We have been following the career of British artist Donya Todd since her early self-publishing days and breakthrough book Death & the Girls from Blank Slate Books. Indeed she was also a contributor to our very first Broken Frontier Small Press Yearbook way back in 2016. It’s been a few years since we last saw new comics from her direction though. So her current project The Witch’s Egg from Avery Hill- now crowdfunding on Kickstarter here – marks a very exciting return to the form. We have seen an advance copy and it’s her best work to date – experimental, striking and vibrant. We caught up with Donya to chat about her big re-emergence, her artistic inspirations, and pushing your creative process…
ANDY OLIVER: The Witch’s Egg is your first big comics project for a while so let’s start by asking you to give us a little rundown of your background in comics from the self-publishing and Blank Slate days onwards?
DONYA TODD: Hello! Thank you for having me. I started making comics and zines while at Plymouth University, it was mostly an attempt to make my friends laugh and tell strange stories. These photocopy zines soon got bigger and more focused and led to comic fairs and the release of my graphic novel Death & the Girls with Blank Slate Books in 2013. This was fantastic! Still amazed to this day about it and the wonderful people who encouraged it along – publisher Kenny Penman, and my lovely partner Jack. Next came a series of self-published projects, Bimba, a comics anthology series, and a long running collaboration with the Comic Book Slumber Party with absolute babe Hannah Chapman. Ricky Miller and the gang at Avery Hill invited me to submit a pitch for a graphic novel, I was delighted and came up with Buttertubs, 2015.
So where have I been? I was enjoying being part of the small press scene until I started having quite bad anxiety attacks unfortunately. I wasn’t enjoying doing the comics fairs anymore and decided to take a break. I got my Masters in Authorial Illustration from Falmouth University. This was so much fun. I made so much new artwork and got to travel to Iceland and New York. Shortly after I got married, had our lovely baby girl, and started painting under the alias Wyrd Gallery, which alongside online teaching, sustained me all the way through Covid and lockdown.
There was a point where I had to pack in the painting, was deep in the trenches of early motherhood, and I had also stopped making much narrative work. I was feeling a bit lost about what to do next when, around this time, Avery Hill got back in touch and asked if I would I like to make a graphic novel. Longer this time and in full colour. I was so happy and excited about the prospect, and launched into writing a script. This has turned into The Witch’s Egg – a 180ish page dark fairytale that’s taken around two years to finish. I’m absolutely delighted with this book, I have worked very hard to make something that I think is quite special.
AO: Your work has always had a very distinctive indie vibe but with some specific influences. What do you count among your inspirations for your comics narratives?
TODD: For this project I’ve been heavily influenced by folk art and fairytale illustration. I’ve been looking at woodcuts of witches, devils and imps quite voraciously and can recommend that to anyone reading. I’ve also had several visits to the Boscastle Museum of Witchcraft, and have been inspired by the literary works of local witches in Cornwall. Style wise: Vasilisa the Beautiful and Baba Yaga by Alexander Afanasyev, Dame Darcy, Tincanforest, The Unicorn Tapestries, Megahex, Chagall, Bosch, Junko Mizuno, Over the Garden Wall, Leo Fox, Henry Darger.
Generally? When I was a kid I would watch Carry On movies with my grandad. Lord of the Rings, Blackadder, Beavis & Butthead and read Viz at my dad’s. There was always all sorts of fun books and stories about witchcraft, the occult and ghosts for me to read at the weekends at nan’s house. They also had a great VHS collection like The Blob, Society, Brain Damage, Trolls 2 and The X-Files. I grew up watching The Neverending Story, Labyrinth, The Dark Crystal, Tim Burton’s movies and Nightmare on Elm Street. My family fed me a rich variety of weird and wonderful stories and encouraged my love of artworking – it’s all had a huge influence on me and I’m very glad of it.
AO: The Witch’s Egg is, then, your second book from Avery Hill Publishing. Can you give us a quick overview of its premise and the cast of characters we can expect to see in its pages?
TODD: We begin with a deal with the devil, a prophecy, and the witch and the angel fall in love. This is a forbidden romance and the consequences are severe. What follows is an odyssey through a supernatural landscape, a journey into motherhood and madness and apocalyptic redemption. At the heart of it, this is a family saga and we meet lots of characters with their own dark fairytales. What can you expect to see? Witch’s conjuring, children growing, worm-kings becoming, madness devouring, love and hope and lots of colourful, poetic imagery.
AO: The one thing that immediately stuck me about The Witch’s Egg is how experimental it is visually in terms of page structure and technique. Were you actively looking to push your storytelling in new directions with this book? And given the layered craft on show here how long did the project take from start to finish?
