Category — Artist of the Month

Bloghorn asked our Artist of the Month, Chichi Parish, how she makes her cartoons.

Before setting about drawing, I need monastic conditions in my studio which is where my foam earplugs and noise reduction headphones come into play. It’s not great for my hairdo, but at least my ears are always cosy and I cut out suburban domestic sounds though the house still shakes from the rumble of the Central Line tube and the A406.

I use flexible drawing nibs (the bendier the better), paper and a splash of Photoshop for my work. Recently an Australian artist/ calligrapher I know called Graham McArthur, recommended Noodler’s ink. It smells divine and flows like boiled gold, to date, it beats any other inks I’ve used.

I like to get my hands dirty which is why the tactileness, zing, unpredictable chemistry of traditional media will always excite me. All my artwork gets scanned then sanitized digitally using a Wacom tablet/pen and Adobe Photoshop.

There will be more from Chichi next Friday and you can also explore our Artist of the Month archives.

Bloghorn’s Artist of the Month for October 2009 is Chichi Parish.
London-based Chichi’s inkiness has best been described as ‘Ronald Searle on acid.’ Notable clients include ad agency TBWA, The Times Educational Supplement and The Big Draw.

Chichi told Bloghorn how she became a cartoonist.

“It sort of just happened. I went to the Association of Illustrators and booked a portfolio consultation with Fig Taylor back in 2003. She looked at my stuff and said: ‘You’re a cartoonist.’ I thought she made so much sense, I invited her to the pub afterwards for a drink.”

Bloghorn agrees, there is a difference.

We are taking a break from our regularly monthly feature during September. Instead we will be showcasing some of the back catalogue of work which our nominated artists have republished on Bloghorn – and we are kicking off with Ken Pyne’s image on the joy of architects.

You can catch up with more work from Ken and the best British cartoonists here.

In our last question for August, Bloghorn asked our Artist of the month, Steve Bright, what is the future of cartooning in the digital age?

I think (with some sadness) that the future of cartooning IS the digital age. Not only do I supply almost all of my artwork in digital format these days (and other than my caricature gig work, it’s 100%),
but almost every client I’ve worked for in recent times has wanted it that way.

Perhaps that’s not entirely surprising, since in most cases they find me via computer technology, and my website in particular. But none the less, even the older traditional markets such as the Beano and Dandy now receive their artwork digitally as the norm, and put up with physical pieces of artwork cluttering their desks only because some of the artists they still favour (I’m no longer one of them), who are not computer savvy, are worth the inconvenience.

From a nostalgic viewpoint, I much prefer the vision of the office in the “olden days”, with artwork adorning every desktop, and the smell of Cow Gum fighting with cigarette and pipe smoke for dominance. But in the later years, when all they wanted from me was a high resolution jpeg, I got to keep all my original artwork. Before that became the norm, I, along with every other freelancer, was sending them page upon page of original art every week, never to be returned to any of us. That alone has made me more grateful for the technological advancements than I can put into words, but there’s more – much more!

Anyone in our business who doesn’t at least try to embrace as much of it as possible is not going to last much longer in the game. I don’t say that with any sense of complacency, but as a fact that faces us all. The key is not to think you need to know it all in order to use the technology. You pick up a phenomenal amount as you go along, and it’s a constant learning curve for even the most advanced of users, but always at your own pace.

It can also be fun – which is our business after all.

Our thanks to Steve for his answers which you can find along with those from many other professional cartoonists in our Artist of the Month archive.

The PCO Artist of the month for August is Steve Bright and Bloghorn asked him which other cartoonists’ work he admired.

There are far too many names to list here, and yet I’m neither a follower nor expert in any other cartoonist’s work. I have a few books by other cartoonists I enjoy, but no definitive collection.

There are also many little known names whose work almost certainly influenced a large percentage to pick up a pencil and begin drawing cartoons. They seldom get a mention beyond the forums populated by UK comics geeks, so I’ll mention a few here.

Cartoon greats such as David Sutherland, Robert Nixon, Ron Spencer, Bob McGrath, Ken Harrison, John K. Geering, Jim Petrie, Reg Parlett and Tom Paterson may reside deeper in the shadows than the more famous comic greats such as Ken Reid, Leo Baxendale and Dudley Watkins, but they have had every bit as profound an influence on me as any other cartoonist.

Many cartoonists cut their cartoon teeth (like me) on the likes of the Beano, Dandy and Whizzer & Chips. They may not know the names, but they certainly were influenced by them.

Did Steve have any tips for wannabe cartoonists?

These days, I would not advise anyone to take up drawing cartoons as a full-time career, no matter how talented they were. I actually feel it would be irresponsible and my conscience won’t allow me to do it. Very different to how I viewed it less than 20 years ago.

However, assuming we’re talking about wannabes who are already beyond the Dissuasion Stage, and are focussed, determined and single-bloody-minded enough to have a go regardless, the only really sound advice I think I could give them would be … to copy!

Studying other cartoonists is important, but only by copying (or even tracing) their work will you begin to appreciate the nuances of how they draw, and it will teach you more than any verbal advice can ever come close to. Naturally, I’m not suggesting that anything you copy can be claimed (or sold) as your own, but as a learning device, there is no better in my opinion.

Much of the early part of my career was built on an ability to “ghost” the work of other artists, and that skill was developed by copying the characters as closely as I could, even (and especially) down to the thickness of line they used, and emulating those characteristics as a style, and not just as the odd figure or two.

