I have two research ideas that I working on. They are both in the same ideal of taking the comic book out of the page and into the real world. As I have explained earlier, I see this as the "analog" version of the webcomic. I started spray painting comics on the wall of a squat/old train shed, but it recently got fire-bombed. A trajic accident not for the artwork on the wall or the collection of garbage and rusted circular saws in the shed, but because of my neighbor's race-pigeon housing being the intended target...
Anyways, the outer walls of the shed I started "publishing" comics on is now black from the fire damage, which gives me an entire new clean-ish surface to work with. I plan on making a wall painting with stickmen as close to life-size as practically and safely possible.
Here is the script for the 1 square wall-painted comic I want to do:
Robber stickman with knife and mask mugs another stickman. He stand on the left of the scene for faster reading purposes (as I have mentioned before in other blog posts, we read English from left to right and top to bottom, therefore for faster readability of the comic the text and images should be situated logically from left to right and top to bottom). The mugged stickman stands on the right looking into his hand.
Mugger: "The money or your life!"
Mugger victim: "I'll meet you half ways. Call it £3.42"
Extremely simple scenario which brings incredibly light humor into a publicly accessible spray painted artwork. The piece will be free to see to all that pass by, making a free self-published "analog" comic.
I tend to spend a lot of time on logistical problems so I am sure everything is executed in a quick and efficient manner. I have achieved a satisfying plan of making a huge stencil with the biggest piece of paper/card I could afford. I will make a giant solid stencil out of it. In fact 3 stencils: 1 for each character and 1 for the text. I am now on the way of thinking on how to create in the most precise manner this stencil. I first thought of drawing it myself on A1 paper. I do foresee the drawing as problematic, not being anywhere used to drawing on such a huge scale, but my main concern lies with the cutting out. All in all, my colleague Mark Rae said to me yesterday that if it where him, he would do it through computers. I think that it is the best solution, especially considering that I need a vectorial program drawn image to have it cut out by a computer and I just so happen to exclusively draw computerised stickmen through Adobe Illustrator which just so happens to be a vectorial program. I plan to use this to create my stencil.
I now have to design the comic on illustrator and experiment with the best stencil techniques to create a clean and functioning giant stencil.
My second project I am also prototyping for alter is the creation of a stickman statue with a white-board/dry eraser board located in the speech bubble. This would allow for the public to add their own story and text to the statue of the stickman, and create an simple, free and playful/recreational publicly accessible comic book creator. On the internet there a dime-a-dozen free Flash programs to create and design your own comics through pre-made artwork and speech bubble tools. This would be a less elaborate and simpler "analog" alternative, bringing the Flash comic book programs to the public.
This would be a participatory and performance-like public project. Although to do this, I have to create the statue, and as for the stencil I like to plan ahead and have a clear and precise plan. The create the statue I need to choose material: re-bar or metal would be my first choice as an aesthetically and tactilely pleasing material to create a stickman out of. In addition to that, welding a speech bubble onto it would be easier and have a high production value statue feel to it. Although this would be a good approach for someone with the time and resources which I dunno posses, I find it would also be very hard to transport and impractical, therefore removing the option of a more mobile statue.
Like the stencil, I foresee myself creating the statue in 2 to 3 pieces from wood carved/shaped through a computer based vectorial program. This creation would be completely 3 dimensional and I am quite new to the creation process therefore more research on that part of the production is needed. A part from that, I have thought about the shape/form of the statue and mainly the way it would be part together: a base, a stickman and a speech bubbly made from wood and spray painted black matt or semi-gloss. The material are cheaper and lighter than metal and allow for much for manoeuvrability. In addition to this the stand would be relatively cheap to create as well as stable. For the stickman, carving him from one solid piece of wood might not only be problematic but also impractical. Therefore he could be divided into 2 pieces at the mid-section. A bolt could be placed inside the body of the stickman allowing for an easy way of putting the piece together as well as making it more transportable.
My main logistical problem for choosing wood as a material of choice is the speech bubble which would need a very solid support, therefore the positioning of it has to be carefully thought through for safety and stability reasons, and to create a solid enough speech bubble that has enough support from the main statue piece. It could be detachable and connectible through a bolt to the main piece. The centre of the speech bubble would be a modified whiteboard shaped as needed, and allowing the public to easily add their text to the scene, allowing them to add their own input to the life comic book scene.
Illustration and plans are still to be finished.
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