THIS BLOG IS A PROFESSIONAL’S EYE VIEW OF THE WORLD OF CARICATURING. IF YOU’RE SIMPLY LOOKING TO HIRE A CARICATURIST, PLEASE CLICK THE LINK ABOVE.
My Stance
I love my job, the laughter, the people, the travel, the artwork and wanted to share my passion with you, by relaying my experiences and opinions from a 20 year life as an artist/entertainer. I hope this Blog enlightens you, while displaying my Passion, Honesty and Integrity.
I am above-all honest, some would say too honest, which can raise some eyebrows, but I stand by my honesty and am not in the habit of writing lies. Perhaps some would rather I simply did not write…
I believe in standing up for my beliefs and my passions. In the Caricature industry in particular, where (in the UK) there is no regulation, I am proud to take a stance against charlatans and monopolies who would damage our industry. I alone have stood up against the three largest online Agencies in the UK and spoken out against them. I no longer patronise them or support their businesses in any way, how many other artists can say the same?
I am a perfectionist, which leads me to be a critic, which in turn makes me few friends, but I will not suffer fools gladly and certainly will not pretend to respect them just to maintain the Status Quo.
I do not tolerate racists, sexists, bigots, back-stabbers, undercutters or charlatans. I may not be allowed to name them, but I will not befriend or condone them.
This is my public stance.
………………………………………………..
Charities
Never let it be said that I am uncharitable, I have my charities which I contribute to via DD on a monthly basis and I rarely pass a beggar by without offering some coins, not to mention my Lottery donations. However I do suffer regular begging emails from various charities, all asking for my time and assuming I would lose nothing by offering them it. On the contrary, as caricaturing is my full time occupation, every day which goes unpaid is the equivalent to losing one week’s wages. How many of you would gladly give £450 to a charity and go hungry for two weeks?? How many of you would work without pay EVERY week, foregoing your income in order to aid a charity? Every charity event I attend means one less paying job.
This week I have received three requests from charitable organisations, asking me to do just that, which is equivalent to losing £1300 of my wages. In an effort to redraw the balance, I have drafted a response letter which I shall send to each charity who contacts me from now on:
Dear Sirs,
I am a sparse profit making creative venture, founded in 1991, with numerous celebrity endorsements, but desperately in need of funding. Rises in inflation, fuel prices, materials and competition mean that surviving as a sole trading artist is painfully difficult. All little Georgie wants is the chance to make people smile and offer all the equal opportunity to enjoy his works of art. I write to you in the hope that you can offer Georgie gainful employment and help raise cash for the ‘Help Art Live Fund’. As a profit making venture I cannot offer his time for free, but he would love to entertain your guests for the full going market rate of £420.
Please help make little Georgie smile again, pay the full fee so another artist doesn’t end his days as a tearful voice at a McDonalds’ drive-thru.
I look forward to your response.
PUBLISHED – GQ!!!
April 29 2013
Just submitted my second illustration for publication in GQ and I must say that after a week of working on it, I’m rather proud. Its the first time my ’3D’ (no outline) style has been picked up and commissioned for publication, the subject; Daft Punk! Was very difficult trying to illustrate two musicians donning helmets, who had already transformed themselves into living Comic characters… but I think I pulled it off. No previews available until publication at the end of May (30th) I’m afraid, but watch this space. I can’t wait to see it in print!
I’m so proud to be recognised by the likes of GQ magazine, the UK’s best selling, glossiest Men’s lifestyle/fashion magazine… I’m uber-proud 
The Iron Lady dies
Margaret Thatcher dies – 08/04/13
2013 – Get ready for LET DOWNS!!
