A CARTOONIST has produced a new book of everyday scenes of Huddersfield.
Rob Martin has created 100 images based on the decline of British standards.
The 42-year-old from Roman Avenue in Outlane told the Examiner yesterday: “Every time I came across something ugly I felt like the way I could exorcise it was to draw a cartoon.
“I thought of it as something negative but when I showed people the cartoons, they reacted positively because they feel they are not alone.”
Mr Martin has used many Huddersfield images in his new book, Challenging Behaviour.
He said: “They are usually things that you wouldn’t take a picture of, but that make you think ‘what the heck?’
“I was in Queensgate Market and there were lots of grannies peering over the counter at the biscuit stall with their chins resting on the Swiss rolls.
“On another occasion I was stopped in the town centre by somebody asking me to give money to charity. I couldn’t focus on what she was saying because of her blonde moustache.
“Huddersfield has always been a bit off-kilter. It’s not a normal town.”
Mr Martin began work on the images following a trip to the seaside in 2010.
“I was on holiday a couple of years ago in Scarborough when I saw some very overweight people wandering down Marine Drive,” he said.
“It was an ugly thing, I had never seen anything like it.
“As a cartoonist, it sometimes feels like people are looking more like cartoons.
“I was disturbed by what I saw this country becoming.
“I felt I couldn’t relate, it was my version of a nightmare. The ‘please’ and ‘thank-you’ world seemed to have gone.
“The Britain I grew up in has gone and I felt that everybody was out for themselves.”
Mr Martin works as an animator, as well as writing television scripts.
“I started cartooning when I was a little kid. I’ve done it all my life,” he said.
