yellow-submazine

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Interanimate (Shopping at Indica), 2023

A drawing made by @the-paper-apricot and digitally manipulated, for the unfinished Yellow Submazine.

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Incidental Illustrations: George's boots

A drawing of the hand-me-down boots, made last year by @the-paper-apricot for our unfinished zine.

"Yeah, you get 'em off me!"

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Field-boxing

A short story

@the-paper-apricot wrote a short story last year for our unfinished zine, and if you'd like to read it, it's now up on Ao3.

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Ringo linocut

A linoprint of Ringo, made by @the-paper-apricot and based on the drawing in our masthead, was another illustration intended for the zine. The masthead can be seen in our blog header.

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Field-boxing

A short story

@the-paper-apricot wrote a short story last year for our unfinished zine, and if you'd like to read it, it's now up on Ao3.

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Find the patterns to make your own John Lennon paper doll here.

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John Lennon Paper Doll (patterns)

We intended to print these patterns in the paper zine so that anyone who wanted to make their own John Lennon paper doll could photocopy them onto card, to cut them out and colour them in.

Instead here are the printables for you. They should ideally be printed onto A4 lightweight/medium weight card so that it can stand.

If you do take part and make your own John Lennon paper doll, please share a pic and tag us is, so we can reblog!

We're sharing these templates under the Creative Commons Attribution, Non-commercial, Non-derivative licence: https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ (this means you have permission to use the templates to make your own doll, but not for commercial purposes.)

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John Lennon paper doll - Double Denim

Our paper doll of John Lennon wearing a tab-on version of the double denim outfit he wore when he sang 'Yer Blues' for the Rolling Stones Rock 'n' Roll Circus in 1968.

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John Lennon paper doll - Fur Coat

Our paper doll of John Lennon wearing a tab-on version of the fur coat he wore to the launch of Apple Tailoring in 1968.

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John Lennon paper doll - White Suit

Our paper doll of John Lennon wearing a tab-on version of the white suit and white tie that he wore to New York in May 1968.

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John Lennon paper doll - Tutu Costume

Our paper doll of John Lennon wearing a tab-on version of his costume from the Rolling Stones Rock 'n' Roll Circus in 1968.

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John Lennon paper doll - White Henley

Our paper doll of John Lennon wearing no tab-on outfit, just a white henley and trousers in 1968.

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John Lennon Paper Doll (part 1)

One of the larger projects @the-paper-apricot worked on for the zine was a paper doll of John. We planned to include photos of the finished doll, and a printable pattern so you could make your own! (We’ll upload the printable version soon). We chatted a lot about the artistic merit of the project, and we planned to include a short essay on the ideas we discussed.

That essay was never written, but here are the main points we wanted to include:

Cutting out and dressing paper dolls is traditionally seen as an activity for girls. As such they are treated as frivolous and lacking substance. There is an interesting interplay between this and the idea that the Beatles were discovered by, and beloved of, young girls before they were ever taken seriously by adult men (this is hyperbole, but you know what we mean)

An early title for the White Album was A Doll’s House (mentioned by Ian MacDonald in Revolution in the Head), inspired by the Ibsen play of the same name. In the play Nora tells her husband: “And you have always been so kind to me. But our home has been nothing but a playroom. I have been your doll-wife, just as at home I was papa’s doll-child; and here the children have been my dolls.” Perhaps the Beatles felt that they had been someone’s playthings.

Andy Warhol played with paper dolls, a fact which we thought added something to the discussion about gender. From an interview with Glenn O’Brien in 1977: GLENN O’BRIEN: What was your first work of art? ANDY WARHOL: I used to cut out paper dolls.

John was interested in his own relationship with gender. "I look at early pictures of meself, and I was torn between being Marlon Brando and being the sensitive poet - the Oscar Wilde part of me with the velvet, feminine side. I was always torn between the two, mainly opting for the macho side, because if you showed the other side, you were dead." John Lennon - 'The Last Rolling Stone Interview' By Jonathan Cott, Rolling Stone Magazine 1980

Tony Bramwell referred to Brian Epstein's home as "that little doll’s house" in his book, although that view wasn't necessarily shared by any of the Beatles.

We were going to make a comparison with the sleeve artwork for Sgt. Pepper, and especially with the insert sheet of cardboard cut-outs that came with it. See https://www.the-paulmccartney-project.com/1967/03/designing-the-packaging-for-sgt-peppers-lonely-hearts-club-band/  for more on the cover and cut-outs

The idea that the stand-up cut-outs of the band should help the fans take part in the project of Sgt. Pepper as an art ‘event’ seemed especially pertinent.

@the-paper-apricot began work on this doll last spring, shortly after beginning her paper doll pop project. 

In part 2 we'll share some photos of the finished doll, and part 3 will include a paper doll of John and patterns of his outfits that you can print and cut out! ✂️

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Coming Soon

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Incidental Illustrations: George

These were made by @the-paper-apricot for the zine. Each is a stylised drawing made in three minutes, with charcoal and a wet brush.

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Incidental Illustrations: George

These were made by @the-paper-apricot for the zine. Each is a stylised drawing made in three minutes, with charcoal and a wet brush.

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Give Some Regard to Broad Street

Paul McCartney's 1984 film Give My Regards to Broad Street received mixed reviews, and its reputation has only gone downhill from there.

In this essay (available on ao3) @i-am-the-oyster hopes to convince you that this film is actually very poignant, and worth a deeper look.

The image above is an illustration by @the-paper-apricot of Paul's hawaiian shirt, which features prominently in the movie.

We both would have liked to name the essay That's It, You're Finished (What are you going to do now?). But that name would only make sense if you already know the movie well, or have read the essay.