HELP THE PINCH! ART SALE

HELP THE PINCH

A5 watercolour/ink drawings sale!

Some of them have fingerprints, some are a bit smudged, but all of them are hand-picked from my personal collection.

I don't often sell my incidental artwork - usually I either throw it away if it's not great, or keep it in a drawer for myself.

ANYWAY!

Potus Pinch, one of the two lovely cats in this household, is in danger of losing his owly yellow eyes - he's gone to the specialist vet now and we need to raise a couple of grand to cover the bills.

He's a big inspiration - I learned how to draw a cat nose from his particularly regal snout.

He's also a kind, cuddly, handsome midnight-black beast, and we love him very much - if you like my cat drawings, now would be a great time to get one. 

Free shipping!

ADDITIONALLY: Discount code PINCH will give you 10% off not just on these but any other item in the shop.

All proceeds from my shop will go to cover the bills for as long as necessary.

Thank you!

BUY HERE

CAT SKETCH REPORT: 50/50 PARLIAMENT DEBATE, WESTMINSTER

Yesterday I went to Westminster for a debate at the House of Commons. The event was to mark the anniversary of Nancy Astor, the first women MP, taking her seat in the Common's 96 years ago.

The room was packed. The seat next to me was shared by two people, and there was a small standing crowd by the door. It was a diverse crowd, including some very eloquent minors.

This is the issue:

Of the 650 seats in the House of Commons 459 are occupied by men and 191 women.
There are 32 million women in the UK,
51% of the population. They are a diverse majority.
But the House of Commons is 71% male.

Here's the Petition for you to sign if you agree that this is a bad situation and must change sooner rather than later.

And here are my sketches! Enjoy. And click to see them big.

The Panel (can't see them all here, they had to run in and out to cast votes and debate elsewhere):

Maria Miller MP, Chair of the Women and Equalities Select Committee, Jess Phillips MP, Angela Crawley MP, Caroline Lucas MP, Baroness Smith of Newnham, Callum McCaig MP, Wes Streeting MP, Ben Howlett MP and Sophie Walker, Leader of the Women's Equality Party.

"There are some awfully, awfully average men in here". Callum McCaig on Whitehall.

Ellan asked Maria Miller if her boss would introduce a quota for his party.

No, he won't.

Baroness Smith of Newnham and Ben Howlett.

Jess Phillips.

Caroline Lucas.

Sophie Walker from the Women's Equality Party.

Many good questions asked.

The last question came from a child, to great applause, and was answered by every member of the panel (in the case of Maria Miller with s shrug - the rest gave firm estimates).

THE THEATRE OF ILLUSTRATION

What is a picture book if not a tiny paper theatre?

Drawing upon over two decades experience in picture book making and the performing arts, award winning author/illustrator Viv Schwarz and award-winning theatre designer Ellan Parry present a master class in visual story-telling, exploring the intersection between picture books and performance. Whether you are a professional picture book artist, a student or just want to try your hand at making something for your family, this class will give you tools to bring drama, expression and emotional impact to your work. We will bring in creative tools and exercises learned, invented, collected and developed over years of professional practice as well as materials that we would use ourselves professionally. We will show you how to work fast to generate characters and bring them to life, using techniques borrowed from theatre as well as drawing games and storytelling exercises. You will learn how to develop your story hands-on to make a well-paced, engaging picture book. This class includes a portfolio/dummy book viewing and discussion in small, friendly groups in the morning, so we can tailor the afternoon book-making lesson to you, personally.   This is a workshop for adults, although we may consider talented teenagers. We are charging an introductory rate of £50.

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BOOK YOUR TICKET HERE

Lights... camera... autocue?

I am setting up recording equipment at the studio so I can film clips now and then, to supplement the workshops I'm running with The Kraken Studio (That's our studio).
It's fun.

Here's the camera and the studio ipad...

...which is a remote and monitor now. There's a microphone, too, and some lighting, but most importantly...

A video posted by Viviane schwarz (@schwarzviv) on Oct 18, 2015 at 10:07am PDT

...the autocue, which is pure ancient open source goodness - plus some duct tape.

Good thing I've been collecting assorted electronics for the studio over the last couple of years!

MONOCLE interview

I was interviewed yesterday for Monocle Radio.
We talked about what makes a good children's book, and I read a bit from HOW TO FIND GOLD, my new picture book...

CAT AND BAG

My Anxiety web comic has a brand-new home.
I am reposting all the old episodes, edited and tidied a bit, and there are many new ones to come.

So: that's where the new stuff will happen. Go Look There.

Drawn Chorus Collective

I'm working on a spread for the Drawn Chorus Collective's latest anthology; it's an alphabet book.

Space Cat Portraits

Today I drew people as Space Cats, as part of the Galactic Fete at Creation Space London.

I especially enjoyed drawing families - I asked them to do a space pose. 

I managed to forget my drawing pen, so I had to hack a writing pen by adding a pipette I happened to have in my brush roll as a reservoir for drawing ink. I also cut a nib from a beer can and used some correction fluid and a toothbrush for stars.

Well, that was fun.

Twins

I'm having a lot of fun doing portrait commissions.
Here is a matching set of twin girls.

Get a treat for someone while I still have the time to draw these! Once I'm getting into the next big picture book project I'll be too busy...

GET A PORTRAIT!

You can now commission me for portraits, as long as you're happy to be an animal in it.

School visits

I had a few wonderful school visits recently...

In St Christopher's School I helped with a project where the kids made their own picture books. I did a day of tutorials, some sketching and in the end made a whole dummy book on stage.
They had a biology lesson in the gym, handling exotic animals, which was great fun to draw.

 In the Haberdasher's Aske's School for Girls I visited for a day with Alexis. We read them our books and drew monsters together.

Very important to have a party stomach. 

modular beasts.

It was awesome.

Thanks everyone!