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Hassall, Lautrec and the true roots of toons
Star cartoonist MALC McGOOKIN introduces two commercial artists beloved by cartoonists and comic artists the world over
(L to R) Utagawa Kunisada, The Female Bandit Kijin no Omatsu, 1851; John Hassall, Skegness is So Bracing poster for GNR (Great Northern Railway), 1908; Henri Toulouse-Lautrec, Jane Avril, 1893 [piccredit: (L to R) National Diet Library/Public domain - Science Museum Group Collection/Public domain - Public domain]

I WAS prompted to write this article after I’d offered up a cartoon satirizing both Nigel Farage and Clacton, a seaside town which has offered welcoming berths for Tories, knights and baronet MPs since 1604, including the wonderfully named Sir Nathaniel Rich and Sir Harbottle Grimston. 

Farage is merely the latest carpetbagging Europhobe to shoehorn himself into the seat, although there was, admittedly, a WTF moment in 1997 when Labour’s Ivan Henderson got over the line.

The cartoon in question satirised the great John Hassall’s famous “Skegness Is SO Bracing” poster. 

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