

We were given a Cthulhu to protect the home.

I made a shower curtain with dinosaurs and ships

We had a lovely party.

favourite toy

The cat still likes the toy mouse I made for her.

put a cat on it

Yes the smudges are cat paw prints.

More cat from my sketchbook:

Cat Present

Diary comic, this morning.

Facebook

I just joined Facebook because it's just too complicated to handle event invitations any other way these days, it seems. So here I am: viv.schwarz is for people who are friends with myself, and VivSchwarzBooks is for people who are friends with my books. Go friend me.

Oh and if we only met once or long ago, please remind me who you are because I am bad with names...

Launched!!

We had an excellent launch!

I kept the marzipan bear for Alexis who couldn't make it because he was away winning awards elsewhere... Sophia the crow got eaten though. So did the rest of the delicious cake.

BOOKLAUNCH TOMORROW!

Just a reminder that I'll be launching SLEEPWALKERS tomorrow. It's my first graphic novel, so I really feel like celebrating it... if you are friends with me or with my books, come and have some cake and free drawings of bears and monkeys, sheep and monsters.

Hosted by the wonderful Review Bookshop in Peckham. Their bookshop dog who Buddy the ghost dog is based on (you can see him there carried by the bear).

There is a nice pub across the road where one can go afterwards to have a drink and a snack and talk about comics...

Facebook event link 

Nesting

I'm setting up home. It's going mostly well. The wardrobe is a bit warlike, it's attacked me a few times, but I think I have the right nuts and bolts to fix it together properly now.

Portrait of me working on my new home (bu Mehedi Haque)

My fish mobile.

Finally: a place for my favourite fascinator!

A magpie I just bought from the local junk shop to watch over my dresser.

I made a crochet mouse for the cats.

I got a new ceiling lamp, at last one that isn't a paper ball. T-Rex approves.

Picture hooks! I need some different ones for the brick wall...

...because all of these need hanging.

Actually this one is up: Wolverine doing his hair. I commissioned that from Dan Berry, it cheers me up about my own hairdo.

McGyvered Steampunk iPad stand for watching things in bed. It's linked up to a pillow speaker so I can listen quietly.

I think an IKEA trip is in order next... I need bed curtains and a step to reach the microwave and... all sorts of stuff.