Christmas Cartoon Pick of the Week

The festive season is upon us, so this week Bloghorn has a bulging sack full of Christmas themed cartoons...

One: Simon Bond in Private Eye: 'City Christmas Tree 2008'

Two: From Tony Holland in the Spectator, the credit crunch hits the Twelve Days of Christmas

Three: Christmas tree dressing at Number 10 for Peter Brookes in the Times

Four: Martin Rowson in Tribune shows the Three Wise Men investing poorly

Five: The Guardian asked artists, singers and comedians to "reinvent" Santa Claus, including Gerald Scarfe

Six: Royston Robertson in Reader's Digest on good health at Christmas

Seven: Patrick Blower has a Livedraw animation on media-savvy shepherds

Eight: Will "Wilbur" Dawbarn in Reader's Digest on the season of goodwill in a bad neighbourhood

Nine: Matt "Hack" Buck in Tribune on the non-jingling tills

The PCO: Great British cartoon talent
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The Big Draw banners for sale

Back in November we blogged about the PCO's team for Transports of Delight – a cartoon banner competition held at St Pancras rail station in London as part of the The Big Draw.

Well, now you can own a piece of cartooning history as the four banners in the competition (from The Guardian, The Independent, Private Eye and the PCO) are being auctioned off on eBay, with all proceeds going to the Campaign for Drawing, a charity whose purpose is to promote drawing as a tool to support learning, and cultural and social engagement for all ages and abilities.

The winning banner from The Independent (Dave Brown, Tim Sanders, Chris Burke and Bloghorn Editor Matt Buck)

The Guardian (Steve Bell, Martin Rowson, Tim Pond and PCO Chair leg Andy Davey)

Private Eye (Andrew Birch, Richard Jolley, Simon Pearsall and Ken Pyne)

and last but not least the Professional Cartoonists' Organisation (Pete Dredge, Robert Duncan, Kipper Williams and Bloghorn writer Royston Robertson)

Hurry though, if you do want to make a bid, as the auctions end on the evening of Monday 22nd December!

The PCO: Great British cartoon talent
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Cartoon Pick of the Week

Bloghorn spotted this great work this week...

One: Stephen Hutchinson (aka Bernie) in Private Eye on child protection officers

Two: Gerald Scarfe in the Sunday Times on India

Three: A spot of blowing our own Foghorn ... Noel Ford on the cover of the new Christmas issue of the PCO's cartoon magazine. (Below – click image to enlarge). Subscribe to The Foghorn here

The PCO: Great British cartoon talent

Cartoon Pick of the Week

Bloghorn spotted this great work this week ...

One: Mike Turner in Private Eye on things financial

Two: Morten Morland in The Times: "Going down"

Three: Paul Thomas in The Express: On resigning

Week ending 3rd October 2008

The PCO: British cartoon talent

Cartoon Pick of the Week

Bloghorn spotted this great work this week...

One: Mike Williams in Private Eye on something feline

Two: Colin Whittock in the Birmingham Mail: "All the best spots have been nicked by bankers ..."

Three: Tim Sanders in The Independent: Just say cheese!

The PCO: British cartoon talent

Cartoon Pick of the Week

Bloghorn spotted this great work this week...

One: Peter Brookes in The Times on gunning for Sarah Palin

Two: Clay Bennett at timesfreepress.com on Barack Obama: a tough act to follow

But enough US elections, already ... Three: Wilbur Dawbarn in Private Eye looks at the the gravity of the situation

The PCO: British cartoon talent

The not-the-PCO-artist-of-the-month-post

Bloghorn is going to be taking a break from our regular Friday feature during April as we feel we may have a lot on our plate with the upcoming cartoon festival. PCOer Martin Honeysett has submitted this piece for the But is it art show up in Shrewsbury.

British cartoon talent

The sex appeal of the creative mind

PCOer Neil Dishington, spots, paraphrases and even quotes from an item from The Times newspaper, as follows;

"The sex appeal of the creative thinker was in part because the possession of a lively creative mind is considered an attractive feature in either sex."

"These lucky people started with the advantage of being considered attractive before they had begun their chat-up line."

"Even being in a regular relationship doesn’t stop their tally rising, for they are usually forgiven any infidelity as this is expected of a creative person."

Neil summarises, cartoonists are creative thinkers...aren’t they?

Bloghorn can only applaud the wisdom of this last observation, the vigilant eye of Mr Dishington, and agree wholeheartedly with parts of the claims made by the research and original words. Although, it ought to be pointed out that the journalist responsible for reporting the original piece, which you may find here, is known by Private Eye as Dr Thomas Utterfraud.

Belief might also be shaken by personal field research, certainly the sound of female cackling chez Bloghorn, has not ceased since the subject was raised.

The last word (and picture) to Mr Dishington.


He’s ’oozing’ something but it’s not sex appeal
3rd January 2008
British cartoon talent

The Big Draw 2007 - pictures

Team PCO at work-the picture gives some idea of the up and down nature of the artist-watcher relationship inside Covent Garden’s covered market.

Eventual winners - Team Guardian at work. From left from right, Steve Bell, Tim Pond, Andy Davey and Martin Rowson.

