Cathy's Art Diary

Charming exhibition at Ditchling Museum of Art and Craft in the life and work of the illustrator Raymond Briggs. The show was beautifully described with lots of quotes from Briggs and included a rich selection of original artwork. It was accompanied by a lovely video of an interview with him. The show also looked at his technique and compared different approaches. From the opening case of memorabilia inspired by his books I was hooked. I loved seeing the portraits of his parents painted on cupboard doors from his house. I hadn’t realised how groundbreaking his books were with “Father Christmas” being one of the first British picture books to use the comic strip format. Closed 27 October 2024 Reviews Times Telegraph

Neat small exhibition at the British Library looking at sea and island pictures by the author Mervyn Peake. The library has been given Peake’s visual archive and this show focused on illustrations of the sea and islands, themes he returned to throughout his career. I must admit I know him more as a writer although I did know he illustrated his novels. There were a couple of individual works as well as three sets for books although one was an early unpublished work he produced with a friend. I loved the fine detail in these pieces which complimented the stories but worked as independent art works as well. Closed 25 February 2024    

Interesting  little display at the Victoria and Albert Museum of Paul Nash’s illustration work for books. Nash’s earliest ambition was to be an illustrator and he continued to do commercial work as a source of income. There were some nice examples and I particularly liked the work for Richard Aldington’s book of First World War poetry “Images of War” which combined realism and Vorticistism as I love Nash’s war work. I also discovered a book I’d not come across called “Memoirs of Other Fronts” by John Rodker about his experiences as a conscientious objector which I am off to look up. Closes 13 August 2023    

Charming exhibition at Foyles on Charing Cross Road of illustrations by Tom de Freston. The show featured work from two books "Julia and the Shark" and "Leila and the Blue Fox", both by his wife Kiran Millwood Hargrave, with a mix of prints and original work shown in a nicely designed space with his characters cropping up between the exhibits and around the walls. There were good explanations of his working methods. Each finished image is a collage using various techniques to build depth. I loved the finished product particularly the more abstract pieces like the one shown here which had layers of paint over a map. I also liked his sweet small drawings of the animals and people in the stories. Closes 27 November 2023

Interesting exhibition at the Victoria and Albert Museum of the winners of this year’s Illustration awards. I always try to go to this show and I always discover new work I’d not come across before. There are four categories for a book cover, book illustration, journalistic illustration and student work. My favourite this year, shown here, is a book cover by Kerry Hyndman for a Stella Gibbons book I’d not come across so I discovered a picture and a book. As it was the 50th anniversary of the award there was a wall dedicated to previous winners and runners up and I remembered a few. It was odd to see Quintin Blake just getting a second in 1996. Closes 9 October 2022

Interesting display at the Foundling Museum looking at the creative process between author and illustrator in producing a children’s book. “Don’t Ask the Dragon” is by Lemn Sissay and Gregg Stobbs and this display shows ideas for the book and the final illustrations along with a conversational commentary between them about the process. It was fascinating to see how ideas changed, presented in same narrative order as the book. I was particularly moved to see that Stobbs the illustrator had given Sissay one of the drawings which wasn’t used for his birthday as it reminded him of the first time they met. Closes 9 October 2022

Interesting exhibition at the Garden Museum looking at the book by Frances Hodgson Burnett. The show tells the story via different illustrators since its publication in 1911 from the original Charles Robinson through EH Shepherd of Winnie the Pooh fame to the latest interactive version by MinaLima. There is a little section on film versions but I’d like to have seen more and some information on the authors own gardens but again I’d have liked to see more particularly on Maytham Hall on which Misselthwaite Manor is based.   Quite a lot of space was given to an installation which would be fun to take children’s photos in but doesn’t add a lot to the show. Because it’s the school holidays it’s very geared to children although I suspect its main audience is nostalgic adults. Closes 5 September 2022

Fun exhibition at the British Library looking at the children’s book character Paddington. This was a beautifully designed show with fun installations such as an animated breakfast table, pictures of different versions of Paddington walking round the walls of the show with you and good clips for the TV versions and the films. It was also packed full of original illustrations from many versions of the books and therefore became a history of illustration in the late 20th century. It explained various stories in the series using those illustration. The first toy version from 1972 was there and the typewriter that Michael Bond wrote the first stories on. Things I learnt? That Michael Bond had been a camera man on Blue Peter and that Paddington is a UNICEF champion for children. What a versatile bear! Closes 31 October 2021 Review Telegraph  

