Brian Puke is the brainchild of Liam Ashley Clark, a multidisciplinary artist and illustrator based in Norfolk. The zine series showcase Liam’s quick ink drawings, taking inspiration from the D.I.Y. cultures and creators of skateboarding, punk, hip-hop, and folk scenes. Originally intended to be just a one-off, Liam has just produced his 20th edition of A5 zine which covers topics including politics, society, psychology, current events, youth culture, and more.
Liam first got into zines after discovering his favourite artists, such as Ed Templeton and Barry McGee, were making their own. This led him to come upon old punk zines and other fanzines too. In college at the time, Liam had some friends making illustration zines, so was inspired to start making his own with skate photos, printed on his parents inkjet printer.
Once he started art school Liam and his friends formed a small collective which they used to produce group zines and put out their own drawing or photo zines, sometimes for free and sometimes through zine sales they’d hold in the art school and around Norwich. “They offered a great way of collecting work together and sharing it with people,” comments the illustrator.
Towards the end of art school, in 2012, Liam made a zine of quick, funny ink drawings, which he titled Brain Puke – and the series was born. Brain Puke was initially intended to be a one-off zine, but before the year was out he’d produced More Brain Puke, and shortly after a third edition Even More Brain Puke.
These quick ink drawings, inspired by the likes of David Shrigley, Raymond Pettibon, Chris Johanson, R. Crumb and more, had always been something Liam had worked on, but never given much weight to. He tells us; “I’d shown lots of painting and some drawing work before, but, much like the zine format itself, putting these drawings to an audience enabled me to get lots of ideas out there quickly and if I wanted to I could come back to the ideas later.”
These drawings have now become the base of Liam’s practice. He states; “I consider them finished works in their own right, but they’re also sketches, sometimes they inform larger paintings, sometimes they become 3D objects, digital prints or t-shirt designs.”
The drawings are produced in his sketchbooks, which he uses to constantly keep notes and jot down ideas. Once he has enough drawings these then go on to form a new edition. The zines are still made really simply, as he did in art school, printed onto cheap, colourful sugar paper. Each zine is A5 and contains around 10-15 drawings. Liam describes; “Now I make them slightly less regularly, but the drawings will be collected throughout the year, so each edition becomes a little time capsule to my mind during that time.” Although Brain Puke is cheaply produced and sold (almost disposable in their materials), only 12-15 of each edition are made, so they are actually very limited.
Recently, Liam released the 20th edition of Brain Puke, and over the past few years has also made a few spin-off versions which have included two editions of Skate Puke’s – featuring funny ink drawings inspired by skateboarding, three Grave Puke’s – containing drawings of headstones with comedic text on, and one Strip Puke – made up of a handful of quick, ink comic strips.
Liam continues to produce the odd zine with other works, illustrations or photos, and still has a great passion for the format. And, of course, as with most other zine makers, he’s an avid collector of them as well. He conclude’s; “I can’t really see the Brain Puke’s ever fully stopping. As long as I’m still drawing quick ideas and can buy the sugar paper I like, then i’ll still put out the zine here and there.”
www.liamashleyclark.com
@liamashleyclark
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