One Sketch 365) (Monday 25th March) Morocco Mole - ONE YEAR - CHALLENGE SUCCESSFULLY COMPLETED

Morocco's a short sighted mole
Who'll rarely be found in a hole
I'm really quite sorry
He's like Peter Lorre
A rather ridiculous soul.

You'll have to take my word for it that I actually did make this sketch a week ago on Monday - but I promise you that I did. So why haven't I posted it? Well, because of inertia really. Rather than feeling as if a weight had been lifted from me on completing my one sketch challenge, suddenly not having it to do any more saw me filled with lethargy. It wasn't a question of how long would I keep going once the year was up. In fact I didn't make another sketch for 6 days, until the Llandaff sketch crawl with the sketchers group.

I've got my thoughts together now, and I will post them shortly.

One Sketch 344) (Monday 4th March) Featured artist Josef Lada

The officer's a frightful bore
There's worse things, though
When you're at war.

Featured artist on today's prompt was Josef Lada. This is a copy of one of his illustrations.

One Sketch 327) (Friday 15th Feb) Monsieur Orson Peluche

The teddy examines the train
"A mystery here, yet again!"
No driver, no guard
Oh isn't it hard
Such mysteries drive me insane"

I really didn't have time to make anything approaching a proper sketch yesterday. So I started doodling with a red biro on a piece of file paper during lunchtime and ten minutes later this is what I'd come up with. This is Orson Peluche (ours en peluche) the world famous Belgian teddy near detective, in a scene from his most famous case, "Orson Peluche et la Locomotive Abandonee. He has just discovered the abandoned locomotive and suspects foul play!

One Sketch 323) Tintin

A brave and loyal journalist
Adventurous, not showy
Did he ever have a human love?
Or only eyes for Snowy?

I say, that's a bit much. Steady the buffs. Given the prompt of Belgium, I decided on one of the two most famous fictional Belgians (Hercule Poirot being the other). Look, don't expect me to say anything (else) negative about Belgium or Belgians. I visited Ieper in 2016, which is where I became an urban sketcher, and as well as paying my respects to my great grandfather's grave at the war cemetery in Voormezeele, I was absolutely bowled over by how pretty Ieper is.

As for Tintin, well, I was given a GAF stereo viewmaster when I was a little boy(ask your grandparents), and a number of reels for it. My favourites were The Jungle Book, and Tintin Explorers on the Moon., and of the two the Tintin reel was my favourite.

One Sketch 289) Sir Quentin Blake - Dragon 3

What a sight indeed
A dragon who likes
To read.

The prompt on Sketching Every Day today was featured artist - artist of your choice. I didn't want to pick an artist whose work I've already copied, so that ruled out Thomas Nast, Sir John Tenniel and Norman Rockwell, all of whom I absolutely love. I considered going for a classical 'fine' artist - ad believe me there are plenty whose work I love - Van Gogh, Monet, Renoir, and the greatest English painter, JMW Turner to name but a few. But well, with time a consideration I plumped for someone whom I also love, but whose work I could make a reasonable copy of in one evening.

Sir Quentin is probably best renowned for his work illustrating the works of Roald Dahl, whose unique works he so memorably brought to life. In 1999 he was the very first Children's Laureate in the UK. Incidentally, in the 1970s, he became the first person other than Dr. Seuss to illustrate a Dr. Seuss book.
This is a straight copy of Sir Quentin's Dragon number 3. It's a one of a series of ten drawings that he made in 2014 for the corridors of the Dragon Centre which treats young people and children in South London.

One Sketch 284) The Secret Life of Butterflies Zine

The Secret Life of Butterflies

Each is a MASTER of disguise

each is a Ninja Glider

and loves to drink rough CIDER

They love to go to Discos

and fly to San Francisco

They knock on People's doors

- and when they sleep, they SNORES!

Basically, if you fold a piece of paper into 8, and cut it in the right place, you get a wee booklet of 8 pages which we can call a zine - from magazine, I'm guessing. I didn't come up with the idea. The nonsense rhyme on it, and the pictures, now, they're mine. I've loved butterflies since my youngest children were very little - about 20 years now - and so this was what occurred to me. The butterfly in the pages is based on the Peacock (Inachis Io) which is my favourite species.

One Sketch 280) Bryant and May Matchbox

A little light
Can be a dangerous thing.
Not as much
As darkness, though.

The prompt for today's Sketching Every Day is matchboxes. Now, the thing is that I did once upon a time collect matchboxes, when I was a boy over 40 years ago. I've been told that the collector gene is more prevalent among males than females. I don't know about that, but I have at different times in my life collected different things. As a kid I was more serious about collecting matchboxes than I was about stamp collecting, although I tried that for a while as well.

As an adult, it's funny the things that can spark you off on collecting. A good 15 years or so ago I had a hankering for a 1960s Roberts transistor radio, and my wife bought me one. Well, this snowballed. It didn't help that I discovered eBay and car boot sales at much the same time. At one time I had well over 50 radios of the same period, but I haven't bought a new radio for years, and a few years back I did start selling the collection off. I still have a lot though.

