Justin Quirk’s new Yellowman project has us looking twice at the graphic novel sector

It’s been an age since anything from the world of comics has hit our radar (aside from the unrelenting throng of “summer blockbusters”). We can’t say we’ve minded the radio silence. But it has recently come to our attention that we might have been a little brash…

That’s right: UJ is doing comics. Well, sort of.

It all started when we heard that the lovely-if-intimidatingly-smart Justin Quirk (writer/editor at HOUSE, Esquire, The Guardian, etc.), and Warren Holder (concept artist for Tim Burton’s Alice in Wonderland) were working on a graphic novel. Talk about a creative partnership! And almost a year later, here it is: part From Hell, part The Master and Margarita, part Victorian romp, Yellowman is a slick new mystery-thriller mini-series, served up in an anonymous black envelope revealing a sexy spot-varnished cover, 30-odd pages of absorbing line work, cinematic thrills, subversive tongue-in-cheek – and not a cape in sight (well, excluding the odd historically-correct Victorian gentleman’s cape).

The next problem, however, was where to get hold of a copy. I mean can you really see us in Forbidden Planet? Quite.

It’s handy, then, that Mr Quirk is stocking at the cosy new Gosh! store, just around the corner on Berwick Street, down from The Box. More Design Museum and Magma than dusty Camden Town geekery, it’s all glass walls and open plan shelving, design- and lit-led graphic novels, retro European reprints and subversive children’s tales (with the superheroes stashed safely in the basement).

Et voila: UJ and comics. Who’d a thunk? Pray what other long-lamented social faux pas is next: Glam Rock? Pottery classes? Speed knitting? Perhaps, but at least we’ll have something interesting to read while we’re at it…

Info
Yellowman is out now, £10.
Available at Gosh!, 1 Berwick St, W1F 0DR

London Design Festival

It seems like when it comes to public art these days bigger really is better – think Urs Fischer’s Untitled Lamp/Bear on Park Ave in NY or Anish Kapoor’s Leviathan in Paris. Now London has established itself on the huge-public-artwork map with REDDRESS, a colossal crimson robe standing 3 metres high and using 550 metres of Kvadrat’s Divina fabric. As part of this year’s LDF, the dress is meant to challenge perceptions as participant and performer. This it certainly does – dance away on the pleats or wrap yourself up in the vermillion folds while listening to the Britten Sinfonia. Dress code: red, obviously.

Check here for specific events.
York Hall, Bethnal Green, E2 9PJ
Until 25 September.

SHOP – Raw Dice’s Pop-up, with quirky design one-offs. Butlers House, 49-51 Curtain Road (Entrance in Luke Street), EC2A 3PT.

DRINK – Italian Gaja wine at Orrery’s tasting session this Thursday. 55 Marylebone High Street, Marylebone, W1U 5RB.

VIEW – British-ish, Giles Deacon’s pick of new design talent at the V&A. Galleries 118-125, Cromwell Road, SW7 2RL.

SEE – Lee Broom’s new 1930s monochrome ‘Salon’ Collection. 93 Rivington Street, Shoreditch, EC2A 3AY.