Free educational minizine

I developed and riso printed a new mini-zine. It's fairly simple and self-explanatory. If my lifetime of experience is at all representative, I think it will be relevant to many people in many situations. That is unfortunate.

I truly hope you will never have cause to use this but you probably will. When that times comes (maybe it's right now), it will be here for you. You can give it directly to someone you think needs to read it or leave it lying around in a space where theory bros hang out. You can even share how it goes down by posting a comment below.
  

This is on the inside when you unfold it. If you want, you could just print this out on another sheet and keep it for yourself. The whole thing is a copyleft publication so you are free to duplicate and distribute it. 

Print it in black and white, on exciting paper, in different riso colors or even embellish it with your own drawings or hand written notes. Seriously, do whatever you need to do.
 
Free A4 pdf black and white download here
Folding and cutting instructions here

Princess Hijab: Shape and Situate #6

My submission to the latest issue of Shape and Situate: Posters of Inspirational Women in Europe. I have been in awe of the work of Princess Hijab for a while and excitedly looked for some of her work on the Metro while I was visiting Paris (sadly I didn't see any). If you are not familiar with her work, this is what it looks like and as you can see, it's not just images of women that get "hijabized":



When the latest call out for poster submissions arrived, I was right in the middle of a long-term, painful wrist injury that was stopping me from doing most things. The most upsetting thing was not being able to draw but using Princess Hijab's super fast, drippy style, I was able to draw this simple shape using my giant tagging marker, which was the only thing comfortable enough for me to hold. Creating something again helped pull me out of a worry-filled funk. I guess inspiration can mean lots of different things.

Order copies of the zine here and keep up to date about the zine by liking the Facebook page (or maybe even contribute a poster to the next issue yourself).

January comic

A free minicomic to help you prepare for 2014. 

 To see the rest, download the full comic as a pdf (3MB) here. 

Sore boobs comic

I made this little comic for a friend who is putting together a zine about PMT/PMS. It's been put on hold as she's got lots of other stuff going on so I thought I'd share it.  You can see the actual zine layout is at the bottom. I'm planning to work on more short comics for my own amusement. Hopefully this is the first of many.

Illustration for Stir magazine

The latest issue of Stir magazine came out today on the topic of commoning in the city and features this illustration of mine. It represents my ideal urban store cupboard packed full of preserves made from food foraged or grown in community growing sites.

As a volunteer at a community orchard in a public park in Hackney, the most common question people ask when they visit is, "how are you going to stop people from taking all this stuff?" Just last weekend, I encountered a woman who asked this very question. She then explained to me that her granddaughters love rhubarb crumble and I convinced her (after much effort) to take a bunch of it so she could make their favorite treat. Even when permission is explicitly granted, it still contradicts everything we are taught about private property and getting anything for free in our current system.

This is a nod to the sense of naughtiness that so many people feel about taking what's right under their noses and how when they push through that fear, they open up a world of new possibilities.

Remembering Who We Are zine

After our workshop at Leeds Zine Fair and our exhibition at Space Station 65, Melanie Maddison and I have collated all of the great contributions we received for our zine Remembering Who We into a brand new website. My contribution is based on an incredible woman I met many years ago but who I will never forget. 

There are already lots of contributions up on the site and more to come. And we are still open to more submissions so please find out more and contribute.

Some thoughts on officialdom

I have been thinking a lot about my art. Things like what to prioritise on my very long to-do list, what formats are best for the messages I want to send and also where I want my work to sit in the wider world. These are questions that don't really involve anyone but me and require no real negotiation with other people's agendas.

Illustrations for Charlotte Cooper

I was recently asked by Charlotte Cooper, the totally amazing fat activist, diy cultural producer, writer and counsellor/psychotherapist, to create some illustrations for her new website. Her awesomeness is so well known that she is a featured subject in the latest issue of Shape and Situate: Posters of Inspirational European Women.

Workshop and zine call out

Melanie Maddison, creator of Shape and Situate and Colouring Outside the Lines zines and I are running a workshop at Leeds Zine Fair this Sunday (4th of Nov). You can read more about it here. We will also be launching a call out for contributions to a new zine. 

If you are awesome and anywhere in the vicinity of Leeds, we'll expect to see you there. If you can't make it, you can still contribute to the zine. Here are all the details.

Send your submission to rememberingzine@gmail.com by the end of March (deadline extended). Go on, fulfill that inevitable new year's resolution to do something creative in 2013.

Occuprint portfolio

Although I've had this in my possession for a while now, I felt the need to express my gratitude for having my work included in such a great project. And not to mention, explain what a privilege it is to be the owner of such a beautiful artifact. 

Another Fattylympics poster

This is my final poster for the exciting Fattylympics, which is just over a week away. It is available to download and decorate here. See the previous two here.