Interesting exhibition at the House of Illustration looking at the work of Maria Neurath who designed science books for children. Neurath devised a way of analysing complex information and distilling it into concise explanations using words and pictures in a technique called Isotype. The style was devised in Vienna in the 1920s with her husband Otto before she fled to England in 1942. Otto died in 1945 but she carried on her work. A lot of the books and illustrations on show did look familiar. The books were a little early for me but I think I was recognising a style which is now fairly common place. She used repetition of an image with slight changes to explain a concept or use large double page pictures to show complex structures such as an underground station. I loved the way her “The Wonder World of Nature” series were shown as open books, two to a frame, showing them off like art. I also liked displays which showed a work from initial idea to published books. ...

Delightful exhibition at the House of Illustration looking at the work of the cartoonist/graphic novelist Posy Simmmonds. I’ve been a Posy Simmonds fan since her work on the Guardian Women’s Page and have all the novels so it was wonderful to revisit her work and see her gentle satire of British life. I was laughing out loud from the first cartoon I read! It was lovely to see her childhood drawings which already parodied school friend style magazines and the show showed how her style changed as printing methods developed. It looked at her books for children as well and included a sketchbook for her book about the old Cat “Fred”. The last room was dedicated to her latest book “Cassandra Darke” and had the complete layout around the walls with lots of sketchbooks and preliminary drawings to show how the ideas developed. This was the first book she had produced digitally but it was reassuring to see that all the drawings were still hand done and her husband still typesets...

Nice little exhibition at the Victoria and Albert Museum showing the prize winners from their illustration awards for this year. Evidently this award has been running since 1972 but I must admit I’d not come across it before.   There were three categories book cover design, book illustration and illustrated journalism as well as a student award. The book illustration award has been won by “Heimat” by Nora Krug, a memoir of her journal investigating the lives of family members in Nazi Germany. It includes family photos and archive material brought together with illustrations to tell the story. It did make me want to read the book. The journalism award went to A. Richard Allen for a piece on the front page of the Money section of the Daily Telegraph. I loved the student award which went to Sophie Burrows’s wordless book which looked at loneliness in crowded places such as tube platforms. I have used a photograph of the book cover award work by Yehrin Tong to mark the ...

Fascinating book talk at Charleston Farmhouse as part of the Charleston Festival with Posy Simmonds talking about the process of writing her latest book “Cassandra Darke”.   Posy gave an illustrated talk on how the book evolved from early sketches saying how you started to give your characters clothes in in this case how Cassandra’s trappers hat isolates her from weather and the world. She told us how she draws the floorplans of characters and sketches their interiors so that she can see the characters in them.   Her sketches were art works in their own right regardless of how they are then used in the book. She talked about taking long bus rides to find locations for the book and how she uses those rides to look at people who she then sketches when she gets home.   She said she was taught to draw by looking. She told us how she works in crayon and paint and writes the story in long hand. Her husband then sets that text in speech bubbles. The event was cle...

I nteresting exhibition at the Fashion and Textile Museum of work by illustrator and journalist Elizabeth Suter. Suter covered the Paris collections for British magazines drawing the clothes from memory as sketching wasn’t allowed at the catwalk shows. She worked at St Martins from 1953 -1977 eventually becoming Head of Fashion. The pictures were a lovely representation of the fashion industry of the 1960s and included sketches and well as magazine layouts. They were drawn freely and expressively. Closes 2 June 2019

Lovely exhibition at the House of Illustration of work by John Vernon Lord.   The show looked at recent work by Lord illustrating three books by Lewis Carroll and two by James Joyce. I loved the inclusion of his note books in the show so you could see how ideas developed. The Carroll books used a lovely colour palette with lots of turquoise. They don’t show Alice herself but concentrate on what Alice can see. I loved the picture of the rabbit hole as it was full of little bookcases and cupboards.   In the Joyce books he saw the illustrations as a bridge of communication to the reader to illuminate the dense text. In his Ulysses pictures he includes a row of small illustrations along the bottom like a praedella on an altar piece. My favourite picture in the show was of Plurabelle from Finnegan’s Wake where he’d drawn her face on the surface of the sea. The detail was stunning. There was also a wonderful piece where Lord did a drawing a day throughout 2016, ...

