There's a Shoggoth under the Bed

Today a friend put out a 'casting call' for someone to illustrate a story he had written for Neil Gaiman's 'All Hallows Read' project.

I loved his story so much I got on it immediately, and this is what I came up with in about 25 minutes (If it was a professional commission I would have used ink and/or shaded smoother, but it was just a bit of fun).

There’s A Shoggoth under the Bed

“Mummmmm! There’s a Shoggoth under the bed!”

“Nonsense dear there is no such thing as Shoggoths”

“There IS and it’s all gooey and bubbly and covered in eyes!”

“Go to sleep dear there really is no Shoggoth under the bed.”

“Daaaaad! There IS a Shoggoth under the bed!”

“Come along now, let me have a look… see? Nothing there but your old bunny slippers.”

“But there IS a Shoggoth under the bed and it has fangs and snakey, slimy tentacles ALL over it!”

“Let me put the night light on and go to sleep, there is definitely not a Shoggoth under the bed.”

“MUUUUM! DAAAAAAD! THERE IS a Shoggoth under the bed and it’s HUNGRY!”

“Oh darling it’s fine look we will leave the door open and the light on….. there really is no Shoggoth under the bed and now it is our own bedtime. Goodnight.”

……..and then there was a squishing and sloshing, an awful crunching,munching and a flapping and flopping from his parent’s room and then….. then there was silence …

And Billy said

“I never said it was under MY bed!”

Story by Robin Stephenson

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Neil Gaiman explains 'All Hallows Read' here:

And if you're looking for a scary book to give someone, I'd recommend Lisa Richardson's fantastic Zombie Apocalypse novel 'Blog of the Dead - Sophie', which is available for kindle for just £1.91 at the moment.

Funnily enough, also illustrated by Yours Truly!

People whose work I admire: 1. Tara McPherson

People whose work I admire: 1 Tara McPherson



I had completely forgotten about the work of Tara McPherson until I was tidying up my book shelves the other day and found my copy of Lost Constellations (the link is to forbidden planet's store - an awesome shop and the cheapest I can find it on line). The picture above is 'Hey, We All Die Sometimes' and features in Lost Constellations.

I was completely unaware of her work, until one day when I was scratching my inner nerd's itch at Playlounge just off Carnaby Street  (Go - they have moomins and tokidoki and Liberty, Drop Dead and It's Something Hell's are just around the corner) and came across the above book. It's AWESOME.

She's a US based artist who draws wonderful, dreamy, ethereal, kooky, Rock 'n Roll characters in surreal, fairytale worlds using a limited palette of colours (usually teally blues, dusky pinks and reds and black). I wouldn't say that her work directly inspires or influences mine in any way, but it's definitely an aesthetic to aspire to.

When I had my finger mo tattooed a couple of years back, I used her 'Lucius' character from a Melvins poster she'd designed as the flyer image to get sponsorship for Movember.

Terrible picture. Let's move on.

It's hard to pick out the best pieces of work from her portfolio, because I love them all - she's one of those rare artists who never seems to do a bad piece of artwork. For the sake of you, the reader, I'll have a go and say that this unicorn seahorse girl for a Shonen Knife album cover is one of my favourite characters.

'Laughing Through the Chaos of it All' features Mr Wiggles (the balloon) another cute character who pops up quite often in Tara's work.

I adore this Isis gig poster, and have a copy of it on my 'Wall of Pirate' (I'll blog about THAT some other time). I really love the resurgence of one-off screen printed poster designs for individual gig dates that seem to be 'en-vogue' on the Indie Rock scene at the moment. To see the archive of Tara's posters click here.

Her 'How to Heal a Broken Heart' comic strip (click on them to see larger images)

More recent works include:

This beautiful Indian influenced piece 'Safety of Water'

'Searching for Penguins'

And of course 'The Umibozu Wish' - because I have a fondness for small, black cute things with big eyes!

Oh, and whilst at Art College, she interned at Rough Draft Studios working on my favourite cartoon ever: Futurama. Respect!



Tara McPherson's website is here



The art boutique she owns 'The Cotton Candy Machine' webstore is here

The gig posters are screen printed by Diesel Fuel Prints  and their website is here