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Tripping Over Myself #3 by Joel Meadows – Dave McKean

Published Sat, 15 May 2010 08:00:07 -0500

We've always been interested in people whose career crosses over from one industry to other connected industries and Dave McKean certainly falls into that category. He started life drawing graphic novel Violent Cases, then became cover artist on DC's Hellblazer and then moved onto one of its best-regarded series, Sandman. The simple fact is that mainstream comic covers had never looked like that before his run on Hellblazer. But his career since then is almost more interesting: he has designed posters for plays, album covers for bands, plays jazz and directs films plus he even dabbles in photography. Surely the term renaissance man must have been coined for McKean?

We were lucky enough to go down and see him at his studio down in Kent. For interviews, it's hard to beat seeing people where they work because their workspace is filled with the kind of things that make it conducive for them to produce their best work. McKean's place is located pretty out of the way in a converted oasthouse but the beauty of the surroundings makes it easy to see why this brings out the best in him as an artist and a creator. He has such a great eye for composition with different elements complimenting each other in whatever he creates that there is no-one else like him currently working in the creative industries.

We talked about his artistic training, working on Sandman and Hellblazer plus typography, switching from film to digital photography and much more. He is a man who gives a great deal of thought to everything he does and has created his own niche across the various areas he has made his home. He is exactly the sort of figure that TRIPWIRE has always covered and shall continue to cover. Everything intersects and while comics is at our centre, it is those areas that fascinate us that are connected to comics, whether that's illustration, fine art, graphic design, prose or movies. Diversity is a big part of what we are about and it's exciting to be able to include McKean in an issue that also features the history of Weta, a look back at Iron Man 2, Michael Moorcock and author Glen David Gold, to name but a few.

Joel Meadows is editor-in-chief of TRIPWIRE, a British magazine focused on graphic novels, TV, film and genre. He is an experienced journalist who has written about Film, TV, animation and genre for publications including Empire, Variety, Death Ray, SFX, Sci Fi Now, The Times, Time Magazine, the Independent on Sunday and The Guardian. He has written Studio Space, a book on 20 of the world's best comic artists published by Image Comics. He has also worked as a sub editor and copy editor on publications like The Times, Evening Standard, NME, Total Film, The Observer and Time Magazine. He is a lifelong resident of London.