Florida exhibition

The Mary Alice Fortin Children’s Art Gallery in Palm beach, Florida is exhibiting Searle's illustrations for Robert Forbes' childrens' books.  (Organized by The Society of the Four Arts, Palm Beach, Florida).  More info here

Another Searle exhibition!

Robert Forbes has one of the largest collections of original Searle artwork in the U.S. and several pieces in 'Searle In America' were generously loaned from the Forbes Gallery, NYC.  Mr Forbes collaborated with Searle on several books of poetry for children and now Forbes has 60 of the pictures on display in Palm Beach, Florida. Read this article for more details

"Forbes, who has been writing poetry for about 15 years, has three books with drawings by Searle. He was known as one of the world’s top illustrators until his death in 2011. Searle produced work for Life magazine, The New Yorker, Holiday magazine, TV Guide and numerous British publications.

“I would send him three to six poems at a time,” Forbes said. “He never did preliminary sketches. Two or three months later, his package would arrive, and inside would be these glorious depictions of what was in my imagination and how he interpreted them and brought them to life. It’s rich, it’s whimsical, it’s silly, it’s lighthearted, it’s fun.”

Forbes said his fourth book with Searle needs about six more drawings. He plans to have another illustrator finish the book."

NYC exhibition

'This exhibition features the poetry of Robert Forbes and the drawings of Ronald Searle, featured in three books, BEASTLY FEASTS! A Mischievous Menagerie in Rhyme; LET’S HAVE A BITE! A Banquet of Beastly Rhymes, and the latest, BEAST FRIENDS FOREVER! Animal Lovers in Rhyme.

Robert Forbes writes:

All the drawings are done by the great Ronald Searle, and I think you will agree that they bring magic to the poems. When I first had enough poems to think about doing a book, I asked myself, who is the top, who is the best illustrator I could possibly get to do these? The answer for me was Ronald Searle, so I just asked. I have learned in life that if you don’t try, you will never know what could have been.

I am very grateful to him for interpreting all my creatures so brilliantly, with such zest and wit. By the way, if you look closely at each drawing you will see a mouse who shows up in every one! See if you can spot him

How does a book like this come together? What I did was write a bunch of poems and then I send them to Ronald.

A few months later, a large package arrives. I felt like a little boy at Christmas opening a highly anticipated present! Imagine my delight and wonder as my creatures sprang to life under his pens and inks, pastels and paints.

The key to these books, then, is imagination. When I read in schools and libraries, that is what I tell the children right away, that we are entering this world created by imagination but they must remember that they too have imaginations as good as mine or anybody else’s. So do you! .'

Through August 3, 2013

Beastly Books

'Beast Friends Forever' is available from U.S. publishers Overlook Press. I'm assuming it's the American edition of 'Beastly Romances' ?

ROBERT L. FORBES AND RONALD SEARLE (Overlook Duckworth £12.99)

It is one the biggest scandals of our Honours system that Ronald Searle was not knighted. I suppose the bureaucrats in Whitehall thought he was ‘only a cartoonist’. Yet he was on the high shelf with graphic satirists like Hogarth, Gillray and Cruikshank.

Searle was a major artist - a million times superior to Damien Hirst or Tracey Emin or any of those. I am proud to say the cover he did for my book What Am I Still Doing Here? was his final commission. In a typically generous gesture, he gave me the original painting.

As for this particular book, all we are told is that ‘the drawings happily were completed a while ago’. What a delight they are. Flirting elephants, strutting peacocks and blushing peahens, intertwined snakes, a boar serenading a simpering sow.

The drawings are so sunny and romantic - amazing to think that Searle was in his 90s when he died, and had once been a Prisoner of War in Singapore, witnessing and enduring the worst Japanese atrocities. He had every right to be bitter and twisted, but was the opposite. A genius.

Daily Mail

One more exhibition for Ronald Searle's 90th!

Robert Forbes' gallery in New York is re-staging it's 2007 Searle retrospective to tie in with the release of 'Let's Have A Bite!' -the 2nd volume of Forbes' poetry for children illustrated by Searle.  The show will consist of the drawings from the new book and also the collection of Robert and Lydia Forbes.
 I'll try to get to NYC myself before next March but if anyone visits the show please send in a report or pictures.

The exhibition runs in the Carrère Gallery September 1, 2010 - March 12, 2011

"Let's Have a Bite! A Banquet of Beastly Rhymes" was released September 16th in the US market and 7th October in the UK by Duckworth Publishers.