There are so many reasons why you should come along and participate:

• It's free, inclusive of all body types, genders and sexualities and in a completely accessible venue.  
• Special editions of all three of my posters will be available on the day to decorate and bring home as one-of-a-kind souvenirs.  
• There is an official Fattylympics Anthem written by Verity Susman of Electrelane. Learn it now as we will all be singing it together on the day! 
  
• And there are even going to be limited edition bright orange Fattylympics sweatbands. 

Seriously, what could possibly be better? More information here. See you there.

Pivo's Fattylympics posters

Oh man, the Olympics. Where do you even start when it comes to complaining? I'm not going to bother. Instead, I'm participating in the Fattylympics. It's free, it celebrates body and gender diversity, it's feminist, it's queer and hetero friendly, it's for all abilities, it's non-competitive and it's in East London this summer.

These are the first two in a series of posters I have designed for the Fattylympics. They are available for anyone to download, print and decorate to proclaim where they'd rather be in July 2012. Download them here and check out how great it's going to be while you are at it. 

Forget the stupid diet or exercise as punishment, let's have fun instead. For Londoners this summer, that may be the most subversive act possible.

Caged Bird Club free graphic

Fountain Pen by Sav Kyriacou
Download pdf

Woody Guthrie wrote a song called Pretty Boy Floyd about the famous American outlaw. It tells of how he got into a fight with a deputy sheriff, killed him and had to go on the run. It then depicts his generosity to the poor as a modern day Robin Hood. There was a line that always struck me relating to the bankers who drove families from their home:

You say that I'm an outlaw
You say that I'm a thief
Here's a Christmas dinner
For the families on relief.
Now as through this world I ramble
I see lots of funny men
Some will rob you with a Six gun
And some with a fountain pen.
But as through your life you travel
As through your life you roam
You won't never see an outlaw
Drive a family from their home.

Now, where have I heard that before?

Medieval times - free graphic

This poster I designed is available for download over at Occuprint. If you haven't seen all the exciting free graphics that have come out of the Occupy movement, this is a great place to start. 

As far as I can tell, mine is the only one that uses a biblical quote in Latin (Radix malorum est cupiditas) to make a point about contemporary inequality. Not that I'm being smug about it though. That's probably another deadly sin.

Note: the version at Occuprint is US legal size. An A3 high-res pdf version is available here.

More free graphics from the Caged Bird Club: 30th November.

A couple of new, free downloadable graphics to show your support for the public sector strike on Wednesday. Put them up in your windows, office, school or paste them up on the walls.

Bullseye by Lindsay Starbuck 

download pdf

I made "get the facts" prominent because the blatant lies being pumped out by the government and the media about "gold-plated" public sector pensions are pathetic. People have really bought them and, in turn, accepted the idea that there should be a race to the bottom in terms of workers' rights and benefits.

Venn diagram by Lindsay Starbuck

download pdf

 

James Venn invented these diagrams in 1880 to illustrate simple set relationships. A bit of old logic that still makes perfect sense.

If you don't work in the public sector you can still support the strike. Visit picket lines near your work. Bring picketers cups of tea to help them keep warm or go join them on your lunch break. Challenge your colleagues if they call public sector workers greedy. Remind them who is really greedy in our society (banks, corporations and our government full of millionaires).

benefit & multiply download

benefit & multiply by Lindsay Starbuck
Download jpeg

We are stronger when we work together.

There are insects that damage the things we want to nurture, and others that will fight our corner. If our goal is to grow some parsley from seed, the ladybirds will feed on the aphids that try to suck the seedling dry.

We should do all we can to support those who support us. This doesn't mean just tolerating them but encouraging their continued survival, even when we find some of them scary. It's the only way we can win the war against the wanton destroyers.

Clockwise from top left: ladybird/ladybug: eats mountains of aphids; hoverfly: excellent pollinator, eats aphids, thrips and decaying matter; green lacewing: eats mites and aphids; garden spider: eats moths, wasps and flies.

Free downloadable graphics from members of the Caged Bird Club

Inspired by the artists of Justseeds offering free downloadable graphics in support of the labour movement in Wisconsin, the Caged Bird Club has decided to offer some of our own in response to what people in the UK are currently facing. You can download high-resolution A3 size versions of each of these images and use them however you want. Please share and distribute widely.

Blind People Against the Cuts by Sav Kyriacou
Download hi-res pdf

The Welfare Reform Bill is nothing but an exercise in reducing welfare payments to people with disabilities by 20%. Blind and partially sighted people will suffer like anyone else under the new proposals. A switch from Disability Living Allowance to a Personal Independence Payment will mean that many will lose any contribution towards the extra cost of living with sight loss, making them more isolated. Linking benefits to the consumer rather than retail price index will reduce the value of benefits enormously over time.

The idea came from illustrator Joe Magee, who about ten years ago was sacked by the Daily Telegraph when one of its readers pointed out that the braille symbols that he used in many of his illustrations had hidden messages, such as "this publication supports body fascism".

The braille on the poster says: "Fucked by Cameron and Clegg!"