FOGHORN
The best of British cartooning talent
Issue 47
NEWS
FOGHORN Issue 47
Published in Great Britain by the Professional Cartoonists’ Organisation (FECO UK)
PCO Patrons Libby Purves Andrew Marr Bill Tidy Martin Wainwright Foghorn Editor Bill Stott tel: +44 (0) 160 646002 email: billstott@lineone.net Foghorn Sub-Editor Roger Penwill tel: +44 (0) 1584 711854 email: roger@penwill.com
FOGHORN The magazine of the Professional Cartoonists’ Organisation (FECO UK)
As government cuts bite ever deeper and even the Duke of Devonshire has been shamed into giving away all but £200,000,000 a year to the poor and needy, har, bloody har, Big Dave’s Society braces itself against the cold winds of Autumn. YouTube addicts wonder what happened to the strange cat/wheelie bin lady, and only profligate use of hosepipes in Surrey can save Cumbria from another flooding.
Fear not! Enter your doughty Foghorn, proving yet again that high quality silliness is way more important than turning off all the street lights [3] in Glossop. Bill Stott, Foghorn Ed.
Foghorn Layout/Design Tim Harries tel: + 44 (0) 1633 780293 email: foghorn@procartoonists.org PCO Press Office email: media@procartoonists.org Web info PCO (FECO UK) website: http://www.procartoonists.org BLOGHORN http://thebloghorn.org/
“Sorry guys, but I really can’t be arsed anymore.”
Top spot for Cartoons Andy Davey gets with the Times.
What is Foghorn? British cartoon art has a great, ignoble history and currently boasts a huge pool of talent. It deserves a higher media presence than it currently enjoys. Our aim is to make sure it gets it. We want to promote cartoon art domestically and internationally by encouraging high standards of artwork and service, looking after the interests of cartoonists and promoting their work in all kinds of media. Copyright All the images in this magazine are the intellectual property and copyright of their individual creators and must not be copied or reproduced, in any format, without their consent. Front Cover: Alexander Matthews Back Cover: Colin Whittock Foghorn (Online) ISSN 1759-6440 Glossop: 6 Pangolin: 0
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The advent of statistics recording visits to web sites has allowed web publishers to see exactly which pages readers head for. Unsurprisingly, many have embraced this technology to show you – the reader – which pages are most popular. So, I ask you to go to The Times website (at www.thetimes.co.uk.) Scroll down. No, you don’t have to get past the Great Pay Wall of Murdoch to do this – no small denomination payments are required. Look at the “Most Read” list of sections which are – as you might guess – the paper’s most popular clickthrough reads. Of course, I don’t know when you’re reading this but I bet you that coming in the top three with a bullet will be “Cartoons”. I have checked assiduously for the past several weeks. “Cartoons” has been at or near the top spot for almost all of my visits (many times at Number One). As I write, I am not chastened by the
fact that nestling at number 2 is “Top Ten Chinos”.Well, a chap’s got to look the part while perusing the best of cartoon art online. Standards, you know. (Of course, if you want to actually look at the cartoons, you WILL have to pay at this point). It’s a subject close to the hearts of us cartoonists. The popularity of The Times’ cartoons is, of course, not unrelated to the fact that they boast two fine cartoonists in Peter Brookes and Morten Morland, together with legend-inna-lifetime Gerald Scarfe at the Sunday title. But it’s not just that. Readers love cartoons. We know that. It’s such a pity that this simple fact doesn’t prevent culls of cartoonists to cut costs at newspapers facing hard times. It seems counter-intuitive to us. For example the loss of almost all cartoon content from The Observer recently was mourned widely. So Bloghorn says hats off to the wildly good taste of Times readers. WWW.PROCARTOONISTS.ORG
FEATURE CLIVE COLLINS
Clive Collins
Mind how you go I’ve always been fascinated by ‘what lies beneath’, and luckily I discovered two books, separated by a number of years, that helped to partially satisfy my curiosity. The first, called ‘The Defence of the Realm in a Third World War’ by Peter Lurie, which I found in Tavistock Pannier Market. The book is now sadly out of print (or - a conspiracy theory – was it ‘withdrawn’?) and the other is ‘Churchill’s Wizards’ by Nicholas Rankin. Lurie’s book came out in the late 70s, and concerns itself with the paranoia surrounding the period from the end of WW1 to the Cold War. I love London, and here is a book that not only lists its ‘Citadels’ (or Government areas of strategic defence) but shelters, some of which run for miles beneath the City’s streets. After the Bolshevik uprising in Russia, the British government of the time was convinced that a large proportion of the ‘lower orders’ among London’s population might consider that disposal of our Upper Classes would be a Good Thing. Thus many public and commercial buildings had machine-gun ports added to keep the mob at bay. One that survived to the early 80s was the NatWest bank (formerly Westminster Bank) in Curzon Street, where they were still clearly visible from street level. Of course one of the reasons that there are still so many examples of wartime blockhouses in London – think of the Eisenhower Centre off Tottenham Court Road, the ivy-covered concrete block by Admiralty Arch, Marsham Street Westminster