I visited Gosh! Comics before, and truthfully – I’ve been looking for an excuse to return, and browse through their independent comics and zines section since I discovered the shop on research trip for Unit 1. This time I was on a mission looking at various illustration styles, and the general binding, and formatting of comics – with an added focus on anything seeming biographical. It was quite difficult to tell what could’ve been biographical, or even nonfiction, as a lot of the titles and cover pages on display are very abstract. Nevertheless, I love all the individually bound comics and zines, as well as the bold designs on the front of many.
Contrary to this however, I picked up an obviously photocopied comic, UAP Comix, by Ed Cheverton – because I was attracted to the stark white paper and copied clip art cover styling. It reminded me of my early usage of computers in the early 00s, and how then ‘clip art’ seemed to encapsulate as much as it needed to at the time. In comparison to the modern day gifs, glyphs, emojis and stock images – it was pretty pared down. I like this revision of a past I remember, albeit, the images on / in UAP Comix were obviously drawn by the artist themself, some by hand, some digitally. On some levels I think these drawings aren’t great – though of course it’s subjective anyway; it actually both pleases and excites me to see potentially ‘bad’ art on the covers of comics actually for sale. I love the freedom of the comics world. This is something I feel particularly passionate about – comics are such an accessible form of communication.
I liked the simple colour combinations of colour on the covers of Entity Reunion 3, by Alexander Tucker, and A Collection of Abstract Mini Comics, by Miranda Smart; as they used only a select few colours (maximum 3 per page) that were all stand-out colours, i.e – green, orange, blue. Orange and blue were used on the same cover image for Entity Reunion 3, and I did find the two complimentary colours pleasing on the eye.
I enjoy the independently drawn styles in Miranda Smart’s work; on some levels it inspires me to do something different for each illustrative technique I use in my FMP. This is an option I’m still considering, and will experiment with as I develop the project.
There were a few tabloid-type publications on display at Gosh! Comics; I selected one – The Scene, by Juliet Collette, to look at based on the style of illustration, and quoted words on the page.
The drawings seemed somewhat caricature, and reminiscent of the street-portrait artists who work around Leicester Square, and I liked the bold colours on the washed-out style of paper used. I also found the confessionary style quotes on the front cover intriguing, for example – “I always wanted to pee my pants on purpose”.
The final two publications I wish to talk about, excited me visually, and as a potential shopper I felt very tempted. The first I noticed was Weighing Machine, a collaboration between Megalashhh (who provided the audio) and Miranda Smart (visuals). It was the only thing quite like it that I could see.
On the shelf it looked almost like something someone had accidentally left behind amongst the other, paper-booklets. The publication itself was described as an ‘8 metre long scroll comic with cassette tape’ and the idea behind the collaboration was to listen to the cassette tape as you read the scroll comic.
I assume that once opened & used, the comic is done, and perhaps it won’t fold back into the packaging again; creating a sort of sacred object (in my mind) before it’s opened, and used for the first, and only, time. This both intrigued me and put me off buying it – what happens on the tape? How does an 8 metre scroll comic look when unraveled? What’s detailed on all 8 metres, and what will I be listening to for all that time? – having taken glances at Miranda Smart’s other work available, I don’t doubt it would be quite abstract, but highly detailed illustration/s inside. However, personally, I’m more of a minimalist fan, and enjoy having space in my home – amid my own collections of memory-holding items, and so despite temptation, I did not purchase Weighing Machine, or the final piece of work I looked over before I eventually tore myself away from Gosh! Comics.
The final piece was a pop-up comic. I hadn’t realised this when I first picked it up off the shelf – I had been drawn to it by the precise level of dotted-detail over the cover. There was so much going on but I loved the colour scheme – red, yellow, white & black, and the interesting hand-binding which was present on all available copies. I was surprised there could be more than one of something so detailed, and with such a complex design inside. It reminded me of a particular book I had as a child – a pop-up version of The Wizard of Oz. There was so much detail on each page, hidden under layers of yet more pop-up detail – I don’t think I ever focused enough on the words to really say now if there ever were many, or any! I found it quite overwhelming on the eye as a child – now, the same applied here really, and yet I loved looking for hidden details within what I found at Gosh! Comics, which was simply called Dot Comics. I hope to see more of them in the future, and that they’re a series of similarly drawn, pop-up comics. I’m not entirely sure what the one I found was about, but the main pop-up page looked like a depiction of hell.
I’d be interested to play around with pop-up illustration elements in my FMP. This will go onto my ‘material experiments’ to do list.
Gosh! Comics, I’ll no doubt be back!