Smaller current collections I have are memorabilia from London Bridge, and from the TV quiz show Mastermind. Actually they're both linked. You see in 2007 I appeared in the grand final of the show, taking London Bridge as my specialist subject, and I won.

Coming back to Bryant and May though, I did some reading up on them this morning. Messrs Bryant and May were a pair of Victorian quaker gentlemen who set up their business in London importing matches from Sweden and repackaging. After successfully starting this business they set up their own factory in London, employing mostly women to manufacture their matches. Many women working or them developed a horrific condition nicknamed phossy jaw, where the vapour from the white phosphorous they were working with would eat away the bones of the jaw, and in many cases cause madness as well.

Phossy jaw, and other poor working conditions in their factory in Bow, such as 14 hour days, poor pay and ridiculously harsh fines for a range of so called misdemeanours, led to the Bryant and May matchgirls strike in 1888. Basically the social reformer Annie Besant published an expose of the terrible conditions inside the factory in a newspaper she published. Bryant and May tried to force all of their employees to sign a piece of paper stating that the allegations were false. The girls refused to sign it, and when the management sacked a worker in retaliation, the girls went on strike. Eventually the management were forced to accept the girls' terms, following the bad publicity and the dent in their profits caused by the strike. However it's worth noting that the company continued to use white phosphorous until 1901.

The same Bow factory continued to produce matches until 1979, since which listed buildings which were part of the complex have been converted into luxury flats. About this time British Match, which Bryant and May had evolved into through various acquisitions and mergers, was acquired by US company Allegheny, and when they went bankrupt it was acquired by Swedish Match. The Bryant and May trademark is still used by Swedish Match in the UK.

One Sketch 248) Christmas Card 30 - One horse open sleigh

Dashing through the snow
In a one horse open sleigh
Is a hell of a lot colder
Than a roller.

That's my 30th card for this year. I set myself the target of 25 by the end of November - when I reached the target last weekend I set a new target of 30. That's all I'm going to do for now, although if I have a sudden need for more I have some blanks to work on left.

One Sketch 241) (Weds 21st November) Christmas Card based on Thomas Nast Engraving

Santa has said with a groan
"Oh blimey, I'm not on my own"
I've come to a house
Where the cats crave a mouse
And the dog is expecting a bone."

Yep, the great Thomas Nast again. I set myself the target of making 25 cards before the end of November, and this is number 19. Getting there.

One Sketch 239) (Monday 19th November) - Old fashioned Victorian Father Christmas

While Rudolph is having a snooze
Pa Christmas will quite often choose
To throw off the shackles
And prepare to tackle
A steaming great bowlful of booze

This is based on another Victorian Christmas engraving, but a very English one, probably from the Illustrated London News or some such. Go back a hundred and fifty years and more, and we Brits didn't really have a concept of Santa Claus. While American cartoonists like the great Thomas Nast were creating what became the classic conception of Santa, his English contemporaries invariably gave us Father Christmas. Not always without the presents for the kiddies but almost always with the steaming wassail bowl full of very alcoholic punch to spread cheer and alcoholism to the adults. You can usually recognise the traditional English Father Christmas through the bowl and also a wreath or crown of holly on the top of his head.

One Sketch 236) Bob Cratchit Christmas Card

How strange to think
A man who died a century and a half ago
Made Christmas what it is
Today

Well, forgiveable hyperbole. Charles Dickens, who died in 1870, gave us "A Christmas Carol" probably did as much to create the traditional ideal of Christmas as any other person.

One Sketch 233) (Tuesday 13th November) John Tenniel Christmas Card

Santa s trying to skate
He seems to be tempting his fate
He's dazed and confused
He's been at the booze
He'll end in a hell of a state

Another 2018 Christmas card based on a cartoon by my favourite British Victorian cartoonist, Sir John Tenniel. Tenniel always drew a very English Father Christmas - absolutely not Santa Claus - with holly around his pointy hat, and seemingly a little the worse for strong drink.

One sketch 214) #inktober2018 prompt 25 - Prickly

It make me feel old, and old at heart

For I was already a dad

When Sonic was state of the art

Out of inspiration, and short on time, I sketched a quick Sonic the hedgehog. I remember when the Mega Drive first came out and I bought the original Sonic for my oldest two kids. What a great game. I am not ashamed to admit that I still have a megadrive, and still play the game from time to time. 

One Sketch 205) (Tuesday 16th) #inktober2018 Prompt 16 Angular

Ah, Dizzy, now there was a guy
Who often did things on the sly
A devious sort
Or so it is thought
But then he was gone, and bye bye.

OK - so what do you do with angular, I thought? Which immediately led me to think of pyramids, as you do. Which led me to think of one of my favourite Victorian political cartoons, by one of my favourite Victorian political cartoonists, Sir John Tenniel. He's my absolute joint favourite along with the wonderful American, Thomas Nast. This is almost a direct copy, although I did stick an extra pyramid in which isn't in the original.