Cartoon of David Trimble and Ian Paisley from the BBC's Hearts and Minds
Ian Knox (b. Belfast, 4 May 1943) is a political cartoonist for The Irish News, and also draws cartoons for the BBC Northern Ireland political show Hearts and Minds. He claims Ronald Searle, David Low, John Glashan, Vicky, Steve Bell, Oliphant and Charles Addams as his influences.
He trained as an architect at Edinburgh College of Art (1963-1967) and Heriot-Watt University, Edinburgh (1967-1968), and worked for a while as an architect before establishing himself as a cartoonist. He worked in animation from 1970 to 1975 for Halas & Batchelor in London, Potterton Productions in Montreal, and Kotopoulis Productions in Toronto. He then joined Red Weekly and Socialist Challenge as a political cartoonist. He signed much of his political work "Blotski", and he and Republican News cartoonist Cormac worked together as "Kormski", drawing the anti-clerical strip "Dog Collars" for Fortnight magazine.
In the 1970s and 80s he drew various humour strips for IPC comics, including "Dreamy Den", "Strawbelly" and "Terror TV" for Buster, "Major Jump, Horror Hunter" for Monster Fun, "The Krazy Gang" and "Pongalongapongo" for Krazy, "Funtastic Journey" and "6 Million Dollar Gran" for Cheeky, "Lucky Dick", "Winnie the Royal Nag", "Starr's Wars" and "Grim Gym" for Whizzer and Chips, "Gran's Gang" for Whoopee!, and "Exercises" and "Roger Rental" for Oink.
Since 1989 he has been the editorial cartoonist for the Irish News, a nationalist newpaper based in Belfast. Since 1996 he has contributed the "As I See It" feature to Hearts and Minds on BBC2 Northern Ireland. From 1997-1998 he was also the political cartoonist for Ireland on Sunday.
External links[]
- Ian Knox-related posts at Peter Gray's Cartoons and Comics
- Peter Gray's UK Comic Artists
- Dreamy Den and Lucky Dick and Fleetway Street
- If You Ask Me, extended cartooning video sequence from Hearts and Minds, BBC, 17/03/2011
