After several years as the plucky underdog, the Professional Cartoonists’ Organisation’s team, this year rebranded as Team Bloghorn, has finally emerged victorious from the annual Battle of the Cartoonists.

Our team came joint first with Private Eye in the Big Draw event in which four teams completed a large banner on the theme of “Now We Are Ten”, celebrating a decade of The Campaign for Drawing. They faced stiff competition from teams from The Sun and The Independent.

A banner year: The Bloghorn team was made up of, left to right, Andy Bunday, Clive Goddard, captain Pete Dredge, holding the cup, who oversaw proceedings, and Nathan Ariss

Work in progress: Clive and Pete get drawing. Click here, to see the full, completed banner

In a post-match interview, Pete told the Bloghorn: “Justice and victory at last for the PCO’s Battle of the Cartoonists’ team, albeit jointly with the Eye (Shurely shome mistake – Ed). What seemed like a clear-cut decision was mysteriously drawn out into a “cheer-off” head-to-head. And even then our clearly louder decibel reading was insufficient for us to be declared outright winners. A big draw indeed!”

Joint winners: The Private Eye team, left to right, Simon Pearsall, Richard Jolley and Ken Pyne, also a PCO member, with MC Andrew Marr, who is a patron of the PCO

But the event is not just about the glory of winning. PCO members Tim Harries, and Cathy Simpson were on hand to run drawing workshops for children and adults at the event, which took place at the Idea Generation gallery in Shoreditch, London.

Drawn to it: Cathy Simpson hosted a workshop for children

The workshoppers were ably assisted by The Surreal McCoy. All photographs here are by Gerard Whyman, who was on hand as the official PCO photographer.

Bloghorn spotted this great work during this week ending the 17th April 2009.

One: Zapiro in South Africa’s Mail and Guardian on Nelson Mandela’s shoes.

Two: Pete Dredge in the Spectator on smoking confessions.

Three: and finally, Harry Venning’s Clare in the Community in the Guardian on youth slang.

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The PCO: Great British cartoon talent

The clocks have fallen back, and subsequently the nights are drawing in, so as we race towards Christmas publishers are putting out books on cartooning. Here’s a selection of recent example that may be filling stockings come December.

First up is The History of the Beano: The Story so Far, a comprehensive round-up of the iconic DC Thompson comic from the last 70 years, here reviewed by the Daily Record and by Danny Baker in The Times. This book also ties in with the recent exhibitions in Dundee and the Cartoon Museum in London.

The History Of The Beano – The Story So Far is published by D.C. Thomson and Waverley Books, priced £25. The Beano and Dandy Birthday Bash continues at the The Cartoon Museum, 35 Little Russell Street, London WC1A 2HH until 2nd November 2008.

Next is Cartoons and Coronets: The Genius of Osbert Lancaster on the life and times of the late Daily Express pocket cartoonist Osbert Lancaster, which is reviewed in the New Statesman, the Spectator and by cartoonist Nicholas Garland in the Telegraph. This book also ties into an exhibition at the Wallace Collection (reviewed in the Telegraph, the Guardian, and the Independent) .

Cartoons and Coronets: The Genius of Osbert Lancaster, edited by James Knox, is published by Frances Lincoln Publishers Ltd, priced £25. The exhibition continues at The Wallace Collection, Hertford House, Manchester Square, London W1U 3BN until 11th January 2009.

And finally we come to The Best of Punch Cartoon, a collection of cartoons from the legendary satirical magazine spanning over 150 years of humour, the launch of which was attended by the PCO’s own Pete Dredge. Reviewed here by cartoonist Peter Brookes of the Times, by Michael Heath, cartoon editor of the Spectator, and in the Independent.

The Best of Punch Cartoons, by Helen Walasek, is published by Prion Books, priced £30.

The PCO: Great British cartoon talent

PCO members will be taking part in “Transports of Delight” at St Pancras International Station in London on Saturday (October 18). The event is part of the annual, month-long Big Draw campaign, which is designed to get the nation drawing.

The PCO will be running cartoon workshops at the event and taking part in the ever-popular Battle of the Cartoonists. Under the expert stewardship of the PCO’s Festival and Exhibition Co-ordinator, Pete Dredge, a crack team of volunteers has been assembled for the day’s activities.

Workshops by members Paul Hardman, Chichi Parish, Robert Duncan, Tim Harries and Terry Christien (plus guests) will take place between 10am and 5pm. Come along if you want to learn how to draw cartoons, caricatures and comic strips.

The Battle of the Cartoonists kicks off at 3pm and runs for two hours. The PCO team, featuring Robert Duncan, Kipper Williams and Royston Robertson, and captained by Pete Dredge, will take on Private Eye, The Guardian and the Independent.