and the ‘warehouse’ frontage in Furnival Street, off Holborn – is that you can’t get rid of them. Just like you can’t get rid of their smaller country cousins, the wartime pillboxes. They were constructed to last forever. The fear of a Third World War even led (according to the Lurie book) to the storing of steam locomotives in tunnels in the West Country in Wiltshire. The reasoning behind steam was that - if the Bomb dropped - rails (unless suffering a direct hit) would be below the area of shock waves, and fossil fuels would be plentiful in order to power them. Lurie maintains that these buried steam engines are still there, awaiting their call when the balloon goes up (or the hardware comes down). The book also gets a little lost in sub plots concerning the positioning of tower blocks in ley lines for easy escape, below London and into the outskirts. I’m always amused by the efforts made to ensure that the Royal Family escape in times of war, presumably with the idea of leading their country from wherever they eventually hole up. I’m not too sure if these days we’d be so concerned. We can be sure that Fergie would be renting out spaces, and Charles would lecture us interminably about not letting nuclear weapons harm old buildings. Having the dear old Queen WWW.PROCARTOONISTS.ORG
Mum say that they ‘could now look the East End in the eyes’ after its devastation from the 2nd World War bombing, isn’t quite the same as having a bit of Buckingham Palace lopped off. The second book deals with the development and use of camouflage which, amazingly, was thought of as ‘ungentlemanly’ during WW1 and ‘typically British – underhand, and not the done thing.’ Many well-known painters were involved in camouflage (known as camoufleurs – it may have been the ungentlemanly Brits who practised it, but it was the devious French who had a word for it). Men like Solomon J. Solomon, Norman Wilkinson and Brian Robb, among many, were those who, after having persuaded the Government to invest heavily in almost industrial amounts of camouflage, then went on to develop ‘dazzle’ painting for ships, which somehow rendered ships ‘invisible’ in certain lights, and able to disguise vast areas of desert, hiding hardware like tanks and depots in all-round views of the terrain. Pillboxes were even disguised as fairground carousels, while blockhouses had pub frontages painted on them. Of the two books, Lurie’s is the one giving endless facts and figures, charts and fuzzy photos of listening-posts disguised as houses on windswept moors, while Rankin’s also deals with the political background and in-fighting among the wartime ministries. It’s also illustrated with many decent photos of camouflaged buildings that look amazingly un-military. Many cities still have the remains of our defences somewhere in a side street or even hidden in plain sight, which you may have passed for years, without thinking to inspect further. Look closer next time.
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BLOGHORN
You say tomato, we say cartoonist
Bloghorn must take issue with the US political cartoonist Daryl Cagle over a blog post (http://blog.cagle.com) in which he talks about the “cultural” difference between cartoons created in America and those from the rest of the world. Cagle, who also syndicates cartoons through the Political Cartoonists Index argues that there is a ‘‘BIG cultural gap’’ between American cartoons, where the emphasis is on humour and/or making a clear point, and those created by ‘‘world cartoonists’’, which are more oblique. He takes the view that in America cartooning is a proper job, but for ‘‘world cartoonists’’ it is merely a hobby, as all these cartoonists do is enter competitions. “The American cartoonists’ idea of actually making a living from our work, and judging our success by the size of our audiences, or our wallets, seems strange to the obscure foreign cartoonists, who are busy building their CVs and planning their travel schedules.” He goes on to say; “Most world cartoons look strange to an American eye and we have a hard time finding world cartoonists to syndicate, whose work can be understood
by our audience.” Bloghorn is not saying we don’t recognise his view of some foreign cartoons, particularly those seen in international competitions, but we think he has got American and ‘‘world’’ mixed up with English speaking and non-English speaking. We would ask Mr Cagle to take a broader view, perhaps by looking at UK cartooning for a start. There are plenty of cartoonists here who draw cartoons which are funny and make clear points. And many UK cartoonists are as baffled by wordless and often worthy competition cartoons as Cagle is. Indeed, not too long ago John Jensen wrote a three-part article for this blog in which he outlined the difference between British cartoons, which focus on being funny, and those created by our European neighbours, which are
about a more serious form of wit. Indeed, just as Cagle characterises them as ‘‘daisies in the gun barrels’’ cartoons, so Jensen talks of ‘‘countless brick walls, endless rolls of barbed wire, and doves of peace in need of a vet’’. And in response to Cagle’s view of ‘‘world’’ cartoonists as hobbyists, we would like to point out that there are many cartoonists in the UK making a living. They may be striving to do so against the odds – and the PCO which runs the Bloghorn does all it can to help them – but they are professional cartoonists and funny to boot.
