Have been working on drawings inspired by various financial articles - particularly this article by Michael Hudson. Have made a drawing around a quote from this article:

At the same time I’ve been working on building a collage generator, with the idea of generating backgrounds that I can use in my drawings - or maybe as a way of speeding up my drawing process. If I can get a machine to do some of it, then why not? But mostly I’m interested in the ubnexpected results that collage throws up.

Here’s the generator (only works on Firefox): http://davemiller.org/tools/collage_generator/

And here are a few collages I made today:

The next step is to pull all this together - drawings and writings - into a booklet -story.

I’ve just made this short satirical graphic micro-novel, based on events last week involving Mr Mandelson on holiday in Greece and the introduction of internet piracy punishments. It’s pretty fictional as well I have to say.



Open the PDF here

A comic featuring superheroes inspired by the qualities of Allah. The superheroes are 99 characters who develop extraordinary abilities after coming into contact with Noor Stones, ancient gems imbued with power and wisdom.

Jacquie Smith, Home Secretary, caused outrage last March when she submitted an expenses claim for an 88p bath plug. It was seen as an example of politicians leeching money from 
the taxpayer without fear of sanction. Gravy-train Britain, pigs at the trough.

I’ve been thinking for a while about doing something on this subject. I’ve got a short comic sketch worked out, and will probably do this as well. I got the idea to do a digital painting from reading about David Hockney’s work with digital drawings, and thought would try the same. He reckons the technology is up to the job - I dont! Photoshop crashes so often it makes the task almost impossible. Maybe it’s my set up?

Using Photoshop and a graphics tablet - very nice.

I know it’s quite an uncool thing to say, but I like Hockney’s work, well some of it. I went along to this exhibition (Annely Juda, London) last week and took a look.

The drawings are very bright and colourful, and very much hand drawn. I like his visual style and use of colour, and free expression. I asked at the desk - very snobby person - about the works but couldn’t give me much technical info. I’d like to know what resolution of image he draws at - as these inkjet prints - all look quite high resolution - and the prints are A2 and A1. He seems to draw on the computer based on his pencil sketches, but the nice man behind the desk told me that all the portraits were drawn on the computer with the person posing directly in front of the computer. Not sure if I believe this. Maybe he’ll read this and tell me, probably not.

While Hockney certainly isn’t the first artist to experiment with drawing on the computer, to say the least, I’m curious that he’s having a go, and I like the work he’s done, some of it looks quite striking. Of course he has a history of experimenting with technology. I also noticed that all he’s done is do what he normally does, but on the computer instead, so he’s not really experimenting is he?

I also felt angry at the prices he charges, I mean each print was one of a limited edition of 20, and each costs £8000. Absurd… why?

What a good idea! Wonder if there’s a decent way of automating this?

The latest e-zine platform58 issue 007 – ‘buildings’ with my ‘trouble at the big house’ artwork is now online: 

A new drawing, made for the latest Platform58 e-zine. Exploring the issues around the (March 09) Fred Goodwin pension scandal, and his home targetted by protesters. Telling the story from multiple angles, in comic style.

I’ve been bothered about this story for a while, about the unfairness of it all, how he buggers things up so hugely and gets rewarded for life. I know the UK media carped on about this for ages, but I still can’t understand how this could be allowed to happen. How many other stories like this are there at this present time, with rich elites being heavily rewarded for failure, while millions lose their jobs?

President Lula of Brazil recently said he felt it was completely unfair that the poorest people in the world were suffering most for the mistakes of wealthy, Western financiers.

This was a crisis that was fostered and boosted by irrational behaviour of people that are white, blue-eyed, that before the crisis looked like they knew everything about economics,’ he declared. ‘Now they have demonstrated that they don’t know anything about economics.’

I made this drawing “The Gite Set” - over the last couple of days:
It explores the recent phenomenon of English people emigrating to France and running gites. It studies the subject from a number of angles - such as reasons why people want to do this, how dreams can be undone, socio-economic factors driving this, and I mix this with an invented story. These are all superimposed on each other like layers of acetate, to try to reveal a bigger picture and show how things are connected and linked up.

I’m describing this as “Diagram Art” - a mixture of mind maps/ decision diagrams/ flowcharts/ system diagrams/ moodboards/ graphic novels. They engage with social and current issues - but issues which are part of my life - as I have actually considered doing something like this. It’s my attempt to explore quite serious subjects and explain them in depth in a fun accessible way.

Basically I see this as the first one of a series of drawings , exploring subjects from multiple angles.

I think this would work printed big - A0 or A1? More on this later, as I’ve written quite a few notes while this work evolved.