A week of Comic Art Masterclasses began at Orwell Park School in Ipswich, which is a very nice private school in an old mansion. All week I was working with Year 5s and, as always in the various schools I visit, I find private and state school pupils have as much in common as they have difference. Though the choice of Albert Einstein as a celebrity was perhaps an indicator of something there.
The next day I was at Queen's Crescent in Chippenham, and an obsession with spouses seemed common to both schools, as did name-dropping teachers. And what a treat it was to have a stab at drawing Uncle Pigg, my old first editor from Oink comic, which I started work on over thirty years ago. (Gulp, thirty years ago Oink had already gone out of business. I didn't manage to go full time freelance until Gas and Brain Damage had come along a year later).
My favourite cover of the week, the title of Dot only came about because a kid got fixated on the word and was enjoying repeating it with exaggerated aspirants. Dot Cotton was my idea, but luckily some of them recognised her. Peppa Pig was boring in comparison, but a fun excuse to draw Earth's simplest character. Both of these from Ponteland Middle School in Northumberland. So quite the travelling I've been doing this week, wouldn't you say?
The celebrities these six groups chose to appear in my demonstration strip were Ariana Grande, Kim Jong Un, Simon Cowell, David Walliams, Jake Paul, and, most inspiring of the week (because, unlike last time it was chosen, the pupils actually meant the real person not the character off Big Heads), Albert Einstein. And is that a new logo you spot at the foot of the montage? Why how astute of you to notice, yes it is. More to follow.
Kev F Sutherland, as well as writing and drawing for The Beano, Marvel, Doctor Who et al, runs Comic Art Masterclasses in schools, libraries & art centres. email for details. Facebook, Twitter. Promo video here.
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