Another year, another Thought Bubble, though this time the event has moved to the Northern spa town of Harrogate. Convenient for me as I used to live there and know it well, but a bit less direct for many coming from further afield. So just how did the event cope with the change in venue and all that comes with it?
A new venue
The Harrogate Exhibition Centre is a terrific venue with a great team, and with the town being fairly compact, everything was in easy reach whether it be bus or train station, nearby eateries or cash machines. All day parking was £11 for me, a lot less than Leeds which tops £20 for the same courtesy, and I was able to park pretty much over the road. The three main halls were all nicely laid out, and despite the number of people milling around, it never felt overly crowded.
Previous events have seen tents erected across main streets in the centre of Leeds, so the more compact layout was a lot easier to navigate. Every hall had a good mixture of independent publications and more mainstream artists, providing a draw in every room whatever your tastes.
Meeting the artists - highlights and purchases
The first table I ventured across belonged to John McCrea, an artist who has worked for all the major studios and best known for his work on The Boys, though his connected covers for the latest Death's Head series (reviewed here) were what caught my eye. It's ot the first time I've met John, but it was the first time I dropped £140 on his artwork - the beguiling Spider-Woman cover was simply too gorgeous to pass up, so home it came with me. He's a lovely guy, and I was very happy to have caught him before the show was busy so we could chat.
James discussing comics with artist Lauren Livesey
I also happened across the table for the Image-published Crowded, a phenomenal book with art by Ro Stein and Ted Bhandt, both of which were on hand to sign a copy of the trade book. Tackling a future where assassinations are handled via apps and crowdfunding, the book is darkly comic and beautifully rendered. It's one of my favourite reads of 2019 and I'd urge anyone to grab this one as soon as possible.
Nathan Stockman, genial Irish artist for Spider-Man: Renew Your Vows, was good enough to get into a competition with Nick Roche over a Spider-Girl (Annie May) commission he did for me last year - not one to let his fellow Irishman get the better of him, and having seen Nick's work (proudly displayed on the About the Author page on this very site) he provided a full-length commission for the price of a torso, and in every sense I was the winner! You can see his work in the gallery below.
The other seasoned veteran I made a beeline for was Marc Deering, who has worked for just about everyone. I picked up a stunning Batgirl piece for the ever-growing original artwork portfolio I've been working on for the last 4 years. Marc himself was a really cool guy, and you can see more of his work on Inking is Sexy.
Imber is a mainstay at Thought Bubble, and his style is just sublime. He'd be very much at home with Udon, but prefers his Indie projects. I can highly recommend his Boom! series care of Reckless Hero studios, and he provided me with some original artwork as well as a commission of Juri and Ibuki, which will compliment my Pop Culture Shock statues nicely.
French artist Bengal was also at the show, and having spent a lot of cash on commissions the previous 2 years (both available to view here), I was happy to catch up and buy a signed artbook on this occasion. It was a genuine treat to watch him geek out about Overwatch with UKA's James Taylor, and while I couldn't really follow the lingo, the enthusiasm was infectious.
One of my favourite pick-ups this year was Being Ginger by Katherine Hemmings. Brought to life via Kickstarter, the book has delightful artwork, genuinely funny humour and particularly relevant to me given that Bryony is a redhead. I was even given some awesome free stickers, which will make for a fun stocking filler next month. If there's a ginger person in your life, why not treat them too? Check out Katherine's website here.
I was delighted to meet Sweeney Boo, who's curvaceous style has been a big hit on Kickstarter too - she's now working on Ms Marvel! I managed to bag the very last artbook, Don't Ask,(kept missing her through the day) and it was everything I hoped for - from sketches to examinations of form, it's a lovely piece of work. Track her latest projects on her website.
The Final Lullaby and Superfriday by Fefe S
I also met Fefe S and picked up a copy of her latest book entitled The Final Lullaby (Walpurgis Night). There's a lot of attention paid to detail here, with beautiful tone work adding a lot of depth, and the unusual touch of adding splashes of colour to magical artefacts and spells. It's very striking visually, and the manga-inspired style and female cast puts me in mind of Laura Watton's work, who I admired in the 90's.I also snagged 3 issues of her Superfriday books, earlier works which really showcase her progression as an artist, with increasingly dynamic panels and layouts. You can follow her on twitter @fefetea and browse Fefe S' work on the official website.
Lastly, I picked up a full run of The Show by McPherson, Velazquez and F.P Sioc Jr, a Truman Show-esque comic with a much darker tone. Art is very expressive, with thick lines and beautiful colours. The extreme violence might not be to everyone's taste, but it's an excellent example of indie-comics covering disturbing themes unhindered by large publisher remits.
Overall thoughts and the after-party
So Dan and I ambled around with James, Charlie and Sophie taking it all in. I've only discussed my own purchases, many more were made by the others but they can go through those on the UK Anime Network and other venues. I enjoyed the day and found the concentrated venue on par with the Leeds Armouries of previous years. Having everything in one area certainly made things more cohesive, and Harrogate has no shortage of fantastic eating places (Dan and I tried out Wagyu in the evening - very tasty!). I'll be interested to see if Thought Bubble returns to the spa town next year, but my chats with some of the crew indicated that the staff at the Exhibition Centre had been exemplary, and that's always good to hear.
We did stop by at the after-party, but only had an hour to chat with the few people we recognised - sadly it seemed to be getting busier as we left, but it was good to see that Thought Bubble was catering for its guests - maybe next year we'll arrange to stay longer (not always easy when you have a 4-week-old baby to get back to!)
Until next year then, and as a great man once said - Excelsior!
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