Been a while since I posted anything here - lots of new work's been going up on my website but I'm trying to get back into the swing of posting other stuff up here - sketchbook things, personal work and experiments, drawings, work in progress and so on.  So here's a portrait of the legendary Zimbabwean musician Thomas Mapfumo.  It's a preliminary drawing for a self-initiated project about Zimbabwean music that I'm starting at the moment; I've loved Zimbabwean music for a very long time (mainly Jit and Sungura styles) but I'm into it more than ever right now - discovered some old gems recently, it's been going down very well in my DJ sets and the country as a whole is not in a good state these days and as such it's perceived in a particularly negative light (a Google Images search of the name for some research is a depressing case in point).  So I'm going to redress that in whatever small way I can, and celebrate an aspect of the country's culture that has brought me immense joy.  Plus it's a good excuse to draw another map (finalising a nice map commission as we speak...).  And some guitars.  Hurrah.

Aside from Mr.Mapfumo I would also recommend listening to the amazing Oliver Mtukudzi (who turns sixty this month), Four Brothers, Nyami Nyami Sounds, James Chimombe and John Chibadura.

Ahhh, May - what a fine time of year. Especially here in Brighton, as the May Festival gets going and the whole town springs into action. A real highlight of the festival has been Jardin Flambeau, a massive event/installation by these clever French dudes. They completely took over St.Anne's Well Gardens, probably our finest park, and completely filled it with all manner of enchanting pockets of firey wonder. Far from the ... spectacular many were expecting, it was the cumulative effect of hundreds of small-scale pockets of fire, in all manner of shapes, positions and configurations that instead generated a wonderfully calm, relaxed and mesmerising atmosphere. Countless flowerpots of fire rose hypnotically up into the canopies of trees, vest-enclosed candles hung ghost-like from the branches, and gazebos dotted around the park housed curious pockets of eery live music. Very refreshing too was the lack of health and safety - exposed fire everywhere and thousands of people (and on Saturday night!)

Caught some ace live music so far too, namely the great Max Romeo alongside Lee Perry and Adrian Sherwood, Shapeshifter, a lovely recital of Boccherini, Locatelli, Telemann and Bach, and even managed to catch the man like Snoop Dogg at his 'secret' gig at the Dome! Hilarious.

Bit slow to mention this but once again I'm back in one of the best Open Houses around for the festival - the lovely Claremont on Second Avenue in Hove. One more weekend left (it's not open on Sunday but is on Monday), so if you're in the area go and check it out to see a whole heap of cracking artwork.

I've finally finished the biggest project I've worked on yet - very satisfying to get it all wrapped up after many months! Working with interior designer Nicola Gobat, I produced artwork for seven large and four small sections of walls, along with 5 large glass manifestation sections, for the sumptuous new offices of DC Storm here in Brighton. Painting directly onto the walls (which made a highly refreshing change!), I portrayed various scenes of Brighton and the surrounding area in a continuous panorama going around the entire office. A huge job and quite a challenge but a real joy to do. Gotta sort out photos of it all - I'll be sure to post once I do....

Couple of other new bits up there too - the first of a series of album covers for Dubmission Records, my entry for the recent AOI/Serco River Thames illustration competition and some artwork for my latest mix, which you can listen to here:

http://www.mixcloud.com/kokerboom/africa-maximum-vol1/