Good time to support the Cartoon Museum

"Ohmigod, what big ears she has! Ohmigod, what a big nose she has! ..."

Here's another cartoon from the Animal Crackers exhibition at the Cartoon Museum in London. This is an old Private Eye one. The exhibition has almost a month to run (it finishes October 21) so get along to see it if you can.

The museum took a bit of a beating when it comes to visitor numbers during the Olympics, and has started opening seven days a week to make up the shortfall, so now is the ideal time to support it.

 
I took my kids along to see Animal Crackers recently and they had a great time. There's a "cartoon trail" for them to take part in and plenty of opportunity to create your own cartoons, above. The next exhibition, from October 24, celebrates 75 years of The Dandy, so I'm sure we'll all get along to that one too.

Buy Royston's cartoon book ... also available in the Cartoon Museum shop!

Greetings card cartoon: Here we row again

This cartoon, which was in an exhibition at last year's Henley Regatta, is now available as a greetings card. It will be sold in the shop at Henley this year.

It costs £2.50, with proceeds going to the Stewards' Charitable Trust, which works with schools across the country, encouraging young people to learn to row. Even Trenton Oldfield can't complain about that.

Click here to buy Royston's cartoon book

Celebrities cartoon: Red turns up the Heat

"Ohmigod, what big ears she has! Ohmigod, what a big nose she has! ..."

Here's a cartoon from the current Private Eye. This was on a page that was dedicated entirely to gag cartoons, which was good to see.

This is another where I've combined a contemporary issue with a fairy tale. In this case the story came first. I was thinking about those famous lines when it occurred to me that Red Riding Hood has a quite superficial obsession with personal appearance ...

Click here to buy Royston's cartoon book

Cartoon for Henley Regatta exhibition

Those of you interested in boating matters may like to know that there's a cartoon exhibition at this year's Henley Regatta, which starts today and runs until July 3.

I've got two cartoons in the show, and as I know nothing at all about rowing they are both Owl and Pussycat jokes! The one above, which was in Private Eye, sold when it was exhibited at the Shrewsbury Cartoon Festival this year. So a different version will be on display at Henley.

So if you're at the event, and it's "Pimm's o'clock", don't forget to wander over to the art gallery behind the Members' Grandstand to have a look and a few laughs. There's more on the exhibition over at the Bloghorn. Chin chin.

Click here to buy Royston's cartoon book

Law cartoon: Rhyme and reason

"I'd say you have a watertight case there, boys"

Here's a cartoon I drew recently for a law magazine. Combining contemporary issues with nursery rhymes, fairly tales etc is a technique much used by cartoonists. This is another example, and another. And so it goes ...

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Rowing cartoon: Size matters

Getting the right size and shape for gag cartoons can be tricky and can require experimentation. Increasingly, I find I'm drawing them in a portrait shape, but with some jokes you have to go landscape.

This cartoon (click to enlarge) appears in this week's Private Eye. Originally the Owl and the Pussycat were rowing with no supplies. After the magazine took the gag, they contacted me to say that the characters were not easy to make out at the size the cartoon would be printed, and they suggested the honey pot to make it more clear. Works OK, I think.

In fact, I wasn't really thinking magazines when I drew this. It was originally drawn on-spec for an exhibition of rowing cartoons that a cartoonist colleague is hoping to stage next year, which is probably why I went for the "wider canvas". I'll let you know the details of the exhibition if and when that goes ahead.

Royston's portfolio website

Cosmetic surgery cartoon, more on "Keep Calm"

"Of course, there's a possibility that you are a swan, but do you want to take that risk?"

This cartoon is in the April issue of Reader's Digest. I referred to one of my kids' nursery rhyme books to get that sad-looking "ugly duckling" right.

The repeated caption, by the way, is for the benefit of those looking at this site on phones, who tell me that sometimes the words on the cartoons are not readable. I may go back and laboriously add all the other ones, when I have a spare couple of days ...



Talking of feedback, thanks to everyone who who emailed asking for a copy of the cartoonists' propaganda poster I posted here a couple of weeks ago, and everyone else who made nice comments about it, online and off.

It was really only intended as a joke, a riff on the original Second World War poster, I never intended it to be a "motivational" poster, as such. But it seems to have touched a nerve, and some people even found it inspiring, it seems.

Particular thanks to the following for linking to it: Jason Chatfield, Tim Harries, Mike Lynch, Chichi Parish, Cathy Simpson, The Surreal McCoy, and my PCO colleague Matt Buck who put it on The Bloghorn.

Royston's portfolio website