To read the John Jensen article in full , go online to http://thebloghorn.org/2010/02/11/john-jensen-on-wit-and-wisdom-part-1/
Cartoonist Portfolios
The PCO’s membership spans the best, most experienced and most widely published full-time, professional cartoonists and caricaturists in the UK. They understand the needs of clients. They are prompt and reliable and they offer a wide range of skills: one-off jokes, political cartoons, caricature, humorous illustration, comics, large-scale work, animation and live performance. Of course, their styles differ, but one thing unites all PCO members: their ability to unleash the unrivalled power of a visual joke, comment or caricature. Our member’s cartoon portfolios can be viewed at:
http://www.procartoonists.org
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Artwork featured: Andy Bunday, Steve Bright, John Roberts, Jonathan Cusick, Rosie Brooks, Graham Fowell.
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FEATURE LADY VIOLET
Random acts of humour
Foghorn’s very own ‘Agony Aunt’ Lady Violet Spume, answers your nasty little personal problems. (Dictation by Lady Violet’s private secretary Clive Goddard)
“Woah! Too much information!”
“You’ve got more than one loyalty card? That’s despicable”
Dear Lady Violet, Can you advise on domestic law issues? I have what is known in current parlance as ‘a nuisance neighbour’ who insists on playing their ‘Lady Gaga’ music very loudly on their stereo system at all hours. Sometimes as late as 9PM! My wife says I should contact the police but I’m not sure whether they would be of any help. Should I go round and reason with them? Ernest Chap, Droitwich Norcs. Lady V: My dear Ernest, This is not a matter of law but of plain, common sense. Reasoning with a problematic neighbour is not only a sign of weakness but a futile course of action, as is contacting the constabulary who are hamstrung by woolly liberal legislation. I suggest direct retaliatory action. Fire a salvo of Mahler’s 9th through their windows at
3AM to let them know that you British and you are not to be intimated by their selfish, antisocialism. Dear Lady Violet I am at my wits end! I have what the tabloids might call ‘neighbours from hell’! Every night this week they have crept into my rear garden, concealed a radiogram in the shrubbery and bombarded our French windows with some painfully loud classical music. Three panes of glass have already cracked and ‘Billy’ our elderly springer spaniel has taken to defecating in the wardrobe. We have no idea why they are doing this. Should I go around and talk to them? Jean Paul G Ringeaux, Droitwich Norcs. Lady V: Dear Mr (Monsieur?) Ringeaux, Oh for goodness sake! Have you never heard of earplugs?
“Ok if I take a shower, love?” WWW.PROCARTOONISTS.ORG
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THE POTTING SHED
The Potting Shed with Cathy Simpson. When John Sheets wrote his ‘Season of mists and mellow fruitfulness’ he obviously hadn’t met the crowd of ASBO kids swarming up next door’s apple tree, lobbing the mellow fruitfulness at Mrs Ferretts’s bichon frise … but welcome to the Foghorn Potting Shed! Our resident experts are here to help with any gardening problems you may care to throw at THEM – that’s Gordon Honkmonster, Binkie Homebrew and Euphorbia Marmelade. The one hiding behind the dustbin is our chairman, Alan Goatrouser. First out of the bin is a slightly singed missive from Belisha Sutherley-Wyndebagge of Beggars Bush. She writes: ‘Well - I’d always heard that good fences make good neighbours. So I put in a really nice wicker fence, but I noticed that the next door neighbours had uprooted it and created a humanoid figure out of the bits. Then they tried to put our Cecil inside it and set fire to it. I don’t think that’s a good neighbourly thing to do at all. Once again, the so-called experts
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get it wrong.’ Gordon’s shaking his head. ‘For best results, you need to match the style of your fence to the neighbours you want to make good. A ditch – around 35’ deep and about a yard across – should help. But the crucial element is the fence itself; in your case a high voltage electric number, suitable for restraining a variety of animals, will do the trick. It should also stop them widdling on your lawn.’ And the lawn is the subject of our next query, an email from Gerbil Sprout of Dorking. He writes: ‘Someone nicked the grass box from my lawn mower, so I thought the best thing to do was to replace all the grass with Astroturf. I had enough Astroturf left over to make a nice green furry jacket, too, which I wear when I go to the shop to replace my surgical truss. But now everyone’s sniggering about me behind my back. They say I’m a pillock. What shall I do?’
