The latest issue of Blueprint Magazine is on stands in the Waterloo Region and online as always as well! The theme of this January issue is “Love”. The Beholder strip for this issue at first seemed difficult to come to–but then I remembered all the mermaid motifs I focused on as an artist during university. My use of the mermaid as a fantastical creature was the opposite of that created in popular media. My mermaid was a seductress, she was evil, purely a creature motivated by her lust to procreate with human men… violently. That resolved the direction and this was the first strip done with much breathing room before the deadline!

I also got to feature a bit of the Iberian culture from the World of Hellmouth. They are a culture of fisherman, explorers, simple folk really. The culture also represents a strong pirate nation that makes a fortune with the slave trade. I imagined a lone young man who dreamed of a more simple life where he could find a dream at sea to take him away from the pressures of his society. Poor bastard.