Just had a colleague tell me of a tale of woe. He was contacted by a Bride’s sister who needed a last minute stand in for her sister’s wedding. After offering a price he was told;
Her sister had been ‘let down’ by another caricaturist who’d claimed he’d double-booked himself but that the agreed fee was £200 for two hours. The caricaturist had let her know last night, with a week or so to go, and the bride was understandably ‘very upset about it’. I suggested that the caricaturist had probably had a better offer and she agreed that that’s what SHE thought had happened! I ended the conversation by apologizing on behalf of the profession as a whole for such abysmal behavior. I do hope I’m not going to get more of these desperate calls from upset brides and grooms in 2013!
Yet another cheap artist has left a Bride in tears, probably in favor of a higher fee. If an artist thinks they are only worth £200 and happy to work for that, then they should leave the higher paying gigs to those professional artists who are worth the fee and who won’t let our industry down!
I’m getting sick of these ‘fly-by-night’ caricaturists, who ravage our industry and work in a vacuum, without the support of other professionals and who leave a wake of disappointed clients!
Flooding The Market: See the Bigger Picture
Following the publication of my advice regarding underpricing and lowering the market value of Caricatures, I felt the need to point out the dangers of flooding the market with cheap artists.
New caricaturists are currently quoting clients ridiculously low fees for their services (and even charging ‘per person’), the net result of which is to lower the market value of all caricaturists in the eyes of the customer. The long-term result is far worse; Lower fees lead to more clients being able to afford to hire caricaturists, in turn the caricaturist will need to work twice as hard, just to earn a decent weekly wage. Pretty soon, every event will see cheap, crap caricaturists, scrawling their trade and becoming common-place. The end result being that no-one wants or respects caricaturists anymore, having grown tired of consistently crap, cliche’d renditions of caricatures being pedaled for pennies… Indeed hiring a caricaturist as a wedding gift will be as popular as giving a stick of seaside ROCK!! The mass influx of new artists, presumably prompted by the Recession, high unemployment and the idea of making an easy buck will magnify the above effect and possibly see the end of established artists and newbies alike
Please, please, please Newbies… SEE THE BIGGER PICTURE!! All I have to do to compete is lower my fees and I would mop up the customer market, but we’d all lose out, so lets keep the fees at a respectable level, along with the levels of drawing and professionalism.
Update – December 2012
This year’s Christmas season is predictably bleak once again, though several dates have been flooded with enquiries and events are popping up all over. Reports are coming in of new artists at events and old agents not getting in touch. This is the effect of Flooding the Market! A recent web-crawl of Google showed several new caricaturist sites popping up and one particularly hideous Agency website listed around 50 artists, the top 20 of whom, I didn’t recognize! Presumably this is the new influx of would-be artists, attracted by a flagging employment market and the promise of a good daily rate with a pen in hand. The agents of course are lapping them up like sharks in a feeding frenzy! All that fresh meat, willing to work for what ever rate they’re told by the puppet-masters. Not one with a proper business plan or knowledge of their own market, many will flounder in the next year or so, but not before they’ve taken the work from established artists and re-enforced the artificially low fee scales, set by agents who (on the whole) don’t care about the survival of their artists.
I have secured 5 Xmas parties this year, compared to a previous 18, most via cherished agents, who know my worth and offer me proper rates. I thanks them, but must assume the other bookings have all been snapped up by the Supermarket sites. I can’t blame the public for wanting to cut costs, but its the Agents’ job to look after the Artists’ interests, not just grow fat off the feeding frenzy caused by inexperienced artists and budget conscious clients.
A punter remarked the other evening; “You draw for GQ and have been on TV? With talent like that you must be booked solid?!” With 22 years experience and a good reputation, I’da hoped so, but as I explained; some people aren’t shown an Artist’s pedigree, only their fee and Cheap is always Better isn’t it?….
A flooded caricaturist market does have one up-side; a recent enquirer was flabberghasted by the proliferation of websites and Agency lists. Not knowing where to begin, they simply chose the most professional looking and least confusing site and ended up booking me. Some are still prepared to be discerning… That gives me hope in the caricaturists’ version of Where’s Waldo?