My own style is a hybrid of many others, and I can vary it significantly from project to project. Certainly, there are many cartoonists who have managed to earn a good living with one particular style throughout their career, but I do think they are the exception.

Being adaptable opens many more doors, some more inspiring than others, but when there are bills to be paid, there’s little room for tying your integrity to one style of drawing. Sometimes a writing ability can be a real asset too.

Bloghorn asked PCO Artist of the Month, Steve Bright, how he makes his cartoons.

I have only just become fully digital, and now require an alternative power source to coffee and Chocolate Hobnobs to produce cartoons. It’s been a gradual process however.

The majority of my career has been carved out using automatic pencils, no-buff erasers, Gillott’s 303 nibs dipped in Rotring black drawing ink, sable brushes dipped in Winsor & Newton coloured inks, all employed upon A2 sheets of bleed proof marker pad paper or Bristol Board.

In the past ten years or so, computer technology has replaced or diminished the role of all of those elements. The recent arrival of my Wacom Cintiq has banished them from my drawing board completely. I now do everything using the Cintiq linked to my laptop, and my biggest fear is no longer a missed deadline, but a prolonged power cut.

Oddly, most of the tools I’d used in the early years was pretty much the same as that used by cartoonists for the previous hundred years. But such is the pace of the technology now, I’ve outgrown a scanner and several drawing tablets in a just few years. It’s a little bit scary for someone who swore he’d never change his drawing ways when others were dipping their toes in the cyber waters.

I’ve taken much longer than some to become a convert. But I have no regrets, and I wouldn’t hesitate to recommend others to do it when the time is right for them. I know I shall revisit the old methods again eventually, but for fun rather than commerce. There is no turning back now.

The Bloghorn Artist of the month for August is Steve Bright. We asked him how he became a cartoonist.

If there is a conventional route to becoming a cartoonist, it certainly wasn’t mine. From the age of seven I have drawn cartoon pictures which impressed my family and made my friends laugh. I concentrated on my strengths and my ability has grown with me.

At school, having established that I could draw quite well in the early years, my themes later revolved around the typical teenage angst subjects like euthanasia, crucifixion and war. Even if no-one else was laughing at my art back then, I privately derived great mirth from the reactions it invoked. This act of self-pleasure eventually evolved, as I gradually realised that the power to make others laugh at my artwork was a great stimulant, and was in itself highly addictive.

Perhaps it was that inability to take myself or my art seriously which led to my application rejection by Edinburgh Art College (or maybe it was my portfolio of death and debauchery), but that and my arrogance at the time were the two single most important factors that led to my subsequent career as a cartoonist. Rather than head to Dundee to attend my second choice art college, I went there to take up my first full-time job as a journalist, for an advertised career in one of the local papers. If I couldn’t be a successful artist, I was going to be a successful writer, after serving my apprenticeship on the Dundee Courier or Sunday Post.

It wasn’t until the day I started at the Dundee HQ of D.C. Thomson & Co. Ltd. that I found out I was to be the office junior on ‘The Beano‘. Within a fortnight I had captured the regular weekly script-writing chores for Billy Whizz, Biffo the Bear, The Nibblers and Pup Parade, all to myself. Six years later, and with a wealth of experience picked up by handling artwork drawn by many of the greats of the British comic industry, I quit, and jumped the fence to become a freelance cartoonist. The rest, as they say, has been lunacy…

There will be more from our interview with Steve at Bloghorn next Friday.

Bloghorn asked Artist of the Month, John Roberts, if he had any tips for wannabe cartoonists?

Hmmm, well, thank goodness for the digital age because it enables me to get most of my work through my website. I think you must have a good website these days so that you can generate good commercial work. I’ve never been lucky enough to get published in Private Eye etc etc (to be honest I haven’t tried sending stuff off for many years) but I would suggest that being published in such a high profile publication would raise your profile and generate commercial work but I’m not one hundred percent sure of that!

And what is the future of cartooning in the digital age?

Goodness knows – I do get most of my work through my website and so in that respect the digital age is good for me but if I was just a gag cartoonist then I’m not sure I would still be able to survive. The thought of having to go back to posting artwork off to clients as opposed to sending it via email would fill me with dread!

John Roberts is our Artist of the Month for July so we asked him which other cartoonist’s work he admired.

The cartoonist whose work I most admire has to be Holte (Trevor Holder) who I understand is now fully retired. (Why does a cartoonist retire….?) His line and colour work was amazing and I think quite beautiful. Every artist I’ve met (as well as cartoonists) has said that they wished that they could draw in a more ‘loose’ style – Holte always did this quite effortlessly. Of course there are many, many more cartoonists whose work I am in awe of but Holte has to be the one whose artwork I never tire of looking at. Not the funniest cartoonist that’s ever walked the Blue Planet but gosh that artwork…

Bloghorn asked the our Artist of the Month for July, John Roberts, how he makes his cartoons.

Like everyone else, I have this huge old trunk of ‘cartoon ideas’ in the loft and once I’ve had a good rummage through I’ll sit down and draw them up. Until recently I would use a computer but now I have reverted back to good old pen and paper and watercolour (with a little bit of scanning in and colour enhancement using various software programs). I now realise that there is something ‘alive’ in the simple black mark of a pen that I just cannot emulate using a Wacom tablet. Drawing caricatures using a computer however is a different thing altogether and all my studio work is done this way.