Just as FrankP can take all the credit for this site and the creation of this blog, I too have passed the baton and can claim ownership (and copyrights) of the blog of Declan Shalvey.

I suggested he start one up to showcase his various works in progress and within a couple of months his blog is world class shit. I hate that Shalvey prick. Never liked him from day one. Nah, he's alright. The first person I've met in this country that I can talk to about nerdy comic production stuff or just general bitching. If you've worked on a comic in Ireland, we've bitched about you, shit, if you've bought a comic in Ireland we've bitched about you.

He's a great artist and his debut smash hit Hero Killers is currently listed in Previews and is generally rocking the world. His bread and butter at the moment is drawing Freak Show and you can find tons of finished and production art from it on his blog. It's mad, I turned my back on drawing superhero comics years ago but he kept at it and is now top notch.Meeting him and combined with a few other factors, I'm now back into drawing that stuff and it's fun.

Declan Shalvey Fun Fact corner:
-He doesn't eat pizzas.
-He's slept on my couch twice, the only person to do so.
-When he needs cash he works as a coal man.
-He has no shame in admtting his watching of Big Brother
-He's a scrud.

So take a mooch at his stuff and nifty step by step processes. I know I did.
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I used to hang around with this lad and they got the Evening Herald delivered every day. Being a moody teenager who hated everything, The Herald was an easy target for my venom, even now I hate their “we’re not a tabloid” stance but that’s another day’s rant. But every time I sneeringly leafed through it I was struck by the cartoons and illustrations by the slick cartoonist Scratch. The sharp lines, the upturned noses and the use of grey tones would slap me in the face. His work stood out a mile. Sophisticated and precise. As I tinkered with making my own comics, I’d keep running into Scratch’s work and his line work would both inspire and depress me.

I emailed Scratch a few months ago, cap in hand and was delighted to see how personable he was although he was working full tilt on a new book: CHARLIE: A Life in Words and Pictures he took the time to answer my fanboy questions and the image he conjured of the old pre-computer, pre-internet editorial cartooning process fascinated me. It soon turned into an interview.

The CHARLIE book is brilliant. Not only for the cartoons but it filled in many holes for me about Haughey’s life. Scratch could really help in making Irish history interesting and accessible to the kids with further installments.

It features a dizzying array of cartooning styles from one man. Really. The nerd in me marveled at the evolution and changing of the art and I spent more time than is healthy picking out which ones were added/created recently.

Truly a great read. For lovers of Irish cartooning and Irish cartoonists like me who spent Irish History lessons learning to be an Irish cartoonist. Available to buy online here for only 9.99 plus 2 quid postage.

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What was it like in The Herald?

Ah the old days in the Herald ... Newspaper offices looked just like they do in old movies, with reporters two-finger typing at manual typewriters and yelling "Copy!" for a messenger to pick up their articles once they were finished. You could smoke in those offices then, so there were clouds of smoke, and the ceilings were brown. The technology hadn't changed since Gutenberg, and the main typesetting hall which housed the Linotype machines was surreal -- straight out of Terry Gilliam's Brazil. Heavy drinking was not only permissible, but expected.

Go to a newspaper office now, and it's just like any other corporate Dilbertland. Watercoolers and coffee machines. I'd love to do an interview on the old days. Just to show what a lucky escape you guys had! Of course in 30 years' time, some young cartoonist will want to interview you about the bad old days when cartoonists had nothing better than broadband and Photoshop...
Before getting the position in The Herald, what kind of work were you doing? Art related or just donkey work?

I was a journalist, editing a monthly magazine called Technology Ireland. I had no formal art training, but did a lot of life drawing at night classes, and was doing cartoons in my spare time for magazines like In Dublin. When the editor of that magazine, Ferdia MacAnna, moved on to the Evening Herald, he commissioned a weekly cartoon on the arts from me, and one thing led to another...

Can you give us an example of your standard working day there, the process of consulting with the staff then rushing out your work.

In the 1980s, the working day started at 7.30 in the morning. A mug of strong coffee, followed by reading the three national papers (Indo, Press and Times). Then I’d start doodling roughs with a Biro or pencil. At 9.00, I’d go to the newsdesk and show the roughs to the editor. The deadline was 10.30, so I tried to get the pencilling done by around 9.45, and the inking by 10.15, which would leave a quarter of an hour to erase the pencil lines, apply some tint and tidy up the drawing. Then a brisk run to the Imaging department who’d make a block or a print of the drawing. After that, more coffee!