Update – January 2013
Just lost one of my only bookings to a cheaper artist in Chester. Had a further two enquiries, which came to nothing, presumably for similar reasons. I cannot blame the clients for wanting to save money, though it is always a false economy, as cheaper artists have a tendency to disappoint their clients. Quite basically, the flood of new artists bumbling into my industry and charging bargain basement prices, will ruin the industry for everyone. As caricaturists become more common and less valued, we will all be forced to drop prices to match these idiots and many will be forced out of full time business. Its heart breaking to watch for an artist of 20+ years experience and reputation, who can do nothing to change the trend other than to Blog about it!
“HOW TO MAKE A LIVING….”
Just read with interest a colleague’s Blog, which gave helpful hints on how to become a professional caricaturist. I found the read interesting and well informed, it offered good advice and followed a basic business model, which many new artists forget about. Nice to see a professional offering his advice. However I must question the logic of encouraging other caricaturists onto the market and helping them to take your work away! The basic business model given aimed at working 2 bookings per week, every week of the year (104 per anum) which is a realistic average. However, speaking as a veteran caricaturist, I have seen the market flood since I began in 1991, when there were around 30 Pro-Carix trading, at 2 bookings each week. Now there are more like 80 artists fighting for the same market, which is not growing, but shrinking! Imagine if another 10 artists are encouraged by the advice given (on the Blog in question) and they take the work from my colleague; making his business model unattainable, with just half the bookings available each year. That is sheer madness surely?! Recent full-time converts may be reveling in their new life choices and enjoying the Caricaturist community, but it is a fragile existence and should be shared with care.
In addition to this, the basic attraction of hiring a Caricaturist is in their unique skill, rare talent and novelty value. If everyone becomes a caricaturist, then everyone will own a caricature, thus no-one will want a caricature anymore. This was underlined last weekend at a wedding in Preston, where a guest remarked:
“I’m not getting a bloody caricature, had one in York and it was crap. You can’t move for bloody caricaturists up there, all over the town they are!”
Quite simply, caricaturists will soon become as commonplace as Magicians and no-one wants a Magician at their event anymore! I would seriously consider the bigger picture before I encouraged any new caricaturists onto the market!!
Update – 26 April 2013
The effects of a flooded market are starting to show. In recent chats with colleagues, most complain about how quiet the market is and how few jobs they currently have, some artists struggling to keep afloat and deeply worried. They wonder why Agents are no longer calling and offering work and who exactly is getting all the jobs? Presumably Agents are now spoilt for choice and can ‘cherry-pick’ the cheapest artists for each job, as is their Modus Operandi, with no thought for those artists who have helped build their business.
By comparison I have had a recent flurry of work, but none through Agents. I saw the flood coming a few years back and took precautions, by ploughing my time and efforts into promoting myself online, in order to become independent of Agents and their whims.
I’ve said it many times and I’ll say it again; Agents should not have the power to control our industry, they enjoy a one-sided relationship with their artists, where they wield the power of survival, but offer no loyalty in return. In hard times surely some signs of loyalty would help those established, yet struggling artists to survive…
PUBLISHED!!!
24 Sept 2012
Just completed my first commission to be published since 2007! I was published weekly from 1999 to 2003 in TV Times, then had a lull until a Sunday Mirror commission in 2007, with a few European published pieces (mostly Michael Jackson) since then, but this commission was out of the blue and most welcome. GQ magazine contacted me and expressed an interest in my work, commissioning an illo for November’s issue. Had 3 days to rattle off a finished vector, over the weekend, while attending 3 weddings and also drawing 14 nuns for a play in Luxembourg!!!!! Bizarrely intense weekend! LOL
I can’t tell you who I drew for GQ, but I’m sure you’ll spot my vector style if you pick up an issue in November. Watch this space for the illustration once the magazine is on the shelves.
How chuffed am I to be in print once again?? :-)))))
01 Nov 2012
GQ is on the shelves, turn to page 234 to see my Will Self illo!!
