Art in the Archives Part 2: Cartoons and Doodles

Archives are not just vast stores of textual documents. Archives also contain an abundance of visual material including posters, playbills and photographs, but amongst the most personal and intriguing artworks are cartoons and doodles contained within predominantly textual formats. These drawings can be by professional artists but many are the work of private individuals, providing fascinating insights into their personalities and relationships.

The reasons for drawing cartoons or doodling can be varied. It can be as simple as wiling away time whilst on hold on the telephone or wanting to add visual interest to a text-heavy document. Another obvious function is to depict something mentioned in the accompanying text, when only an image can do justice to the idea or message trying to be conveyed. Drawings may also be able to convey said message more succinctly than text or get across a desired sense of humour or caricature more easily. Drawings were also, no doubt, used more often in the days before photography could be employed to capture memories.

Three of the most prolific ‘doodlers’ in our collections are poet Philip Larkin, Colonel Sir Mark Sykes and cartoonist Victor Weisz…

Philip Larkin is best known as a poet and librarian at Hull University. However, he was also a prolific letter writer and his correspondence to family and close friends is littered with doodles. Perhaps his most famous doodles are of himself and his mother depicted as seals. The seals are drawn affectionately and are placed in various scenarios by Larkin, sometimes illustrating a point made in his letters and at other times seemingly operating just to provide some visual interest. Larkin also added doodles to other letters, including several self-portraits in order to illustrate his recent activities and thoughts. There’s also a nice example in the collection of Larkin, arguably, doodling like most of us do – whilst bored, drawing some identifiable things and other completely abstract shapes. So even great poets need an aimless doodle at times!

Larkin doodle [U DLN/1952/94]

Larkin doodle [U DLN/1952/85]

Colonel Sir Mark Sykes was another prolific letter writer. He travelled extensively owing to his work as a politician and diplomatic adviser and is perhaps best known for his role in the Sykes-Picot Agreement (1916) – the now highly controversial arrangement between Britain, France and Russia to divide the Ottoman Empire between themselves following the Empire’s defeat in World War One. Sykes’ doodles include humorous illustrations and self-portraits, but also depictions of people he met on his travels, sometimes drawing them in stereotypical ways that were commonly held beliefs at the time but would now be considered offensive. As opposed to Larkin’s anthropomorphic illustrations, Sykes drew from what he actually ‘saw’, from his own perceptions of things. In this way, it gives us direct insight into his activities but also his personality and prevalent cultural attitudes of the time.

Sykes doodle [U DDSY2/1/2a/23]

Sykes doodle [U DDSY2/1/2a/49]

Victor Weisz, in contrast to Larkin and Sykes, actually made his living as an artist, working as a cartoonist for the News Chronicle, Daily Mirror, Evening Standard and New Statesman during his career. From the 1940s he worked under the pseudonym ‘Vicky’. It is not his professional work though, but his personal correspondence with his wife Inge Lew that is held in our archives. These wonderful examples of love notes and letters always come with humorous and heartfelt illustrations, usually depicting Weisz and/or Inge. Through the illustrations alone it is possible to feel the warmth of affection held by Weisz for his wife but also begin to understand his sense of humour, including self-deprecation, whilst appreciating his simple yet highly effective and accessible style of illustration.

Vicky cartoon [U DX165/3]

Vicky cartoon [U DX165/10]

Alongside our three main ‘doodlers’, our collections hold lots of other fascinating hand drawn illustrations each with their own story waiting to be told…

Detail from journal of Hewley John Baines [U DDBH/27/3]

This sketch comes from a ‘Journal of an excursion’ by Hewley John Baines, a pupil at Haxby School near York (1837). The beautiful and detailed drawings are of Skelton Church, Byland Abbey and Helmsley Castle. The detail and accuracy of the drawings, alongside the eloquent textual descriptions of the places visited, suggest that Baines spent a great deal of time looking at the buildings and cared about them and their histories. These are not ‘doodles’ in the sense of being quickly composed, but rather act as a visual aide memoire for a trip that, arguably, had an inspiring affect on the young Hewley Baines.

Pencil sketch of T.E. Hulme [U DHU/10]

Another delightful sketch, drawn from life, can be found in the papers of Thomas Ernest Hulme. It is a pencil drawing of the poet and critic Hulme by his lover and host of an important artistic and literary salon of the day, Ethel Kibblewhite. The sketch of Hulme’s body appears to have been drawn quite hastily, whilst the artist seems to have spent much longer trying to achieve an accurate likeness of his face. Hulme is shown reading a book, with a thoughtful expression. It feels quite intimate as though Ethel sketched Hulme when he wasn’t aware, but there is also a slightly staged quality – so perhaps Hulme was aware after all?

And for some doodles, we may never know the full story behind their creation…

Detail from a letter written to Irene Lawley [U DDFA3/6/365]

This illustration from the Forbes Adam collection depicts the letter’s recipient, Irene Lawley, bathing in the sea. The letter was written by a friend, Rosemary, no surname, so we are unable to fully identify the correspondent. Consequently, we may never know how the two ladies knew each other, how they met, or what their friendship was truly like. However, the fairly intimate subject matter of the picture and the general warmth of the text, suggests a good friendship!

Front cover of an exercise book [U DDX/16/227]

Our final doodle is also a bit of a mystery. It is a rather abstract illustration of two swans swirling around the text ‘Arithmetic. Miss Ann Lamb. Rudston’ and comes from an exercise book kept by Miss Lamb c.1850. Perhaps the artist felt the front page was too plain without an illustration, perhaps she was instructed to illustrate the page, perhaps she was bored in class and started ‘doodling’ or perhaps she simply liked swans? We will never know, but maybe that makes it more magical, that the secret of this drawing’s creation will only ever be known by the original artist?

I hope you’ve enjoyed this exploration of our archives’ artistic side and make sure to keep an eye on our social media to hear all about our latest news and blogs.

See you next time!

Verity, Archives Assistant (Hull University Archives)