© Andy Davey cartoon for The Sun

Bloghorn hat tips PCO cartoonist Andy Davey.

Cartoon art spanning the ages will be on view, starting with Thomas Rowlandson from the 18th century, through 19th century greats such as Tenniel and on to the 20th century, with such big names as Searle, Thelwell, above, and Larry.

Contemporary newspaper cartoonists will also feature, including Peter Brookes, Matt, Christian Adams, Martin Rowson and Mac.

Members of the Professional Cartoonists’ Organisation, which runs the Bloghorn, feature in the show, including Andy Davey, Martin Honeysett, Tony Husband, above, Ed McLachlan, Royston Robertson, Kipper Williams and Mike Williams.

Tony Husband will open the event, talking about his life in cartooning while illustrating this with spontaneous cartoons. For more details, and to see the full exhibition online, visit the Chris Beetles website

Bloghorn Shrewsbury 2011 Olympics cartoon © Chris Madden

This year’s events have an Olympian theme and the show Personal Bests will be highlighting some of the cartoonists responses to this challenge.

Bloghorn Shrewsbury 2011 Olympics cartoon © Andy Davey cartoon

For those local to the town, the show is opening 11th April at the Bear Steps Gallery.

Bloghorn Shrewsbury Olympic cartoon 2011 © Matthew Buck Hack Cartoons

Spring has nearly sprung and so has the latest issue of Foghorn, the cartoon magazine of the Professional Cartoonists’ Organisation. In keeping with this issue’s musical theme, the magazine features an operatic cover by PCO’s Chichi Parish and is available to subscribers for the very merry annual price of £20 for six full colour issues.

What’s inside?

Noel Ford reminisces about his time as a guitarist in the Stormbreakers
Fellow guitarist Roger Penwill tells of  his love for the instrument
Tim Harries has a less than relaxing spa break
John Jensen gives us his musical memories
And you’ll find a full page of cartoons by the Surreal McCoy!

Plus…

…all the regular features - Buildings in the Fog, The Critic, The Foghorn Guide to…, The Potting Shed, Andy Davey‘s ‘Foggy’ strip and many more random acts of humour crammed in wherever we could find room.

You can read older issues of Foghorn online here, right up to our most recent issue.

Just in time for Christmas, the latest issue of Foghorn, the cartoon magazine of the Professional Cartoonists’ Organisation has been published. Featuring a festive cover by the PCO’s The Surreal McCoy, the magazine is available to subscribers for the very merry price of £20 for six full colour issues – all delivered down your chimney (or through your door).

What’s inside?

Ian Ellery treats us to a very Stanley Unwin Chrimbletide
A short history of the Christmas card by Chris Madden
Nathan Ariss relates some seasonal thespian tales of Mason Ayres
Mike Williams tells of his first taste of Punch
The partridge gets well stuffed by Neil Dishington
And  you’ll find a full page of Wilbur Dawbarn cartoons!

Plus…

…all the regular features - Buildings in the Fog, The Critic, The Foghorn Guide to…, The Potting Shed, Andy Davey‘s ‘Foggy’ strip and many more random acts of humour crammed in wherever we could find room.

You can read older issues of Foghorn online here, right up to our most recent issue.

Cartoonist Andy Davey writes:

To the glorious surroundings of Pembroke College, Cambridge, for a learned and earnest discussion of humour in art.

The conference featured two keynote addresses: one by Robin Simon, editor of the British Art Journal and author of Hogarth, France and British Art, and a second by Quentin Blake on his approach to humour and how it informs his work, especially his recent 70ft mural for Addenbrooke’s Hospital depicting Cambridge University’s
800-year history.

Unfortunately, due to deadlines of the crust-earning variety, your correspondent missed both talks, but there was plenty else to tickle the synapses. It was an interesting departure for a humble practitioner to go back and be enveloped by the warm, crusty embrace of academe; a delightful chance to enjoy in-depth reflection on our art-form. It was a true cartoon nerd’s paradise (in the nicest possible way).