TODD: I knew I wanted to push myself with the story, style and the artwork on this project. I wanted the illustration to feel rich, textured, experimental and for the narrative to read like a fairytale. The shape of the panels and pages themselves were very loosely thumbnailed, and from there drawn intuitively. I let it take shape as needed and adapted the script often.
I’ve mostly lost the strict grid structures I used to rely on, and let it all go. I just wanted it to be beautiful and raw and weird. I’ve gotten so much more confident in my ability to colour digitally, and it’s because I had space to breathe and paint and play (thank you for trusting me and letting me do what I wanted to Avery Hill, you are great.)
It’s been just over two years of work to get her finished. It has taken so much hard work to make such a large scale project in that time, and I’m really proud of myself! Most of the work was done late into the night, after my daughter had gone to sleep. Later on, time opened up a bit more so I could work on it a couple days a week too. It’s certainly the longest, most dedicated project I’ve ever worked on, with a toddler to look after too. I couldn’t have done it without Jack, my girl, my wonderful in-laws, family and friends who have been cheering me on, and supporting my endeavours all the way.
AO: Similarly your use of language and colour is so rich in The Witch’s Egg. Can you tell us a little about your intentions with both in evoking mood, creating atmosphere and embodying theme?
TODD: I’m glad it feels rich and moody, I used colour heavily to attempt to evoke a sense of place. I wanted it feel like a fairy kingdom far away, and also like home, but as if it was being threatened with apocalyptic doom worms. The language is witchy and poetic, it’s been directly influenced by real spells, and accounts of witches like Isobel Gowdie.
To turn into a hare Gowdie would chant:
I shall go into a hare,
With sorrow and sych and meickle care;
And I shall go in the Devil’s name,
Ay while I come home again.
Other passages came directly from spells lifted from books. For example –
“Underneath this hazelen mote, is a maggoty worm with a speckled throat” is the beginning of a spell to cure a wound made by a snake in Secrets of East Anglian Magic by Nigel Pennick. You breathe the spell onto the wound and you are cured. Isn’t that interesting?
AO: Can you give us some insights into your creative process and the mediums you worked in on The Witch’s Egg?
TODD: It started with two cannibalized characters and a simple idea – a forbidden romance which descends into chaos. It evolved rapidly into a script exploring the apocalyptic fallout between two powerful characters, motherhood through a folkloric lens, a family saga with biblical style repercussions. The script took a long time, I enjoyed researching my themes and genre and it needed rewriting several times to get it right. I read a lot of existing fairytales, gnostic texts and accounts of witchcraft to build the narrative. I drew on research and memories to pinpoint and amplify the extreme emotions that the characters experience.
The Witch cat Urfi is an exaggerated personification of naivety, recklessness (The Foolish Man in tarot) but also joy and the pure love and power of motherhood. The insect angel Urbina makes monstrous her anxiety, fed by the fear of death. Everything is entirely fictional, but the feelings simmering underneath it were real, and it was a cathartic experience to draw and write it all out of myself, like drawing poison from a wound. I think it adds a lot of depth to the story, but it also transforms it into an exploration of my own maternal mental health which was important for me to accept, uncover and work through.
Then a couple rounds of tiny thumb-nailed books on pink paper. These were okayed, and I set to work on drawing – I drew the whole thing to actual size to keep it simple, and used fineliner pens on paper. I followed the script closely to keep the story on track, but illustration wise I kept it quite intuitive and lose. You’ll see the style change and evolve chapter by chapter as I experimented with layout, composition and form. Then scanned and digitally coloured on a cintiq. This is my first time using one, and it has been marvellous to colour with. I was able to play around with digital textures and colour on a much larger scale and you can see this quality in the final pages.
AO: So much of your work in comics to date has had a fantasy or mythological basis to it. Are there any other genres or specific projects that don’t fit into those categories that you would like to tackle in the form in the future?
TODD: My research for this book could probably fill another whole book – but that is again, heavily magical and fantastical. What do your readers think? Maybe you can let me know what you’d like to see.
AO: What’s next for Donya Todd? What can we look forward to seeing from you next both in and out of comics?
TODD: I will be attending LICAF, Short Run and Thought Bubble comic festivals as a guest this year to promote The Witch’s Egg. I’m very excited for you all to read it, and come and talk to me about it.
Now that I’ve finished this massive project, I’m having a little rest and mostly gardening. At time of writing I’ve left my university job (redundancy) so will be focusing on making and selling original artworks, books and prints. I’ve got lots of ideas and will be exploring what’s next. I will definitely be making more comics and painting more paintings. I know that’s quite a vague answer, and the truth is I don’t know. It’s a hard time to be an artist. I just hope I can carry on making weird beautiful stuff for as long as possible. Cheers Andy! Donya x
Back the The Witch’s Egg Kickstarter here!
Interview by Andy Oliver
