Finally, the first post of 2017 on my tumblr!
I’m sorry for the lack of updates for the past year and a half. In between life and making art, it has been a pretty hectic time in my life and also a time of great change.
Anyway! Here I am jumping back in the saddle again! So, a quick update:
I made a new self-published one-shot original slice-of-life comic in the middle of 2016 named ‘Pointes De Contrôle’. I was going through some stuff that I processed by making this comic (and on a pretty tight self-imposed deadline), and this time around I didn’t want to make it autobiographical like other comics I’ve done before, so Pointes was born.
Why the French title? It’s kind of loosely tied to something in the story, but it basically means ‘Checkpoints’. (One of the people who browsed the book and knew French told me that I could have just gone with ‘Pointes Contrôle’. That’ll teach me for using Google Translate to help with a book title!)
A few months after that I got to work on my first paid commercial project, which was to draw a comic for an anthology by Grab (a ride-sharing service app), published by Maple Comics.
The premise for this book was to pair artists with true stories shared by people who used Grab’s services and turn them into comics. I am truly grateful to Amir from Maple Comics for this opportunity, and for the chance to be in this book with other great local comic artists! It’s also thanks to this book that I got to draw on an actual car for the first time in my life, as part of this book’s tie-in promotion at Comic Fiesta 2016! If you’d like to grab (hurhur) this book, you may order it from their official website!
And now we’ve reached 2017. I’ve yet to put out anything new, but I’m working on a longer story which will hopefully be out later this year.
There’s a piece of good news though: I’ve been accepted to be part of this year’s Comic Art Workshop that’ll be taking place in Jogjakarta at the end of October!
I honestly didn’t think I would get in (especially since I did apply for their first residency in 2015 and only got to the shortlist), but after some encouragement from loved ones, I decided to try again and-...! I’m elated and excited to meet new and talented people...but currently I’m still frantically working on the aforementioned long-form story, trying to finish it as soon as I can while working on the project I’ll be bringing to this residency. Exciting times!
So, yeah, that’s about it for me, art-wise. Comic Art Festival Kuala Lumpur is coming up next weekend, but for the first time since they started 3 years ago I won’t be boothing because of deadlines. I’ll still be visiting the event on both days though!
However, I’ll be up and about for the first 2 weekends in October at 2 different events in 2 countries. I’ll definitely be updating about them real soon, with previews and other stuff that I’ve yet to share!
Thank you for reading this far, and till the next update, be well and stay cool!