Q&A with Ben Heywood

Which piece in your gallery is your favorite and why?

They are all my favourites! I don't buy what I don't want. My favourites rotate through my collection as my fancy takes me. Each represents a memory or an experience: when I first saw an image that I am privileged enough now to own. some of this is from when I was a kid, other when a student, others from awesome new artists that I've only recently discovered.

Please tell us a little about yourself.

My day job is in art also (www.bellevuearts.org). My comics and illustration collecting allows me the ability to cut loose a little and apply my professional skills to a different but related field. My job is presenting art to the public; this collection is only for me.

How long have you been collecting comic art and what prompted you to start?

I've collected all my life, but the first pieces of comic art I bought was in 1989 from the original Forbidden Planet comic shop in Denmark St, London. I still have them - 2 pages of Cam Kennedy: Rogue Trooper; To The Ends Of Nu Earth - and they cost me just 40 pounds.

How do you display/store your collection at home?

Some pieces are framed, and displayed carefully away from natural light. The others are in file folders. I also have a sliding wall that allows me to rotate pieces of my collection on display using magnetic clamps. It's a great system, and allows me to admire pieces that might otherwise be hidden away; even display entire stories.

What are your top five most wanted original pages or commissions?

I'd like something by Brendan McCarthy from 2000AD, and a fully painted piece by Chris Foss. One of Oli Frey's 'Into The Unknown' DPS from Look & Learn would be high on the list. Friends know that there is particular David Pugh page that I would move heaven and earth for (it's with a collector in Australia), and an acquaintance owns a complete episode of Flesh Book 2 that I would drop everything to acquire. A Liberatore piece would be high on the list, and more Magnus, Talbot or Hanselmann is always good.