So what would you do with the rest of the day?

I wrote as well, and as a freelance I'd pick up work by being available if I stayed at my desk. I also worked on other freelance cartoons, like book and magazine illustrations. Sometimes I'd go around town with a camera or a sketchbook drawing buildings, because the Herald cartoons demanded a background, and I needed practice at architectural stuff. One great thing I learned from that Herald stint was drawing buildings, previously a phobia of mine.


Who was the resident cartoonist before you?

Bob Fannin, a real gentleman. At the Herald, he specialised in stylish pocket cartoons and illustrations, which he continued to do after I joined. The editor at the time, Michael Brophy, and Features Editor, Colm McGinty, asked me to do a trial run at something different -- a sort of Mac/JAK/Giles feature. It was to be topical or political without preaching. I double-jobbed for a month, and then handed in my notice at Technology Ireland. The Herald in the 1980s had two cartoonists; now many papers have none.

I know, it's sad. Political cartoonists are facing hard times the world over but what would you attribute the lack of Irish editorial and staff cartoonists too?

Cost-cutting across the newspaper industry is the main reason, even though there are more people in the business now than in the 1980s. Also, as the Guardian's Steve Bell has argued, most newspaper cartoons haven't changed in content or style since the late 1970s. The medium is still stuck in the prog-rock era, so we have to accept some of the blame ourselves.
And then there's Photoshop. Montages can be very effective -- and are less hassle for editors to commission. Computers have democratised satire: you don't have to be able to draw to do a good graphic joke.

The animation industry re-invented itself with 3D technology and rock soundtracks. We print cartoonists need to do something similar, or risk an inexorable decline. It would be great to see a new Scarfe, Steadman or Searle shake up the medium again.

Do you have a copy of your first ever published editorial?

No, it was terrible! Long since destroyed.

You had a run in The Herald from 1986-90 but then you returned for 3 years from 2002-2005. Was there much of a change at the paper in your 12 year absence?

One big change was colour printing -- they’d got a much better press. A second change was that everything had been computerised, and the cartoonist no longer worked in the building. Instead the cartoons were emailed from home. The cartoons were done a day in advance, not on the morning. I’d submit 3 roughs in the early afternoon for the following day’s paper. The paper was going to press even earlier in the morning, and the artwork had to be in colour, so the old schedule wasn’t workable.


And there was a big change in the newspaper’s tone. My first stint in the 1980s was before the Father Brendan Lynch scandal, and the Eamonn Casey affair, so the Catholic Church was much stronger then and people could still be shocked. In the 1980s, the aim was to be funny or even sharp but without unduly offending readers. When I went back, though, they encouraged me to be more direct and to put the boot in. This change has happened in all newspapers. The days when you could be sacked for offending people are gone. Now blandness is what will get a cartoonist or columnist fired.

Ever get any complaints or static from the readers over a cartoon? Or would all the juicy/close to the bone gags be shot down by the editorial staff?

I got occasional complaints -- mainly about the North. Some people found the mere fact of a cartoon being drawn in the aftermath of an atrocity or tragedy to be tasteless. Actually, I can see their point. There’s no easy answer to that for a cartoonist. In the 1980s, readers were far more easily offended, and most journalists practised a degree of self-censorship, myself included. You can be cruder today. Occasionally, though, I’d submit a really sick or tasteless gag, mainly to give the guy picking the roughs a laugh. It was a private joke between us.

The big constraint is the news. A newspaper cartoonist has to do the day’s headlines, and if the big stories are crime, tragedy or sport, or if the news is quiet, it’s hard to come up with something good.

When was the name ‘Scratch’ assigned to you?

I started using that signature when cartooning part-time. The magazine I worked for was published by a semi-state organisation, so I thought a pseudonym would be prudent. When the Phoenix started up, I submitted a batch of cartoons for their first issue. They rejected the lot, with a compliments slip saying “Sorry, not up to scratch”. And at that point the proverbial cartoon light bulb flashed over my head...

Jumping forward a bit, you now work digitally and are a black belt in Adobe (Certified Expert in Illustrator 10), When did you first get into generating your artwork on a computer? What kind of graphics tablet do you use?