troturf is that it looks SO artificial. What you need to do is to apply some worm casts, a couple of dandelions, a dog turd and a small flock of house sparrows to recreate that authentic look. You can also put some of this material on the ‘lawn’. That should stop them laughing at you!’ So – that’s all we’ve got time for today. But wait; here’s our usual lastminute text message from Maisie Tonkers, aged 8. You know how we like to encourage our young gardeners: ‘No – untie your little brother at once, and take those stinging nettles out from under his t-shirt. No, it doesn’t matter that it’s the third lolly he’s nicked this week. Just stop it, there’s a dear …’ Meanwhile, feel free to send us photos of your gardening disasters. We will have a good laugh before putting them into the recycling, and the most daring of them may even get to be reproduced as a nice design on a tea towel!
Euphorbia’s quick off the mark … ‘Well, the problem with using As-
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LETTERS TO THE ED
Letters to the Editor
Random acts of humour
The Editor, Foghorn Magazine, 7 Birch Grove, Lostock Green, Northwich. CW9 7SS E-mail: billstott@lineone.net
The Bourne Identity I have been doing some digging into the family roots. Apparently I am related to an Orang-utan called Eric on my father’s side and a rare species of lemur on my mother’s. I have traced my roots back through Crippen, Jack the Ripper, The Borgias, Genghis Khan and Thrug the awkward to a slime mould in the Cambrian. Thankfully Geoffrey Archer appears nowhere on my tree. Anyone else got interesting ancestors? Duncan Bourne
Not mushroom for error Dear Sir, Many thanks for placing our advertisement for The Glossop Festival of Fun. Unfortunately, due to an administrative problem, you received typographically incorrect copy. It should read, “The Glossop Festival of Fungus”, celebrating as it does, all manner of things which grow in dark, moist places. Please accept my apologies for any confusion this error may have caused. Yours sincerely, Elspeth Groynes [Mrs] Glossop Tourism and Events Board.
“Actually, I’ve always wanted to design roller-coasters for a living.”
A doctor writes Dear Me , as you say many distant away in your country. Greetings from my country. As you are knowing Dragvonia is highly thinking of cartooning British, but disappointment our companion now there are not any enterings from your cartoonies to our last week competition. Unkel Bippi, 17 time winner of Dragvonia Golden Kondom, say you not do this because theme of competition, “Clinical Depression and Crop Failure” not to make you laughing.How can this be? I ache for you reply; Gorosvandia! Dr Ivan Nudda Dragvonia House of Cartoon. WWW.PROCARTOONISTS.ORG
Middle-aged angst
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FEATURE NATHAN ARISS
An Actor Pontificates Foghorn invited the World-renowned actor and tragedian Mason Ayres to share some of his more lucid memories with us. Nathan Ariss was there to keep him company and to jot down some of the long words. All hail, fair acolytes of Thebes! I am called thus, by the divine good grace of Providence, to furnish the wider world with an account - a simple thing, but all mine own! - of this poor player’s life upon the stage. But I need no epitaphs, no sycophants to sound my name; let Theatre be my clarion call, my garb, my grave and victory! Such is our fate - our lot - we actors, whose name is, er, are legion. Why, one may be a Prince by day, and a very Pauper by night (Mon-Sat, excluding matinées). And what care I if the name of Mason Ayres is but a very large footnote in the annals of Dramatic Art, if I have served the noble craft in some small way? The playing’s the thing! Those of you who are indeed fortunate enough to have caught my many theatrical appearances will no doubt be amazed, and somewhat humbled, to hear how such a rôlemodel as I, a veritable Titan of the Mummers (“Mason Ayres’ largerthan-life acting leaves one simply gob-smacked!” – The Clitheroe Times), can lead such a simple life away from these precious boards. Well, for the record, I am just as you are: I, too, sometimes ‘pop down’ to the butchers’ or eat toast; I read the papers and go on caravanning holidays to the Mendip Hills; I have even been – yes, I! – a little starstruck and tongue-tied ‘round other Giants of the Green (modesty forbids me mention whom, as Trevor used to say!), so I can entirely empathise with how you, dear reader, must be feeling right now, to be sat there almost within spitting distance of genius. Ah, but where to begin?! Shall I 8 THE FOGHORN
