Doing battle at The Big Draw

This weekend I'll be taking part in the Battle of the Cartoonists, part of the Big Draw Festival in London.

I'm on the Professional Cartoonists' Organisation team and we'll be competing against teams from Private Eye and The Guardian. The idea is that each team produces a banner on the festival theme of "Make Your Mark on the Future".

This year we're at The Scoop, an ampitheatre close to City Hall, aka the Greater London Assembly building, and Tower Bridge on the South Bank. The Battle takes place on Saturday between 3.15pm and 5pm. Voting is by public approval, so come along and cheer for us! There will also be workshops for cartoon enthusiasts of all ages.

I last took part in 2008, that's the banner we came up with above. That event took place at the revamped St Pancras station, hence the train tickets motif.

Cartoon for Big Draw auction

Here's a cartoon (click to enlarge) which I submitted this week for an exhibition and auction which is to be run by The Campaign for Drawing, the people behind the annual Big Draw events.

A larger version of this cartoon was featured on the Professional Cartoonists' Organisation's banner which we created at the St Pancras Big Draw last year. The banner itself will also be auctioned, if anyone's got enough room for it.

Details on the exhibition and auction are below. Click to read, or visit the Campaign for Drawing website. Why not go along and see if there's anything you want to bid for? The auction raises money for the Campaign so they can carry on their excellent work.


Royston's portfolio website

Cartoonists meet the public: Big Draw 2007

I took part in The Big Draw at Covent Garden at the weekend. The Big Draw is an annual, nationwide campaign to get people enthusiastic about all kinds of drawing.


A marquee was set aside specifically for cartooning. There were workshops on strips, caricatures etc. with cartoonists on hand to offer tips, advice and encouragement to those taking part.


Here's me doing a spot of “reverse caricaturing” (Thanks to John Stilgoe for the pic.) This is where people put their faces through a board, like the ones you see at the seaside, except it’s blank and the participants say what kind of body they’d like. Very popular with the kids: lots of fairies, pirates, princesses, animals and a couple of Bart Simpsons. I probably had to draw a few too many girls as butterflies than was strictly necessary. All good fun though. The whole event reminded you of how much people love cartoons – grown-ups as well as kids. I hope there were some art editors from magazines and newspapers taking note!

Like last year, there was a Battle of the Cartoonists, where four teams competed to produce a banner on the theme of “High Life, Low Life”. Again there were teams from Private Eye, The Guardian and The Independent, plus this year there was a team from the new Professional Cartoonists’ Organisation. The banners were put to the public vote, with those clever clogs from The Guardian, led by Steve Bell, winning again. There's more on the Battle at the PCO Blog

There are Big Draw events throughout the UK right now. See their website for details.

The Big Draw

I attended the launch of The Big Draw, the annual campaign to get the nation, young and old, drawing. Myself and fellow Cartoonists' Club members spent part of Sunday in a marquee, encouraging kids to draw funny faces and offering tips and advice ... though to be honest, few of them seemed to need any, as they were very keen.

Here is some of their handiwork:



The Battle of the Cartoonists was fun too. Teams representing Private Eye, The Guardian, The Independent and that laugh-a-minute publication the Financial Times, each produced a banner on the day's theme of "Amazing Space", as the event was held in the marvellous Somerset House. These were then put to the public vote, with The Guardian emerging victorious.


It was a very well-attended, well-organised day, with beautiful sunny weather (the kids were playing in the fountains!) There are Big Draw events throughout the UK in October. See their website for details.