Small exhibition at the House of Illustration looking at illustrations by Quentin Blake for two editions of the Cyrano de Bergerac book “Voyages to the Moon and the Sun”.   This book is seen as the first science fiction classic published in 1657. In it the main character travels to the moon, is imprisoned on earth, escapes to the sun and is put on trial by birds! OK I’m not rushing out to buy a copy but Blake was attracted to the work for the variety of subjects to draw.   As there were illustrations from two editions I’d have liked an indication on the pictures of which one they came from a bit more about the text which went with the pictures as I didn’t know the story. Some were easy to work out from the brief synopsis but others were a more obtuse.   I liked the fact these were the original drawings and some had notes to the publisher on them such as “Delete this monkey.” Closes 30 September 2018  

Fascinating exhibition at the House of Illustration looking at the illustrations and design work of Enid Marx.   Marx was at the Royal College of Art with Ravillious, Bawden, Hepworth and Moore but moved into design work in the 1920s. She specialised in abstract repeat patterns and there was wonderful wall of her utility designs from the Second World War. Most famously she designed some of the iconic London Underground fabrics and there was a good display on this talking about how the material has to be patterned so it doesn’t show the dirt.   Marx also designed and made hand printed pattern paper for the lining of book covers and there lovely examples of this both in books and as rolls of paper. From 1929 she moved into book illustration as well specialising in covers for Chatto and Windus and later for the King Penguin series and well as producing her won children’s books.    There was a also a nice display on her stamp designs including the Christmas st...

Annual exhibition at Somerset House of the shortlisted entries in this year’s World Illustration Awards. I always find this show interesting as it shows all the different ways illustration is used and it’s not just the book illustration you expect.   Entries which stood out this year included Paul Thurley’s National Treasures windows for John Lewis and and Boo Paterson’s take on East Coat railways posters to highlight refugee issues. My favourite piece was Josie Shenay’s “The Buildings That Made London” for National Archives which showed a circle of London buildings.   Closed on 20 June 2018

Fun exhibition at the Halcyon Gallery looking at the early illustration work of Andy Warhol.   I hadn’t realised that when Warhol moved to New York he began by working as an illustrator for fashion brands and he became one of the city’s most successful commercial artists. I’d also not know that he lived with his mother and 25 cats all but one called Sam!   I loved a wall of shoe pictures called “A La Recherche du Shoe Perdu” from when he worked for a shoe manufacture, with the captions transcribed by his mother. The colour was added to the prints at painting parties which he held.   There was also a copy of his first book “Wild Raspberries” a satirical cook book with tongue in cheek recipes such as Baked Hawaii and a set of lithographs from 1953 of star crossed lovers.   Closed 10 June 2018  

Interesting exhibition at Somerset House presenting the prize winners in the World Illustration Awards organised by the Association of Illustrators. I have been to the show before and am always amazed by the range of work on show through books, posters, information boards, stamps and wine labels. The works are arranged in the eight categories of the competition. I liked the way the exhibition showed the illustrations and then showed how they had been used in cases in the centre of the rooms. I loved a picture by Lisk Feng of a woman in a boat wearing a big hat pictured from above and Neil Webb’s design for Agatha Christie stamps. I was integrated by Joast Swarte’s pictures for a children’s book on artists related to the De Stiyl movement which seemed an odd idea. My favourite was Peter Greenwood’s poster for the Great Western Railway V150 train with its carriages made up of London landmarks. Closes on 28 August 2017  

Nice little exhibition at the House of Illustration of work by Quentin Blake illustrating a book by Beatrix Potter. Potter had sent the words for the book to her publisher in 1916 but only completed one picture. The text was rediscovered 100 years later in the Victoria and Albert Museum archive and Quentin Blake was commissioned to illustrate it. The pictures were very distinctive Blake and there were some lovely witty images. It would have been nice to have the text with the pictures as it was hard to piece the story together just from the pictures. There seemed to be odd images such as the cat shooting crows which I am sure fitted in but looked odd out of context. I did fall for a lovely picture of a line up of three sheep and book plate incorporating other Beatrix Potter characters.   Closes on 27 February 2017