While working in magazines, I had been involved in computerised typesetting, and computers appealed to me ever since. In the late 1990s, I was working for the Star, and they installed a bank of Macs. It was amazing to see what could be done in Photoshop, and I was hooked. But then I found that artwork scanned on a cheap scanner never looked as sharp as cartoons processed the traditional way. Adobe Illustrator could produce razor-sharp lines, and bring that quality back.

I have 2 Wacom tablets, a small A6 Graphire and a more expensive A5 Intuos. I move between them, with a preference for the smaller size because it allows me to keep one hand on the keyboard and the other on the pen. I once bought a large and expensive A4 tablet, but it involved stretching right across the desk. Complete waste of money -- you’d need extensible arms to use it.

The software I use most is Adobe Illustrator CS2 and Photoshop, though I’ve experimented with Flash, which can give really nice lines that can be exported to Illustrator for use in print. Another interesting program is Sketchbook Pro, which gives amazingly natural results if you want to draw direct on-screen with a graphics tablet. (http://www.autodesk.com/sketchbookpro). I use it for roughs rather than finished art.
Ever do any sequential work as opposed to single panel gags?

Sporadically. I’ve done strips for election campaigns. There was a daily strip called Hughie the Handler about a spin doctor working for a party suspiciously like FF, which ran in the Herald for a month or so. I also did a weekly strip called Matt the Moaner for the Star; it had two rows of panels and featured a guy in a pub giving out surrealistically about the week’s news. But my most ambitious effort was a 2-page Christmas special for the Herald. It was a topical retelling of Scrooge, with lots of panels and drawings -- a round-up of the year’s politics. I’ve never attempted a graphic novel, however. Haven’t got the stamina for that kind of marathon! Apart from Will Eisner, most of my influences have been magazine and newspaper gag cartoonists, so I don’t feel entirely confident with sequential art. I think it’s a vocation.


The new book Charlie: A Life In Words And Pictures hit shelves within weeks of his death. Without sounding too callous, was the book already compiled and you just waited for his passing or just a great coincidence? I know it's part recycled from your previous CJH book but such a fast turnaround is impressive.

I was talking to the publishers, Currach Press, about a different project -- a collection of cartoons on the health service. They'd seen the earlier book on Charlie and liked it, but were weren't sure about a new edition. They changed their minds in the wake of the state funeral and its attendant Fianna Fail hoopla, though, and asked for a new book. I had to rewrite the earlier work in two weeks, with new drawings and text. I'm still recovering.

You've done 3 books in Irish. Are you into Irish in a big way?

I like Irish. My first published national cartoons were in Irish language magazines. The monthly, Comhar, gave me great freedom in the 1970s, including the liberty to make mistakes in print -- I learned an incredible amount from that. At the time I couldn't believe my luck...

Is there a phrase or term for when a cartoonist uses a newspaper in a gag? Like when the whole gag is set up by a headline on a paper in the cartoon?
It seems an unavoidable device in editorial cartooning but has it got a name?

It's an appalling cliche, and one we use all the time. There's no technical term. Perhaps we're too embarrassed to put a name to it.

Let’s call it ‘Zelpatok’.Ever miss a deadline or be just too sick to make it into The Herald?

Only once. Dead to the world. They had a line "Scratch is unwell..." The editor wryly observed that no other Herald journalist received that honour. There was another incident: I slept it out by an hour and a half. Frantic phone call. Got through to the deputy editor. He said, "You'd better come in then." Mad dash for a taxi, and lashed the cartoon off in less than 40 minutes, and it was the best thing I'd done all year (page 56 of the Charlie book). Go figure... there's a lot to be said for working really fast. Readers often respond more to to the energy of a drawing (I really like those cartoons on your blog, by the way) rather than finicky technique.

Yeah that’s a great cartoon (page 56) really loose yet concise. During your time there, was there ever any talk about Count Curly Wee, it's cryptic story and all round shitness? Surely every now and then the Indo or Herald staff would question it's never ending run....

No, I didn't hear journalists talk about it. Like death and taxes, Count Curly Wee will always be with us.
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Ohhhhh Juicy. Jooo-SAY! That line about ‘Computers have democratised satire’ is a classic. Visit Scratch’s site here and buy the new book here. Also available in all bookshops too.

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