Kev F comic art: I Roasted Peppa Pig

February got off to a good start with a busy schedule of Comic Art Masterclasses. In fact February 2021 is busier with classes than February 2020 was! How's about that for the green shoots of recovery? And all thanks to moving my classes online and, as we'll see in the next blog post, getting in touch with Arts Centres.

Chawton Primary in Hampshire started the month nicely, doing the year 3 & 4s in one class, the 5 & 6s in the other. As always, in my Zoom classes, they get a comic like this emailed to them. Rather than the photocopied black and white comic they takeaway from my live classes, which takes 10 minutes to produce and contains all of the strips they've drawn, this is a full colour version which I produce usually two editions of, to fit all their faces on the back. It does, however, take way longer to produce. I'd love a scanner that copied A4 pages as quickly as a sheet-feeding photocopier. Is there such a thing?

Tydd St Mary's primary school (above) illustrates another advantage of doing my classes on Zoom: the travel. This is a primary school in Wisbech in Cambridgeshire, which would have taken me five hours and an overnight stop to get to. True, Hev and I enjoy these overnight trips, and she's able to turn them into a day out while I do my schools, and we're looking forward to the return of such things. But, by golly, commuting to the back room to do the work is a hell of a lot easier. And, by the way, cheaper for the school!

Newton Ferrers primary in Devon was one of the last schools to have me in in person, pretty well a year ago, and had originally scheduled this as an in-person visit. Luckily they were happy to go with the Zoom class, and ended up with year 5 & 6 producing the most eye-catching title of the month so far (always gets a laugh when I show it to other classes).

This comic was the product of a Saturday morning class which I organised and promoted myself. A fun class, with happy children given their comic at the end. But not very many of them. I have found that, though I have the whole world as my potential audience, I am only able to reel in about a dozen pupils for my self-promoted classes (whereas a school can automatically bring a class of 30 every time).

I wonder what will happen when I do a series of classes organised, and promoted, by arts centres? (Says he, writing this after he's just finished a week of classes organised, and promoted, by arts centres, about which you can read next...)

The celebrities these 7 groups chose to appear in my demonstration strip were Harry Styles, The Queen, Billie Eilish, Ariana Grande, Boris Johnson, Joe Biden and Taylor Swift.