what to draw (Patreon)
Content
hey hey, i am trying to work out what to draw for my monthly thing for Overland. last time i did that 'Right Wing Queensland?' piece, which u can zoom in on from here, if the text was too small in the last version i sent out: https://overland.org.au/2021/06/right-wing-queensland-a-self-fulfilling-prophecy/
below theres 5 options for what cld be made, i'll do the one that gets the most votes. also anyone that votes will go into the draw to win a big cloth banner print of the above drawing, i will randomly choose the person who gets it at the start of next month.
1: I am obsessed with this friendly smooth corporate style of illustration that makes up probably fully three quarters of all drawings that u see day-to-day. its called ‘Alegria’ or ‘Corporate Memphis’. Even tho it has all character sheared away from it so as to be as benign and inoffensive as possible, i feel like it’s quite creepy........ I hadn’t rly noticed the dominance of the style til my bf pointed it out a couple of years ago on some real estate billboard. then as we continued walking down the street we saw the same style of drawing two more times lol. I was thinking it cld be fun to draw a comic where some characters that are drawn in a more punky or scrappy style come across these smooth bodded ppl, in the same landscape, maybe they attack them.they cld try and see whats under the skin?? Not sure if i’d do it as something along the lines of “they say communism kills creativity then why does almost every drawing under capitalism look the same” or make it a bit more broad and absurd.....
2: I rly like this quote from Mary Ann Evans, an english writer from the 1800s who wrote under the name George Eliot:
“The growing good of the world is partly dependent on unhistoric acts;
and that things are not so ill with you and me as they might have been,
is half owing to the number who lived faithfully a hidden life,
and rest in unvisited tombs”
was thinking it cld be nice to draw this up as an ode to ordinary-ass ppl and the billions of tiny unremarkable everyday decisions and actions that push us forward, in spite of how selfish the systems we live under encourage us to be
3: for a while now i’ve been meaning to make a street poster that kinda beats the drum for safe injecting rooms, they were about to build one on my street until some dickhead nimbys arked up, and it’s been annoying to watch the north richmond safe injecting room relentlessly cop shit ever since it was built. I read that the richmond one stopped at least 21 deaths in its first 18 months and stopped over 270 “extremely serious overdose incidents”. we all know ppl who wld still be alive if these things were dotted around the city but the conservative press always beat up on them and fuck things up. i wld try to make the poster something kinda evergreen as a celebration of safe injecting rooms and harm minimisation, n particularly design it to be stuck up in the streets.
4: the 'star of the south' would be australia's first offshore wind project, built 40kms off the south coast of Gippsland in Victoria (not far from where a fire raged for *45 days* at a coal mine in 2014, which included coal underneath the earth catching fire!!!!!). the offshore wind farm wld power 20% of the state and create thousands of jobs as part of a just transition for the region. it has funding secured, along with the support of Indigenous communities, environmental groups, trade unions, the state govt and is ready to get going - but planning approval is being intentionally held up by the federal government.
i guess a drawing on this topic wld be a general celebration of the idea of our first futuristic offshore wind farm, maybe in a postcard style, and a calling to attention of the govt holding it up for what is surely just straight up coal-glomphing reasons. is there any point blaming this govt for anything when they are covered completely in teflon and lube, who knows
5: staff at two popular bookstores in sydney and melbourne are trying to unionise with the Retail and Fast Food Workers Union, and their bosses are behaving appallingly as a result. there have been mandatory one on one meetings with the boss, threatened sackings and even the threat of defamation lawsuits as a result of publicly discussing the desire to unionise. both groups of workers are attempting to get agreements in place with management, something that has never gotten up at any bookshop in australia outside of universities so it's a pretty big deal. i wanna draw something about how readers and authors shld support this organising effort. both bookshops masquerade as progressive, as like central parts of their branding, so the bosses are guaranteed to fkn hate anything that draws attention to their attempts to stamp out their workers efforts to collectivise. i may cheat and vote for this option myself but obvs im happy to draw any of the above.
thanks heaps!