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.

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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.

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Cycling cartoon: An Olympian effort

Here's a sneak peek at one of the cartoons I have submitted for exhibition at the Shrewsbury International Cartoon Festival 2011, which takes place in April.

The theme is Olympian Sports, and this is a new version of a cartoon I drew for the Kent Messenger when the Tour de France came through the county in 2007. This version is coloured using Faber-Castell Pitt brush pens, for those that care about that sort of thing.

It was a bit of an Olympian effort coming up with four cartoons on a sporting theme, as it's not a subject I turn to a lot, to say the least. This year I'll also be drawing a Big Board cartoon in Shrewsbury market square, so I need to think of another gag too. That one won't have bicycles in it though. I hate drawing bicycles.

The theme may appear to be a year early, as the London Olympics are in 2012, but it is in fact a tie-in with the Shropshire Olympian Festival, which takes place in June, and the Wenlock Olympian Games, also in Shropshire, in July.

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Football cartoon: Make some noise

His Master's Vuvuzela

As the England football team face their final chance in the World Cup in South Africa tomorrow, here's a topical spin on a favourite cartooning theme. Paarp!

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Football cartoons: Bluffing it

The World Cup is here, time to dig out my one and only football cartoon! ...

"I must admit, your explanation of the offside rule was spot on."

OK, this old Reader's Digest cartoon is not quite my only football cartoon, but I haven't done many. Largely because I'm a bit like the guys in this cartoon:

"You know nothing about football either? So we've both spent TWO HOURS bluffing?"

Here's a recently published football cartoon, drawn to accompany an article about a new World Cup beer called 4-4-2. Now, beer is a subject I have done lots of cartoons about. Write about what you know, I say.

Footnote: Footnote! See what I did there? While on the subject, I recently posted an article about a cartoonist's World Cup song over at The Bloghorn.

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Election cartoon: Winners and losers

"Remember, it's not the winning that's important, it's the not losing ..."

This was drawn for a local paper this week. I notice that another cartoonist came up with basically the same joke in the current Private Eye. This kind of thing happens a lot with topical cartoons, it's inevitable when we're all thinking about the same subjects and working within the parameters of the gag cartoon.

Now, of course, we know who won, and I suspect that the resulting Conservative and Lib Dem coalition will be a gift for cartoonists.

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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.

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From the archives: Football cartoon

"I must admit, your explanation of the offside rule was spot on."

Cartoonist Alex Matthews mentions this cartoon as one he wishes he'd thought of in his Cartoonist of the Month interview over at Prospect magazine's blog. It was in Reader's Digest in 2006.

This is one of those that I never had particularly high hopes for when I drew it (I thought it may have been done already) ... so, of course, it is one of the most popular cartoons I've ever drawn!

Hey, look! Here's one of those wordcloud thingies from the Wordle site. Everyone else seems to be doing them, so here's one created with this blog feed. Click to enlarge.


No surprises with most of the words that are prominent, such as "cartoon", "joke" etc. But it's always a bit disappointing that wordclouds highlight such mundane words as "come" and "going".

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Football cartoon: Game for a laugh

I know nothing about football, but I still managed to get a cartoon on the subject published. Probably because I'm the person who always has to have this infamous rule explained to them.