KURT VONNEGUT SERIES
Each title features an everyday object given a dose of Vonnegutian dark humour. Slaughterhouse – an alarm clock without time (look - no hands!), suggests a wake-up call for the anti-war movement. Mother Night – the power of words when under the influence of the State (and how what you write reveals your inner truth — whether you like it or not). Breakfast of Champions offers a cereal (or serial?) that will devour you too. Slapstick celebrates the genius of physical comedy (thanks to Gary Taxali for joining in with the fun and supplying the illustration!) God Bless You Mr Rosewater has pearls before swine with a twist, and Timequake relates to Kilgore Trout’s quote about ‘his job being ‘like cleaning birdshot from cuckoo clocks’. The half cuckoo clock was inspired by Willy Wonka’s office in the Gene Wilder adaptation.
Most recent additions are Hocus Pocus and Jailbird.
The former - Smalltown America becomes, through a bizarre set of circumstances, a microcosm of the Vietnam War. The oddities of political violence and everyday life seen as an explosive ice-cream. Our model was made by the wonderful modelmaker Karen Britcliffe.
Jailbird – one of my favourite Vonneguts – asks - who is at the end of the phone at the RAMJAC Corporation? Who’s in charge? Framed around the Nixon administration years, the appropriately named Walter F. Starbuck checks in on big business/franchises the US Economy and ultimately corruption…
Coming soon… Piano Player…
The labels? I wanted to suggest Vonnegut (and his protagonists) as 'Ordinary Joes' - everyday folk, packaged and processed by the system.