Three-quarters of team Independent. From left to right, Tim Sanders, Lucy Rogers and Matt Buck, regrettably, the multi-skilled Dave Brown has managed to get himself off camera.

Private Eye worked in a lot of detail
Many thanks to PCOer Chichi Parrish for the further photographs.

British cartoon talent

PCO Procartoonists - The Big Draw 2007

A news entry in which we learn how to coordinate a team of four cartoonists, all with different ideas, into making a 12 feet long banner in under two hours.

Team skipper, Bill Stott, reports thus;


The finished PCO banner hung up, or out, to dry.

The PCO Big Draw banner team, Roger Penwill, Alex Hughes, Neil Dishington and Bill Stott, arrived on time, splendidly turned out in new PCO T shirts (trousers were their own choice), at Covent Garden on Sunday 14th. The place was awash with sophisticates, and, in the Private Eye team area at least, best bitter.
The Big Draw event fairly hummed when at full scribble ; cartoonists everywhere, helping and hinting, and the public generally proving yet again that they love cartoons.

Using military precision and forty seven swear words, your team dealt swiftly with the first problem – that being the banner’s actual length – NOT 12 metres, as we’d been told, but 12 FEET. That meant the jettisoning of several good gags including Dish’s one which features the entire cast of Wagner’s Ring cycle. Undeterred, and calling on all their Shrewsbury Big Board experience, Team PCO produced a cracker. Compere for the event, Andrew Marr, confided that he liked ours the best. So there!

Sadly we’d reckoned without localised skullduggery. The Guardian and Private Eye teams had brought with them hordes of rowdy troops, doubtless bribed with free tube tickets and promises of double helpings of tiny post- drawing canapés, and as the banners were judged on volume of applause... erm...PCO didn’t win. But then, moral victories are sweeter. (Quite so says BLOGHORN - and we thank you Mr Marr.)


Competition compere, judge and cartoon fan, Andrew Marr, gives the result to the Covent Garden crowds.

The whole Big Draw event was a vibrant advert for our job, a sartorial triumph for the PCO team, the ingenuity and skill of the Independent, Guardian and PCO teams (but not the Private Eye team who cheated and had FIVE drawings on their banner and not four – you know who you are, Steve Way), and not least for the organisers who all did very well, but who should perhaps take an Imperial/Metric conversion course.

So – bring it on for 2008 ! When Team PCO plans to be supported by 250 recently ASBOed Tranmere Rovers football fans.

BLOGHORN would like to add something to Bill’s report - the PCO actually had members in all four of the teams - ourselves, Private Eye (hello to Ken Pyne), The Guardian (congratulations to Andy Davey) and the Independent (hard cheese to Matt Buck) so, some part of the PCO won anyway.

The best British cartoon talent
Thanks to Ger Whyman for the photographs

PCO Procartoonists - The art business by Ken Pyne

PCO member Ken Pyne writes:

I went to a recent exhibition and overheard a cartoonist humbly thanking one of the organisers for lowering themselves to include cartoonists with 'proper' artists.



It is this Uriah Heep attitude I have heard over the years from cartoonists that keeps us down, and while it exists among us, we cannot easily complain about how badly we are treated as a profession, if we are going to do this sort of thing ourselves.

For God's sake we need to show some bloody self worth now and again instead of just whingeing in pub corners!

Bloghorn says click P for Pyne and a fine selection of to-the-point cartoons.

PCO Procartoonists - The Big Draw

Coming soon PCO Procartoonists at London's Big Draw. Get the details here and here.

PCO Procartoonists - The Big Draw

The PCO will be fielding a team of cartoonists at this year's Big Draw event on Sunday October 14th.

Part of the annual festival of drawing is being held in London's Covent Garden this year and the PCO team have been invited to participate in the 'Battle of the Cartoonists' where professional artists bid to outdo each others’ creations in an art time-trial. Our competition is going to include cartoonists from The Guardian and Independent newspapers and Private Eye magazine.

The Big Draw is one of the activities of the national Campaign for Drawing.


Here is a picture of last year's event at Somerset House which took place when the PCO was little more than a twinkle in the eye of some cartoonists...

In the run-up to this year's big day, Bloghorn will be posting a few more photographs and we'll obviously, also be reporting on our activities after the event itself.

Bloghorn must thank PCO member Gerard Whyman (Ger) for the photographs of last year's event and recommends clicking a W for Whyman here

PCO Procartoonists - Artist of the month: Pete Dredge

Pete Dredge is the PCO's Artist of the Month for September. Bloghorn says click D for Dredge for more

PCO Procartoonists - Artist of the month: Pete Dredge

Pete sold his first cartoon to Punch in 1976 and has been going strong ever since. He has been a regular contributor of gag cartoons and cartoon strips to Private Eye for many years - as well as working for many other publications and businesses.

In between all the work, Pete also managed to set up and run a highly successful cartoon festival in his hometown of Nottingham. Sadly, this eventually became a victim of its own success and got too big for Pete and his volunteer team to maintain without the help a funded, full or part-time, organiser. At this point, the Arts Council failed its audition for the role of hero.

There's an interview with the enterprising Mr Dredge, courtesy of BBC Nottingham, here.

Bloghorn says click D for Dredge