Buy Beano stuff!

There's no Cartoon County meeting on the last Monday of this month (we brought it forward to Monday 24 January) but we'll hope to see you at the usual place on Monday 28 February: Sussex Arts Club, Ship St, Brighton, come and join us any time after 6pm. In the meantime make that diary date for the launch of Leo Baxendale's Bash St Kids show on 11 February at Hove Museum.

From the 'ComingSoon.net' website:

The Wachowski Brothers and Joel Silver, the creators and producer of the revolutionary, $1.6 billion-grossing "Matrix" trilogy, will unleash the action thriller V For Vendetta for Silver Pictures and Warner Bros. Pictures, with Natalie Portman ("Star Wars: Episodes I-III," Closer, Garden State) set to star.

"Natalie Portman is one of the most gifted actresses working today, and we're thrilled that she is bringing her extraordinary talents and presence to this film," Silver said.

Set in the futuristic landscape of totalitarian Britain, V For Vendetta stars Portman as a young woman who becomes the unlikely ally of a mysterious revolutionary.

"With 'V For Vendetta,' the Wachowski Brothers have created an uncompromising vision of the future driven by a totally original superhero," said Silver.
Continue reading "'V for Vendetta' Movie announced"

Local publisher and editor of Comics International, Dez Skinn, is seeking support and sponsorship for a cartoon/comics/games convention in Brighton for this year. This event could be fruitful for anyone wishing to participate in it, or help with it. Check out the website www.comicexpo.biz or call 01273 566 333 for details. We have become aware that the published web address doesn't work at the moment, so, for information on a related event to take place in May in Bristol, use comicexpo.net - and call the number for detail on the Brighton plans.

In 1953 the 22-year old freelance artist Leo Baxendale created Little Plum, Minnie the Minx, and The Bash Street Kids for The Beano. Fifty years later, to celebrate their anniversary, Cartoon County organized a touring exhibition of Baxendale's drawings. Minnie, Plum & Bash St UR 50! was launched at the Cartoon Study Centre, Canterbury, in August 2003, and has travelled the highways and byways from Ballymena to Hartlepool. The show is now at the Atrium Gallery, Central Library, Uxbridge, until February 7th, and will be at the Hove Museum & Art Gallery from 12th February to 10th April 2005.

Join Steve Bell, Woodrow Phoenix and other distinguished guests for a free event at the Gallery in Church Road, Hove, on Sunday 13 March at 2.30 - 4pm when we will be debating Where is Minnie the Minx today? Children's comics past and present - have we lost the Art of Subversion? A number of workshops for children and adults will take place while the show is on.

Baxendale first thought up the first Bash Street Kids while striding along Fishergate, Preston, on the afternoon of 20th October 1953, and set about drawing it that same evening. He drew 2,500 pages of his famous strip.



All the drawings in the exhibition are by Leo Baxendale - with one exception. Minnie the Minx decided to right a wrong in history by awarding a posthumous Nobel Prize to Rosalind Franklin. Baxendale asked cartoonist Jacky Fleming to make a drawing to record this historic occasion. You can check out more about Leo Baxendale by visiting www.reaper.co.uk