Hurry Up Ow Press

09/12/2025

OHU, a crazy quest across the Waikato of a different dimension, with a unique and quirky gang of characters. This colourful graphic novel is a fun gift, now $40 +p&p, message us to get your copy.

23/11/2025

HO HO HO >>> PRICE CUT IN TIME FOR CHRISTMAS !!!!
Give the gift of local creativity, or new mythologies of the Waikato, or smartly gross humour, or cool comix, or the memory of our crazy pal, or all of the above!

Dean Ballinger Anthology, double ended volume featuring The Art of The Puster and The Tower >> now $60 (was $75).

OHU graphic novel >> now $40 (was $55).

Or both books >> now $90 (was $110).
Postage and Packaging $10.80 for up to two books.

Order them via the links at booksbydeanballinger.nz/ or DM or email [email protected].

04/11/2025

Happy birthday Dean...

Have been in the back bar of what is now called Biddy Mulligans a few times in recent weeks, always recalling how the Mobile Stud Unit were the first band to ever play that space, when the venue rejoiced in the name of Diggers.

Here is Dean Ballinger performing that night, my personal favourite MSU gig. Today would have been Dean's 52nd birthday.

24/10/2025

HEY TAURANGA! We're at the Tauranga Zinefest 2025 right now, come and get your Dean books, zines and badges.

30/08/2025

Today marks the 3rd anniversary of our friend Dean's passing.

My mind has been much on a recent obituary I wrote, that of John Winslade, an academic and narrative therapist who challenged traditional grief models that demand we say some sort of permanent "goodbye" to those we loved who have died.

Winslade knew, as many of us do, that human psychology doesn't work like that. Family and friends of significance in our lives sustain a presence long after their physical demise. With someone as special as Dean, his wit, his intelligence, his insights and pithy remarks, his art, his poetry, his music, all leave much more than a trace behind. Barely a week goes by that I don't think of him and I'm certain that that is true for a great many others, not least his wife and sons, whose loss can be but imagined.

Here's a photograph that I am struggling to accurately date. It looks like it was taken at one of the 164 Cambridge Rd Guy Fawkes parties (1997-2005) but efforts to confirm as much through an examination of age and apparel have proven inconclusive.

Perhaps it is not a great one of any of us. It's significance - for me, at least - lies in the fact that a portion of former flat mats are grouped together. Missing are Richard Campbell, Huw O'Connor and Dan Looker, amongst others but here are some of the folk who lived on Cambridge Rd in the late 1990s and early 2000s: Simon Campbell, Dannii Vallely, yours truly, Dean Ballinger, Andrew Joblin.

Dr. Ballinger checks in with a semi-ironic peace sign, hovering at my shoulder. Would it be too fanciful to suggest that, from time to time, he still does?

25/07/2025

Now at WGTN Zinefest "Trade Wars" Market, at the School of Design on Vivian St, come on down...