regale you with my tragedies or my comedies; my historicals or pastorals? Perhaps the tragi-comedies or comical-historicals… (Edited due to space constraints) or not? In life - as so often in performance, don’t you find? - one must always be ready to shift from comedy to tragedy in an instant (“I didn’t know whether to laugh or cry!!”- The Musselborough Gazette), and sometimes, of course, the other way round. Well, I have given my Lear and my Bottom to those two great impostors, Fate…, er. I smile at the fickle fingers of Fortune; the gods who have wrought such challenges upon me, yet brought such ample compensations; such desires and ambitions, and yet such talents to achieve them. For all the many pathways and slip roads on life’s highway; the myriad lanes and cul-de-sacs; the T-junctions; the diverse, um, diversions and forks in the road… (See above) cannot hope to fashion out my course in so simple a cloth, nor account but in meagre part, for this gift I so unworthily am possessed of. As you will no doubt recall from ‘An Actor Prepays’ (© Mason Ayres): “There is no such thing as ‘acting’; there is only ‘being’!” I personally find that there is no separation between the craft and the very living of it! Why, I sometimes spend the entire evening watching television in character, and once I even took the dog out for a walk dressed as Richard III, complete with the hunch and antalgic limp! And that was a very long walk back, I can tell you. But I see Time’s winged chariot draw near, so I must, I fear, be brief, and, in conclusion, like a wanton satyr presaging the fall of Dionysus, or
as an epilogue, delivered sotto voce, leave you with a humble entreaty to please be so kind as to purchase my ‘Master Class on Acting: How to Become a Really, Really Good Actor’, by Mason Ayres (available exclusively by mail order), in which you will learn the advanced techniques of: stage-fighting with children and small animals; holding various pieces of period crockery throughout the Ages (improv sessions still available); and - perhaps most importantly! - exactly how to hail a black cab at half-past two on a cold, wet night at the bottom of the Haymarket, just where… (Yup), among many other things. Please do send any unused cheques you may have to: Mason Ayres. WWW.PROCARTOONISTS.ORG
FEATURE CURMUDGEON
Random acts of humour
Utter Gobbins
“Oh darling, how wonderful he’s playing our song!”
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labelled “easy fit” isn’t. And the phone WILL ring when I’m trying to sneak a swift nod. The caller will NOT be a financially profligate editor begging for cartoons, or a relative with news that my granny has exploded for a fifth and final time. Instead, it WILL be somebody who wants to know if I’m the householder and would I like my loft lagged. Even on the rare occasions I’m wide awake and willing to chat, mobiles are much worse. “So what happened then ?” “Well, Mr SSSZZSSST ame in a h got the PCHCHCHTTT….lump hammer and sai- I- a- u………… sfmn. sssssssssssssss “ “Hello? Hello ?” Cars turn probabilities into dead certs. If, being mindful of the fact that there are many motorists out there who really shouldn’t be, and you try to park well away from anybody else in Tesco’s carpark, when you return to your vehicle, a gobbin or gobbette WILL have parked close enough to your driver’s door to compel a passenger side entrance, necessitating crutch-splitting negotiations of the gear stick. Carpark gobbins also follow you to deserted beaches, sit next to you, play Radio One, sing along, go “Yeah !” and have the bloody nerve to smile.
The ordinary hum-drum day – to day course of my life suggests that The Theory of Probability is redundant as a theory. Probability is fact. Pure and simple. Oft- repeated scenarios prove this. And I’m not talking about dropped toast always landing butter side down. Besides, the toast thing’s got nothing to do with mathematical predictability. Its all about gravity and butter being magnetic. Drop unbuttered toast and it doesn’t matter which side hits the floor. Butter it and said dairy product always finds the carpet first. But it’s the countless other not – really – coincidences which wear me out. For example, packaging which [writes Dr Whimbrel ; I have read flaunts itself as being “reseal- the foregoing and find that it is utable” definitely won’t. Anything ter tosh. Probably.]
