What a great idea. I quickly responded that I'd love to take part, and sent in a few ideas, which a number of scientist then responded to with their views on whether they would work or not. They wouldn't, but when has a small detail like that put me off. I set to illustrating it anyway :o)
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| Cover Art by Mark Wilkinson. |
The comic was launched at this year's Thought Bubble event, appropriately, in Leeds where I managed to meet up with James himself and collect a copy (or two). It's a free comic and the guys on the stall were busy handing them out all day.
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| Me and James McKay at Thought Bubble 2013. |
I'm really happy to be part of what is a great little book, and even better my pages have been selected to appear in the Cartoon Museum exhibition called ‘Saving Tomorrow’ which runs from the 3rd Jan to the 1st June 2014.
I'll be doing my best to pop down there... with my camera :o) It's a shame my two pages are on such scrappy paper... oh well... I wasn't to know.
Here's a press release of the project...
University of Leeds Press Release
Novel vision of the future
Penguins wearing reflective hats and cars that run
on tomato ketchup are among the highlights of a new graphic novel published by
the University of Leeds’ Centre in Low Carbon Technologies.
More than 370 schoolchildren from Yorkshire, 40
Engineering PhD researchers at the University and 20 artists contributed to the
96-page cartoon book, titled Dreams of a low carbon future.
The project was led by Professor Paul Williams,
Director of the Doctoral Training Centre in Low Carbon Technologies, and
supported by the Royal Academy of Engineering as part of its Ingenious scheme,
which aims to foster creative public engagement with engineering.
James McKay, who works in the Centre in Low Carbon
Technologies and managed the project, said: “The aim of the project was to work
with young people in schools and other groups and to think about how current
environmental issues and the challenges they pose might affect the future of
the Earth and its inhabitants.”
McKay is also a comic artist, with art published in
magazines including 2000AD, and contributed his own work to the project. Six
professional artists took part.
Dreams of a low carbon future
mixes the young people’s original ideas and art with work by professionals. In
parts of the book, characters invented by the children are taken up by the
professionals in their strips and in other sections the children’s own drawings
are featured. The result is a highly polished and engaging comic narrative
expressing the ideas of young people about the world of the future.
“Scientists in universities like ours are
constantly trying to understand the future, working out what that might be, and
how we can change it, but this is an attempt to visualise that future through
the eyes of younger people. It is made up of stories that stand alone, but they
also fit together to build a bigger story,” McKay said.
As well as producing a gripping book, the project
has resulted in a comprehensive set of activities to encourage young people to
think about the environment, sustainability and alternative ways of living on
the planet.
Five thousand copies have been printed, and will be
distributed for free at the London Cartoon Museum, specialist cartoon shops in
Leeds and London, and at the 2014 Leeds Festival of Science.
The King James School in Knaresborough, Mirfield
Grammar School, Wakefield City Academy, The Nicholas Hawksmoor Primary School
in Towcester, and schools in Skipton, Barnsley and east Leeds took part in the
project. Girl Guides in the north of
Leeds also contributed and activities were held at Leeds City Museum.
