The Spring 2019 issue of Art Quarterly, the quarterly magazine for members of the Art Fund charity, and features a focus on Comic Creators, spurred by the upcoming re-opening of London’s Cartoon Museum.
Established over 100 years ago, Art Fund helps give grants to help museums, supporting the buying works of art and sharing them across the UK, and providing funding and opportunities for curators.

Published four times a year, Art Quarterly (not to be confused with The Art Quarterly, a US magazine of the same name) is a benefit of becoming an Art Fund member. It provides readers with insightful and accessible content and comment on art and artists, galleries and museums, and the works they show and hold in their collections, as well as highlighting the discounted entry and other benefits available to Art Fund members with their National Art Pass.
In this issue, to celebrate the impending opening of the new London home of the Cartoon Museum next month in Wells Street, artist Steve Marchant and the Museum Director Becky Jefcoate select six of the works that they been able to acquire for the museum’s Lottery-funded Comic Creators Project, and Guardian cartoonist Martin Rowson, a trustee of the Cartoon Museum, also chooses a strip that made the biggest impression on him – “Judge Dredd” from 2000AD.

In 2014, The Cartoon Museum was awarded £164,300 from the Heritage Lottery Fund to grow our collection of original comic artwork. With this investment we have been able to acquire over 300 artworks including Faceache by Ken Reid; Thunderbirds by Frank Bellamy; Dan Dare by Dave Gibbons; Roy of the Rovers by Mike White and Slaine by Simon Davis.
Report with thanks to Richard Sheaf
• The Art Fund is online at www.artfund.org
• Cartoon Museum Comic Creators Project | Check out the Comic Creators blog to keep up to date with the project | Comic Creators Gallery | If you would like to find out more about the project, or donate towards it, please contact Steve Marchant at learning@cartoonmuseum.org
• More about the Cartoon Museum move
• Read Richard Sheaf’s article on Art Quarterly here on his Boys Adventure Comics Blog
- About the Author
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John is the founder of downthetubes, launched in 1998. He is a comics and magazine editor, writer, and Press Officer for the Lakes International Comic Art Festival. He also runs Crucible Comic Press.
Working in British comics publishing since the 1980s, his credits include editor of titles such as Doctor Who Magazine and Overkill for Marvel UK, Babylon 5 Magazine, Star Trek Magazine, and its successor, Star Trek Explorer, and more. He also edited the comics anthology STRIP Magazine and edited several audio comics for ROK Comics; and has edited several comic collections and graphic novels, including volumes of “Charley’s War” and “Dan Dare”, and Hancock: The Lad Himself, by Stephen Walsh and Keith Page.
He’s the writer of comics such as Pilgrim: Secrets and Lies for B7 Comics; “Crucible”, a creator-owned project with 2000AD artist Smuzz; and “Death Duty” and “Skow Dogs”, with Dave Hailwood.
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