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THE TREVELYAN FILES
The Trevelyan Files Chapter Five - the grand finale! What becomes of our eponymous hero? Settle back, don your reading trousers and proceed... Trevelyan reeled as he was dragged towards the waiting powerful black saloon, Big ‘Arry at the wheel. Dr Demenzia scuttled before them, chortling as only bald, deranged, cross-dressing criminal scientists with pointy metal things under their coats can. As Red Angus and Johnny No – nose prepared to bundle the ace ‘tec into the powerful black saloon’s cavernous boot, Treveyan’s mind raced with the myriad unanswered questions which tumbled through his double first brain. Why do those American coves call the boot the trunk? What on earth was depleted uranium? But more importantly, what fate awaited him at Demenzia’s Harris Tweed factory? One thing was sure. If the two ruffians hauling him towards the powerful black saloon succeeded in locking him in the boot, the game would be up. Demenzia paused, turned and looked deep into Treveyan’s eyes. “I suppose its only fair to tell you how you’ll meet your end, Trevelyan. Soon, your lifeless body will be shredded, the remains dried then woven into the first of my new range of Harris Tweed underpants, cut in the Continental fashion. And by way of sweet revenge, Trev-
elyan, that first pair will be presented to The King when His Majesty opens the shooting season at Balmoral!” Trevelyan staggered. The fiend. The utter bally fiend! Cut in the Continental fashion? That meant dressing either side! Ye Gods! Trevelyan prepared for one last desperate throw of the dice. He could not let his Monarch wear Continental underpants. Trevelyan knew where that could lead. It must not happen. He turned away from Demenzia and his aniseed ball breath. Fixing Red Angus with a steady gaze he said quietly, “I understand your colleague Mr Nonose considers Celtic to be a team of
continental pansies with English forebears.” The effect was electrifying. Red Angus released Trevelyan and fell upon his brother in crime, roaring, “Aaaarrrrrr ach m’doddle ooo’er the trossachs, aaaarrrrr!” The grappling pair tottered, and with a despairing yell of, “Aaaarrrr! We’re doomed, we’re all doomed!” fell into the unfathomable depths of the slurry pit. Several things happened at once. The powerful black saloon roared away, leaving a defeated Dr Demezia at Treveyan’s mercy and a lady in Glossop fell downstairs having tripped over her new – fangled electric vacuum cleaner. But Treveyan had no knowledge of this. Instead he gripped Demenzia by his scrawny neck and heard in the distance the unmistakeable sound of an O-6-0 Gresley rebuild approaching at speed. Within minutes, Trevelyan had chained a blubbering Demenzia to the old engine’s buffer beam, clapped his friend Bert Nubbins on the back in silent, manly thanks and bellowed into the night in a deep resonant baritone, “To the Harris Tweed factory. We’ve underpants to burn!” So it’s au revoir Mansard Trevelyan! Look out in the next issue for something new and just as utterly pointless. Goodnight!
The Gallery
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ADRIAN TEAL CARICATURE
Adrian Teal hits the Recognition Button There’s a theory about caricature – and I agree with it, for what it’s worth – that we all carry around in our brains a model of the ‘perfect’ human head, and that what the caricaturist does is exaggerate the elements of a face which deviate from, or fall short of, that perfect image. This is why the young and pretty celebrities who spring up from nowhere all the time are so difficult to turn into grotesques: they don’t do much deviating. Having said that, the caricaturist’s job should be easier now than it has ever been. The mass media supplies us with all the photographic and televisual source material we could ever need, and thanks to that same media the consumer can recognize a public figure on a front page from fifty paces, which means if we’ve done our job properly, our caricatures will hit the Recognition Button without us having to telegraph exactly who it is we are trying to lampoon. This certainly wasn’t al-
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ways the case when Gillray was scribbling away in TV-free Georgian London. There are, of course, certain tricks that all of us use to help the recognition process along, such as Prince Charles’s big ears (which aren’t, in reality, particularly big, but everyone thinks they are, so we exploit that prejudice). We’d be fools not to cheat a little. And over time, we tend to reduce public figures to their component parts, which is why Thatcher usually ended up as little more than a pointy beak, hooded eyes, alarming teeth and a bouffant. But before we reach that stage of boiled down likeness, we have to work out what someone (a French caricaturist, I think) once called the ‘unique architecture’ of the face in question, and in this respect, I think every caricaturist has his or her own approach. My general approach goes like this…. I start by looking at some good, well-lit photos of the victim, and let a few first impressions sink in. Then, I put the photos to one side, rough out a general shape of the head, and slot in the general positions of the features. Then I lay a sheet of thin paper on top, go back to the photos, and start tracing and refining my decisions. I often repeat the process, but look at the head from a different angle. This helps me work out exactly how the face is constructed. I might do this three of four times, but I try to ensure I don’t ignore my first and roughest sketch, because the first impressions are the most important. When we meet someone for the first time, the elements of their face which deviate from that mental model of perfection I men-
tioned earlier are very clear to us, and the caricaturist must try not to lose those first impressions. This might explain why I find it difficult to caricature members of my own family. I’ve known them too long, and I know them too well. I don’t have a lot of time for caricaturists who base their portraits on a single photograph, and try to make their work an exaggerated, ‘realistic’ version of that one snap. The very best caricatures are born of the hard toil of poring over as much visual information as one can get one’s hands on. View the head from every angle, and in different lights. See if you can catch the expression that sums up that person’s demeanour and personality. I honestly believe you almost have to think your way into their heads, like an actor or an impressionist. You have to come to a conclusion as to how you feel about them, and you have to see them talking, performing, laughing, lying, or crying in your mind’s eye, and then put that down on paper. If you can do that, then you’ll be a caricaturist, my son. THE FOGHORN 11
CARTOONS CLIVE GODDARD
“May I ask what it’s in connection with?”