Topics ranged from Shanghai art-deco cartoons to a study of the African woman as muse for Georgian cartoonists like Gillray and Newton. An unexpected bonus was a short talk by the remarkable polymath Loyd Grossman (yes, that one) on Babar the Elephant, the much-loved French cartoon strip, delivered with a liberal sprinkling of wit – a dangerous weapon to use in the groves of academe.

I was keen to explore the reasons for the apparent distaste for the British to embrace the study or appreciation of cartoons as an art-form, wondering whether it was connected to a wider disdain for the art-form here by serious art mavens, while continental Europe holds it high.

Over coffee, I unfairly ear-holed poor Professor Jean Michel Massing of the History of Art deparment to find out. His off-the-cuff explanation was that there was no inherent disdain, it was simply down to lack of money to initiate research projects.

Your correspondent respects the learned professor’s pitch for funding, but reserves judgment, while retiring to scratch his beard and think.

Alex Hughes reports.

You may have not noticed, but there’s been a general election in Britian recently. And a general election means it’s open season for the political cartoonists, so here Bloghorn presents a brief summary of the events of the last month or so in cartoon form, starting at the beginning of the election with Dave Brown of the Independent on the runners and riders and the Guardian‘s Martin Rowson on the approaching media obsession.
During the campaign The Guardian‘s Steve Bell talks about drawing at the manifesto launches, the Sky debate, and drawing Nick Clegg, Peter Mandelson and David Cameron (and the cartoon that came from this).

The TV debates may have changed the direction of the election, but they were seen differently by Tim Sanders in the Independent, Dave Brown, Peter Brookes of the Times, Steve Bell and Paul Thomas of the Daily Expesss,whilst Morten Morland of the Times produced a series of short animated responses to each of the debates (ITV, Sky, BBC).

The debates lead to widespread Cleggmania as seen by Stephen Collins in Prospect, Matt in the Daily Telegraph, Martin Rowson and Paul Thomas, and the inevitable media backlash as satirised by Peter Brookes and Dave Brown.

Gordon Brown made what was probably the biggest political gaffe of the campaign by calling a member of the public a “bigoted woman”; Peter Brookes, and Dave Brown, Mac of the Daily Mail, Paul Thomas provided their own takes on Bigotgate.

The election night itself inspired Tim Sanders and Matt, but as we now know it resulted in a hung parliament, as shown variously the Sun‘s Andy Davey, Dave Brown, Matt, Peter Brookes, Paul Thomas and Mac (and even a hung parliament themed game), Gordon Brown’s departure as seen by Nick Garland and eventually the Con-Lib coalition Christian Adams, Tim Sanders, Morten Morland and Martin Rowson.

Looking forward to the challenges for the new Government were Harry Venning’s Clare in the Community and Kal in the Economist, and looking back, Bloghorn‘s very own Matt Buck produced a series of  weekly despatches for the Guardian from the 1710 campaign as seen by Tobias Grubbe (2, 3, 4, 5).  The Times produced a 9 page comic summary of the election campaign available for download here (PDF, 7Mb).

(“Keep Calm and Cameron” cartoon by Nathan Ariss).

The Editor adds: We are bound to have missed many other great examples of cartooning so please do feel free to add things you have seen in the comments. Thanks.

Alan Coren, ex-Punch editor and PCO patron (Art: John Roberts)

Bill Stott is a cartoonist. A rather good one, actually. Even the great Alan Coren thought so. But then he loved cartoonists generally.

Like many cartoonists, Bill doesn’t change his trousers with unseemly regularity. It’s a working-at-home thing. Why bother when the ones you’re wearing have a perfectly serviceable extra few weeks in them … and probably a healthy supply of mints and pocket fluff? However, the recent change of season occasioned a re-trousering, whereupon one of the pockets yielded a piece of gold dust.

