About John Vernon Lord
John Vernon Lord is an illustrator and educator and is Professor Emeritus of illustration at the University of Brighton, UK. John retired from the University as Programme Director for the visual communication department aged 60, to return to being a full time illustrator. Since then John has fully illustrated over 25 publications.
Internationally acclaimed for his works for James Joyce’s Ulysses and Finnegans Wake, his illustrations Lewis Carroll’s Alice in Wonderland and his writing and drawings for the seminal The Giant Jam Sandwich set to verse by Janet Burroway.
John Vernon Lord and Unseen Sketchbooks founder Gavin Ambrose spent days at the Ditchling Museum of Art + Craft, and time at John’s studio reviewing hundreds of sketchbook entries and works for the a new volume, ‘Random Notes about Doodling, Sketching, Drawing and Illustrating’. The book spans work from John’s prolific and sustained career.
About Random Notes about Doodling, Sketching, Drawing and Illustrating:
‘This book represents 66 years of some of Lord’s drawings and notes carried out from his student days to the present (1957-2022). They are mostly informal works that were carried out as a way of exploring and discovering. There are very nearly 700 pages of drawings here selected from the many pages of his sketchbooks, notebooks and doodles.
The apparent precision of many of the drawings belies the actual spontaneity of making them. They vary from depicting something observed to subjects that lurk inside his imagination. Drawing is one of the sharpest ways of keeping within the present.’ – John Vernon Lord
The book brings together a series of essays by Lord exploring the subtle differences between the four types of activities he undertakes as an illustrator. These range from the quick doodles produced in long programme meetings at the University through to intricate journal entries John still does o na daily basis.
The book:
Random Notes about Doodling, Sketching, Drawing and Illustrating
University of Brighton Research Week entry:
Research Week
University of Brighton Alumni page:
Read Alumni page