The original drawings from the first book 'Beastly Feasts' will be on display at the Nassau County Museum of Art from September 25, 2010 through January 9, 2011 with a reading of Beastly Feasts! and Author signing on Friday, November 12 at 4 p.m.

Publishing house OverLook Press feature the new book on their blog with a link to a Wall Street Journal artcicle on Mr Forbes.


"Mr. Forbes said he contacted Mr. Searle, who lives in the south of France, and whose work he collects, out of the blue, fully prepared to be rejected, but figuring it couldn't hurt to ask. But Mr. Searle said yes. "I'll write a couple of lines about the poem," Mr. Forbes said of their collaborative process, "and a month or two later back this package comes with all these illustrations. It's like a little boy opening a Christmas present. . . And the poems keep coming. The drawings too. Last month the 90-year-old Mr. Searle delivered five more. "I've got at least two more books done by him," Mr. Forbes said. "I have no idea whether my publisher will do it—but I don't care."

I've added material to the following sections:

Advertising Part 1
Advertising Part 2
Punch French theatre

Beastly Feasts!

The Forbes Galleries, NYC is pleased to present 'Beastly Feasts! A Mischievous Menagerie in Rhyme' in celebration of the release of Robert Forbes’ poetry book of the same title. The exhibition features all forty wildly playful rhymes about animals naughty and nice, along with the original charmingly intricate drawings by master caricaturist Ronald Searle.
On view in the Picture Gallery, November 21 — January 12, 2008

'Beastly Feasts! A Mischievous Menagerie in Rhyme', Overlook Duckworth, New York, 2007, is available at local bookstores and at www.amazon.com as well as other online booksellers.














RONALD SEARLE: A LIFETIME OF DRAWING

Is there a more trenchant yet sympathetic observer of mankind than Ronald Searle? His work is backed up by the unerring eye of one who has tasted life at its worst, as a P.O.W. of the Japanese during World War II. Searle survived and moved on, never bitter, to become one of the greatest caricaturists in history, ranked with Hans Holbein the Younger, Thomas Rowlandson, Honoré Daumier and his favorite, Annibale Carracci.

His wit is infused with compassion and a sense of the ridiculous; he brings a visceral delight to life and finds humor, silliness, pathos and absurdity in everything. He takes pleasure in his characters: what they do, what they look like, what they desire. Above all, there is joy, never arrogance or flippant irony, that ennui-filled detachment so much in vogue today.

The exhibition, culled from the collection of Robert and Lydia Forbes, spans Searle’s wide-ranging career, from his drawings in a Japanese POW camp, to his early success as a magazine and book illustrator, to the enormously popular series of “St. Trinian’s” drawings, to his work for movies and businesses, to his famous drawings of cats.

On view in the Carrère, Hastings and Lobby Galleries September 19, 2007 — March 15, 2008




'A Celebration of Colorful Critters'

By Sally Lodge, Children's Bookshelf -- Publishers Weekly, 8/30/2007

A motorcycle-riding snake, tea-drinking gnus and a red carpet-strolling leopard are some of the eccentric creatures Robert L. Forbes introduces in Beastly Feasts! A Mischievous Menagerie in Rhyme, which The Overlook Press will publish next month. Accompanying Forbes’s poems are fanciful illustrations by British artist Ronald Searle, whose many books include Searle’s Cats and Cat O’Nine Tales and whose art has appeared in magazines and newspapers worldwide.

This is the first children’s book by Forbes, who has pursued several other careers. He is v-p of Forbes Inc. and president of ForbesLife magazine, and has authored numerous articles on food and travel, produced documentary films and coauthored Toy Boats 1870–1955: A Pictorial History. Additionally, he spends time across the Atlantic, as the proprietor of an organic vineyard in the Languedoc region of France.


What inspired him to publish a book of children’s poems? “My love of animals and my love of poetry,” Forbes answers. “My wife and I like to go to the zoo and see the wonders of nature there and I had written a number of poems based on those visits. And some of the poems I wrote for the book are based on other experiences. ‘Spike the Biker,’ for instance. I spent many days and thousands of miles riding on motorcycles with my dad [Malcolm S. Forbes] and I began thinking, ‘What is the most unlikely critter to get on a bike?’ and a snake came to mind.”