It was a short note from Mr Coren, penned a short while before he died, which Bill had rammed into the pocket for filing; a paean to cartoonists intended as an introduction to the website of the Professional Cartoonists’ Organisation, of which he had just accepted the title of inaugural patron. Bill hadn’t the heart to publish the piece because Coren died shortly after sending it.

In it, having left Punch, Coren mulls over what he misses. The limos, the yachts, the voluptuous assistants? No, he says, “None of these. What I miss most is those Tuesday mornings with the sadly late and very great Bill Hewison, my brilliant Art Editor, when we would sit at a huge leather-topped desk overlooking the complete absence of central heating, pull off our generously lent company mittens, and sift through the hundreds and hundreds of roughs submitted by the extraordinary numbers of extraordinary cartoonists which – and, remember, I speak as a writer – made Punch the brilliant and, most important of all, hilarious magazine it was.

“I miss the six hours of those golden-era Tuesdays when Bill and I would struggle – handicapped by constant helpless laughter – to choose, from 20 times as many, the 50-odd cartoons we needed to lift the readers’ spirits and break their ribs in next week’s magazine.”

He continues:

“Cartooning is the toughest art of all. A freelance cartoonist lives and works alone, staring out of the window in the fervent daily hope that something will begin to draw itself on the sky, then murmur its caption in his ear. He needs this to happen several times a day, every day, because he has not the faintest idea whether the editors who pay his rent will laugh at the same thing he laughs at, and therefore has to send them lots and lots of things, praying that they will laugh at at least one of them, and the cartoonist can get his shoes mended.”

Coren concludes that his greatest struggle was that “we couldn’t put a thousand gags in the paper, so how to select the best when ten are equally funny?” Enough, enough already. We cartoonists couldn’t possibly be so immodest about our talents. But … thank you, Mr Coren.

Declaration of Interest: Andy Davey is chairleg of the Professional Cartoonists’ Organisation which runs The Bloghorn (Editor: Matt Buck) and the print magazine Foghorn (Editor: Bill Stott).

He and the organisation welcome your comments, and your contact with us at our artist portfolio websites, through our social-media services, or via direct contact with our media team led by Pete Dredge.

Bloghorn on Twitter – Bloghorn at Facebook
(Editor’s note: these are subscriber services and require a sign up from the service providers to use them.)

This can be seen in the national press today as three heavyweight cartoonists give their take on Lord Goldsmith appearing before the Chilcot Inquiry into the Iraq war.

One: Peter Brookes in The Times suggests he was leant on

Two: Steve Bell in The Guardian thinks pressure was applied

Three: Dave Brown in The Independent on suggests arm-twisting

Of course, all these cartoonists are working at the same time, operating under the same time pressures – there’s no suggestion of copying! – which makes it all the more a fascinating insight into the way cartoonists’ minds work. Thanks to Andy Davey for drawing it to our attention.

The PCO: Great British cartoon talent
Subscribe to The Foghorn – our print cartoon magazine

PeterBrookes: The Best of Times, above, is at the Chris Beetles Gallery from Monday (October 12) until October 31. More than 100 of Brookes’s most recent cartoons from The Times will be on display. Signed copies of the book accompanying the show are available from the gallery.

The Chris Beetles Gallery, at 8 and 10 Ryder Street, St James’s (nearest Tube Green Park or Piccadilly Circus) is open Mon-Sat, 10am–5.30pm.

Drawings by Peter Brookes also feature in Cameron in Caricature, an exhibition of cartoons on the Tory leader David Cameron is at the Political Cartoon Gallery from next Tuesday (October 13) until December 24.

Cameron’s infamous Twitter faux pas, as seen by Morten Morland

The exhibition of 60 original cartoons charts the fortunes of Cameron since he became leader in December 2005. It will feature cartoons by political cartoonists such as Martin Rowson, Steve Bell, Morten Morland, Dave Brown, Peter Schrank, Ingram Pinn and Andy Davey.

The Political Cartoon Gallery, 32 Store Street, is open Mon-Fri 9.30am–5.30pm and Sat 11.30am–5.30pm.