Drawn To
Sunny Southport
Paul Hardman
The first Southport mini cartoon festival
was an unpublicised surprise to most in the
business – but for a very good reason. It all
had to be arranged at the very last moment,
with little or no budget or opportunity for
planning. Paul Hardman tells the tale;
I have for many years thought that my,
now, hometown of Southport in the NW
of England to be an ideal location for a
cartoon festival. I have tried in the past to
get something started here but without
the financial backing needed. The general
recession over the last six years had put
paid to any further efforts but suddenly
and out of the blue I was approached by
Brendan Riley, a local comedian and friend,
with whom I’ve worked on a project called
the Southport Comedy Festival for the last
three years. Bren put me in contact with
Tony Wynne, our local arts project manager,
who had been asked by the local council to
put on a week long Arts Festival as part of
an event to promote a local regeneration
funding bid for the council.
with a very limited budget. My immediate
response was to call on some of my old
friends and a tried and tested formula. A
hasty budget and plan was arrived at and
it was decided to have a big-board event in
the centre of town. Tony coordinated the
costings with the council and arranged the
building of the big boards together with the
Tony wanted to know if I could come up
with something at very short notice and
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www.thecartoonistsclub.com