Forbes is a long-time fan of Searle, who has contributed illustrations to ForbesLife. “I thought there was no one better to illustrate my poems, and imagine my absolute delight when he agreed to. He is now 87 and at the very top of his form. Each time I send off poems to him and he returns a batch of drawings I feel like a kid at Christmas-time.”

The project landed at Overlook thanks to what he terms a “lucky connection.” A friend of his, Maria B. Campbell, who heads a scouting agency, is a friend of Peter Mayer, Overlook’s publisher and CEO, who acquired the book. After the original editor left the company, Aaron Schlechter inherited the task of editing Beastly Feasts! The book, Schlechter says, “came into place very smoothly. Bob has a passion for poetry, knows quite a bit about publishing and was a pleasure to work with.”

The most challenging part of the project, recalls the editor, was procuring good reproductions of Searle’s art, which is created using numerous media, including pencil, markers, crayon and liquid paper. “It’s sometimes hard to get good color matches when you’re working with Wite-Out,” Schlechter says. “We had to go back and scan the art multiple times to pick up all the details.”

Searle’s original artwork for Beastly Feasts! will be on display at the Forbes Gallery on lower Fifth Avenue from September 8–29 and at the Chris Beetles Gallery in London from October 12–31. At the end of September, Forbes will embark on a five-city tour to promote the book.

The prolific poet has written enough animal poems (which Searle has already illustrated) to fill at least one sequel to Beastly Feasts! and he expects there might be additional children’s books in his future. “I’m not exactly sure what other books I might do,” he muses, “but I know I will always use poetry and rhyme to get where I want to go.”





Publishers Weekly Review-

As much coffee-table conversation piece as a collection for children, this oversize volume allocates each of 40 spreads to a different animal, portrayed in tepid verse by Forbes and in first-rate cartoons by Searle. Forbes, the president of ForbesLife magazine, leans on puns ”and then the hippo potty must!”), interest in appearance (“An uptown leopard named Lottie / All the guys consider a hottie”) and grisly demises (“A naughty lad, he took no care, and in the end did feed the bear— / an accident”). Most of the animals are adults, their concerns those of middle age: weight gain, stale marriages, professional advancement. The verse can scan poorly or seem tired (“Her neck is very, very tall / So tall she towers o'er us all” says Forbes of—what else?—a giraffe). Satirical cartoonist Searle (Searle's Cats) redeems the wacky menagerie. Punctuating pale watercolor wash with inky black lines and splotches, he draws Forbes's hippopotamus hurrying goggle-eyed and cross-legged with urgency to the nearest bathroom, and Lottie the leopard strutting like Cyd Charisse down a red carpet. The aforesaid “naughty lad,” pale and pimply, stands before the bear cage, incapable of interpreting the bear's menacing grin while a tiny, anxious mouse in the corner waves its paws in alarm. (In a child-friendly touch, the mouse lurks in each picture.) For die-hard Searle fans. Ages 6-up. (Sept.)

New Searle books published

'ST.TRINIANS'


With the imminent release of the re-vamped St.Trinian's film the original Searle volumes are being re-published. US version above & UK version below.


Then another for younger readers-'BEASTLY FEASTS'


'This is an outlandish menagerie of madcap rhymes and extraordinary animals, from the inimitable minds of Robert Forbes and Ronald Searle. With over 40 delicious poems and zany illustrations of each featured creature (and a secret critter peeping out from each page) from master cartoonist Robert Searle, these wildly playful rhymes and charmingly intricate illustrations will keep readers 7 to 70 coming back to the table again and again. The Gnus are out! So are the dachshunds, squirrels, and giraffes! Open up Beastly Feasts for a menagerie of poems that are as good for a scare as they are for a laugh!'
Hardcover: 96 pages
Publisher: Overlook Press,U.S. (1 Nov 2007)

New book coming later this year...

'This is an outlandish menagerie of madcap rhymes and extraordinary animals, from the inimitable minds of Robert Forbes and Ronald Searle. With over 40 delicious poems and zany illustrations of each featured creature (and a secret critter peeping out from each page) from master cartoonist Robert Searle, these wildly playful rhymes and charmingly intricate illustrations will keep readers 7 to 70 coming back to the table again and again. The Gnus are out! So are the dachshunds, squirrels, and giraffes! Open up Beastly Feasts for a menagerie of poems that are as good for a scare as they are for a laugh!'
Hardcover: 96 pages
Publisher: Overlook Press,U.S. (1 Nov 2007)