Cartoons by
“No response. We’ll have to use the corporate logo flashcards again.”
“Day 57. The tigers appear to be adjusting to my presence.” 12 THE FOGHORN
“Brian’s a professor of stating the bleeding obvious.” WWW.PROCARTOONISTS.ORG
THE FOGHORN GUIDE TO
In consultation with world famous experts in All Sorts of Things, these Foghorn Guides seek to offer the unwary reader safe passage through Life’s apparent contradictions. The Foghorn Guide to Countryfolk [q.v. but you’ve probably chucked it away] touched on the following briefly, but now examines it in greater and wholly biased detail. Below are two main things to remember: 1] Guns, if waved about or even discharged in shopping centres or banks or Meadowsweet Avenue, Glossop are BAD. [unless you’re an armed police officer acting on the orders of a dim spy.] 2] Guns are GOOD when used to kill birds and animals which don’t have opposable thumbs. Or which DO have opposable thumbs but are too thick to be able to buy their own guns. Part of the UK’s rich pastoral heritage includes “The Glorious Twelfth” [of August, natch.] Prior to this day, gamekeepers spend their working hours supervising the mating, hatching and rearing that most dangerous of birds, The Pheasant. Why do they do this? Well it’s a job, right? It’s what we do round ‘ere. Swot we’ve always done. Way of life innit. Traditional. Clear off, townie! Anyway, the point is, they’re very good at it and were it not for the timely intervention of men [mostly] with guns, after the twelfth of August, we’d be knee – deep in the flappy creatures and society as we know it would become like Switzerland. Or Woy – Woy. [exactly why is unclear, but this is the opinion of our chief researcher, Dr J.C. Whimbrel, Emeritus Professor of Probability, Goole Drop – In Centre.] Fortunately, after the said date, men with guns, many of them toffs or money launderers or musical entertainers are taken to where the deadly pheasants lurk, and wait for local yokels to encourage the nasty, treacherous birds to fly up into the air. Then the men with guns blow them to pieces, [the pheasants, that is, although a yokel might occasionally be blown to bits as well, by accident WWW.PROCARTOONISTS.ORG
of course, and this is known as “a tragedy”] and there is a lot of blood, which is the point, because the men and the scary women with guns aren’t hungry and don’t eat the pheasants they kill. They kill them because they can. This is called “esoteric” or “part of the rural heritage” and urban oicks like you won’t understand. Clear so far ? But killing birds and animals and getting to see lots of blood and painful death can be achieved without the use of guns. Some equestrian types [Fog45 q.v. but you’ve probably chucked it away] often dress up in strange clothes, jump on horses, equip themselves with large gangs of dogs and chase foxes so that they can watch the dogs corner the horrid fox and tear it limb from limb, causing the nasty fox unimaginable agony and giving it the novel experience of watching a fellow dog eat its entrails. “The Hunt”, as these gatherings [one of which lives in Berkely] are called rarely manage to do this because the average fox is much more intelligent than the average pretentious fat berk on a horse. Why do they do this ? Dr Whimbrel’s conclusions are interesting. He précis them thus; “People who employ yokels to breed pheasants so that they may kill pheasants with guns are cruel bastards, have screws loose and a personality disorder. People who like to watch dogs disembowelling foxes are also cruel bastards and their personalities are buggered up beyond belief. They believe that even though they may be middle – aged, balding, pot- bellied property developers with erectile dysfunction, killing animals makes them powerful.” Thank you, Dr Whimbrel. [Letters to the editor objecting to this article will be read, screwed up and discarded, because you’re wrong, see? Wrong, wrong, wrong. And God will get you. When you least expect it. In the loo, putting out the wheelie bin, half way through Corrie, or whilst stealing underwear from next door’s washing line] THE FOGHORN 13
BUILDINGS IN THE FOG
In over my head No buildings this time, but a matter of design. Actually a matter of design that dates back to when design wasn’t really a matter. It’s something that needs some severely lateral thinking, or perhaps, more appropriately, blue skies thinking. That sort of thinking comes naturally to cartoonists, so we might find the ideal design solution for this problem. I am talking about aircraft overhead luggage; that frustrating moment in air travel when you board the aircraft and endure a strange ludicrous ritual that seems to take forever. There are those passengers who have somehow managed to board with bags clearly larger than the maximum dimensions allowed, so that they don’t fit the locker. There are those who have the right size luggage but who can’t use their locker because it’s For Crew Use Only, or because of some quirk of the aircraft’s structure their locker is only large enough for a couple of magazines. Or someone whose seat is right of the gangway has put has bag in the locker on the left. Those then who can’t use their lockers fling their bags in someone else’s space, or the cabin crew might grab it and stuff it anywhere they fancy. Passengers later in the boarding queue then discover their allocated storage space is already full so, again, these people stuff their bags elsewhere. If you try to be helpful by stowing your bag under the seat in front of you, which 14 THE FOGHORN
