July Round-Up | Small Press Day, MOTHER Releases, Shop Launch!
- Abs Bailey
- Aug 1
- 5 min read
Wowza, what a month! If there are two things I've taken away from July, then it's that the indie comics community is one of the best groups of people out there, and that self-publishing is punk as hell! This month...
Small Press Day 2025 🌞
Back at the start of the year, myself and Kamila (aka Pigeon) spontaneously decided we were going to run an event for Small Press Day to celebrate small press comics and the amazing cartoonists and makers in and around South Wales.
We collaborated with the legendary ArtHole CIC to host a day of talks, panels, workshops, and a marketplace, that looked a bit like this:
A massive thanks to Pigeon for being the best collaborator ever, ArtHole for being our amazing hosts, Lydia Turner for hositng our panels, Burn the Ladder for photography, Mia for being an amazing volunteer, and all of our participating artists (we couldn't have done this without you!): Archie McKenzie, R.E. Burke, Cat Lilith, Coleg Gwent Illustration, Ed Stockham, Erika Price, Joe Latham, Josh Hicks, Kai Dylan, Mereida Fajardo, Piggyhammer, Shri Gunasekara, Thunderchair, and USW Illustration.
This was my first experience running an event, ever - And I'm so glad I did. I'm eternally grateful for everyone involved for making it such a wonderful day... Watch this space for next year!
🦠🦠 New Book Alert! MOTHER Released at the LDC Online Fair 🦠🦠
MOTHER made it's digital debut at the LDC Online Comics Fair. Thanks so much to everyone who has purchased a copy. Here's some praise:
"The approach is comics confident, instead of relying on a loose inner logic justifying why this or that weird thing happened, multiple levels of real and unreal commingle in Mother because jumping around aesthetically while maintaining a mood is how comics work. Bailey runs with it." Arpad Okay for comicsbeat.com
If you missed it at the LDC Fair, no fear! It'll be out in print at MCM London, or you can grab a digital copy in my online store right now. Speaking of which...
Shop Launch!!
You can currently get*:
Comics (physical copies & digital downloads)
Stickers
Postcards, prints, and other products will be available at a later date, but I want to update my offerings with some newer work that I'm still making.
*UK shipping only for physical items at the mo, until I've figured everything out.
What I'm working on...
With SPD and MOTHER now behind me, I've been able to make a start on some new projects!
I've got some new things on the go, including writing a new graphic novel (really early days there though) and some anthology projects.
Fish Guy Gatcha Figures
I've always wanted to make gatcha-type figures, and made some for Thought Bubble last year. They went down really well and all sold out before I could do a real launch, so I'm making some more! Getting an early start this year because all that painting in one go almost did my spine in last time.
These are based on the main character from my comic 'SWIM'. The 3D model was sculpted by Josh Hicks, and printed by Jit at 3dPrintGenie.
La Belle Comic
I've started working on a new mini comic that's a queer, sci-fantasy adaptation of La Belle Dame Sans Merci by John Keats. It's very self-indulgent and mainly a bit of experimental fun, more than anything serious. I wanted to do something like this when I was a teenager (obsessed with The Smiths and Romantic period poetry, like a loser), but didn't have the skills/self awareness to pull it off back then.
I've been itching for some experimentation and have been drawing with biro on cheap paper a lot lately, like I used to at uni. There's something so tactile and free that feels missing from my practice at the moment, so I'll be returning to it here. I think I want to try riso printing too, or make them on a photocopier, but I'm still playing around there. Honestly, I'm just happy to be having fun and feeling less pressure to make mistakes! It's been nice to meet myself in the middle, with old interests and ways of making meeting my current knowledge/skill/confidence. It's been a quite cathartic experience so far.
Sketchbook
Here are some sketchbook spreads I liked from this month:
Journal Comic
Looking Back...
This is part of a comic I made for Sweaty Palms Volume 2, an anthology exploring mental health, specifically anxiety, published in 2018.
It feels like a bit like fate that I'm looking at this now: My comic here explored how creating helped with my mental health, and is probably the most vulnerable thing I've ever put out there. I often hide behind characters beccause it gives me a mask that lets me push to extremes of one element or another, often thinking 'what if I took this part of myself, and made it evil, or funny, or evil and funny'. That's not always something you can do in autobio because there needs to be a layer of honesty, but honestly often isn't funny, and requires a level of self-worth and acknowledgement I've always found hard.
That's something I've been seeking again ately - I wonder if it's anything to do with the way the world is right now, but I desperately want more tactility, realness, and vulnerability in my work again. I'd love to experiment more with mixed media work and re-integrating it into my comics practice. It doesn't leave as many places to hide, and I think exposure therapy might be good for me and my comics practice.
Anyway! Not sure where I was going there. This has been a big one! Thanks for reading if you made it this far. If there's anything you'd like me to explore further in its own post, just give me a shout!
(And check out my online store! Link in menu! I hate marketing!!!!!).
Thanks! Abs x
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