The PCO’s 2007 Battle of the Cartoonists team in action

Previous Big Draw attendees will know that the winning team is decided via extremely vocal public approval, so please come along and do bring any loudhailers and male voice choirs you have lying around. And how will you know who the PCOers are at the Big Draw? Oh, we’ve thought of that …
Yes, red is most definitely the new black. This is the Team PCO T-shirt to be worn by workshoppers and the Battle of the Cartoonists team. Team captain Pete Dredge told the Bloghorn: “Some unscrupulous attempts at ‘tapping up’ team members by other team leaders have been firmly stamped on, and I’m confident my lads will deliver on the day.”

Activities will take place in The Circle – 2nd side entrance on St Pancras Rd and opposite the German Gymnasium. The dedicated area will be marked out with artificial grass and picket fencing for that summery October feeling. Hope to see you there.

The Big Draw: Get involved

The PCO: Great British cartoon talent

PCO cartoonist Pete Dredge writes:

What saddens me most about the demise of Punch, apart from the purely selfish loss of what was once a regular market for me, is that thousands of jokes which would have graced its pages on a weekly basis have never had the chance to be made by the amazingly talented bunch of cartoonists this nation possesses. They would have helped to cast a little light in these dark days. We all laughed at those “Prepare to meet thy doom” gags … erm, and we’d probably still laugh at them now.

The PCO: Great British cartoon talent

Breaking News on Bloghorn…

The PCO team for this year’s London Big Draw event is confirmed. Team skipper, Pete Dredge (Private Eye regular) will be leading Robert Duncan (Not particularly orange cards), Kipper Williams (The Guardian) and Royston Robertson (Prospect, Readers Digest, Private Eye) into the suitably absurd Battle of the Cartoonists.

The 12 feet long, two-hour epic PCO banner from 2007, hung up, or out, to dry.

You can find details and a report from Bill Stott on the 2007 event here.

PCO members will also be running workshops throughout the day, featuring the many coloured skills of Tim Harries, Chichi Parish, Matt Buck, Andy Davey and Paul Hardman among others.

We will be publishing more details in the run up to the big day on Saturday 18 October.

It’s British cartoon talent

As we drift into the sometimes quieter backwaters of the summer news season, here’s a few cartoons that caught Bloghorn’s eye this week.

One:
Dave Brown on lip-reading, from the Independent

Two:
Pete Dredge on the continuing effect of the smoking ban, from the Spectator

Three:
Christian Adams on yawning dogs, from the Telegraph

As previously mentioned, if you’ve seen a cartoon in the last seven days or so that you think deserves a bit of attention, please pop a link to it into the comments below.

It’s British cartoon talent

First person testimony on how it feels to try and make something this big in less than ten hours comes from PCOer Pete Dredge.

’For the majority of our working year we toil away in solitary isolation, hidden away, apparently unloved and unsure of our worth. Two days in Shrewsbury’s town square working on a big board in front of an appreciative audience and we leave with enough ego to see us through the next twelve months. Thank you people of Shrewsbury.”

Click the picture to enlarge it.
It’s British cartoon talent

PCOer Pete Dredge writes about making a Big Board for the Shrewsbury International Cartoon Festival:

I’ve been in training for weeks now, aiming to be at peak fitness for the Big Board Challenge at Shrewsbury this month. Yes, the “knee-bending, back-stretching, squat-thrusting and magnum marker pen-clutching” exercise DVD has been dusted off once again in preparation for this most unnatural of acts for the normally indoor, horizontal A4 practitioner of the cartoon art. Rather like a finely tuned Test cricketer being asked to adjust to the Twenty20 version of the game, the entire spectacle is rather more entertaining for the uninitiated than for the true connoisseur of the art!

British cartoon talent

Kipper Williams of The Guardian is one of this year’s PCO Big Boarders at the festival. Above is one of Kipper’s submissions to the “But is it Art?” exhibition, which is already open in the town.

The full list of cartoonist Big Boarders drawing at this year’s festival, over the weekend of Friday 18th and Saturday 19th April, is:

Steve Bright, Clive Collins, Bill Stott, Ross Thomson, Martin Honeysett, Alex Hughes, Pete Dredge, John Roberts, Matt Buck (Hack), Royston Robertson, Mike Turner, Noel Ford, Steve Best (Bestie), Dave Brown, Ian Baker, Chris Burke, Andy Davey, Neil Dishington, Paul Hardman, and Andy McKay (NAF).

PCOer Pete Dredge will be blogging tomorrow about how it feels to do a big board at Shrewsbury.

British cartoon talent