they announce you can do, the cabin crew usually helpfully insist on removing it and finding a last gap in a locker at the other end of the plane. Some customers are too frail to hoik up their bag into the locker and after several failed attempts that have succeeded in bashing various parts of nearby passengers, usually someone becomes frustrated enough to do it for them. Other passengers who have never flown before look bewildered by the experience and do everything very, very slowly, immobilising the queue of passengers behind. Others plonk their bags on their seats, rummage inside them for their magazine, book, bottle of water and a banana for the flight, again holding up the queue, before they put their bags up. In winter times, heavy outdoor coats add to the storage chaos. These are coats that are not needed to be worn on the aircraft, the fully enclosed access gangways or inside the airports at each end. Once all the luggage is wedged in the lockers the cabin crew march down the gangway slamming shut the locker doors, doing untold harm to anything precious in a soft bag. It all becomes a crazy muddle which is then sorted out somehow when everyone stands up when the plane has landed and come to a stop and the captain is thinking about switching
off the engines. The process of removing all that luggage from above people’s vulnerable bonces in fraught with danger. Has anyone been on a full flight on a normal passenger jet when this boarding palaver has taken less than ten minutes? Aircraft take off slots can be missed by it What is it all for? The vast majority of passengers do not access their cabin luggage at all once on the aircraft. So why does it have to be with them? Sure, just having cabin luggage speeds your exit from the airport, but that does not mean that it has to be put above you in the cabin on the flight. The system of overhead lockers we have today has not changed since I first flew back in the sixties so I suspect it hasn’t changed since whenever they were first introduced. Why not? What we have is a totally crazy system that is disruptive, inefficient, dangerous and unnecessary. There has to be a better way. So enter the cartoonists, the lateral thinkers. Let’s find that logical solution. Rethink the interior of the aircraft or the procedures before we get on and off the planes. We can then claim that with wit and imagination this tricky issue has been Solved By Cartoonists. Roger Penwill
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THE LAST WORD
The Critic Strictly Legroom
Foghorn’s resident TV critic Pete Dredge goes dancing. There’s a pungent whiff of flogged dead horse emanating from the latest series of Strictly Come Dancing. Not so much from this season’s extra surfeit of ageing celebs or from the panto arch-villain panel of judges or, indeed, the increasingly corpselike Brucie but from the rapidly dying format itself. It’s Series 8 but it seems like we’ve sat through a whole lot more of this once phenomenally successful tv dance competition. There’s been some tweaking to the format and voting systems but as the years go by the all too familiar flouncy judges cry of “It’s a dance competition, sweetie!” has been more vigorously riposted by the voting public in traditional panto style with, “Oh no it isn’t. It’s an entertainment show you big girls’ blouse!” Good God, it seemed like only yesterday that we were cruelly denied the prospect of John Sergeant actually winning the damn thing . Did he resign or was he pushed? We will never
know but it was a great story at the time and did John Sergeant’s World Cruise Lecture Tour career no harm at all. I’m not sure what goal-keeping legend Peter Shilton’s doing here though. The usual trend has been to include recently retired ‘eye candy’ sporting stars who are still relatively fit and agile and are not likely to pull something in the first week (female pro dancers excepted of course). The likes of Mark Ramprakesh, Austin Healey, Matt Dawson and Darren Gough all progressed well in the competition. Willie Thorne was an exception, but snooker is hardly a sport, is it. Shilts, on the other hand, hasn’t kicked a ball in anger for twenty years or more so he must be hoping that Ann Widdecombe, Paul Daniels or Pamela Stephenson don’t all pick up the popular vote. Mind you, he probably needs the money. Wasn’t much around when he was at his professional peak so a good run in Strictly could open a few
doors by the time the Panto Season kicks in. But he was a graceful mover in the penalty box. Slightly hunched with bouncy gate and nimble of foot he should still be able to move around the dance floor with a certain amount of elan. One can only hope he doesn’t make a complete arse of himself. Cue Ann Widdecombe and the Cha-cha-cha...
Andy Davey WWW.PROCARTOONISTS.ORG
THE FOGHORN 15
“Yes, I always get a lovely show in this border - it’s where I bury my husbands.”
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