Linley Sambourne House

 

Linley Sambourne's career as an illustrator

Cartoonist Illustrator Photographer
French holiday sketch

1873
Our Autumn holiday on the French Rivers: Sambourne took his sketch book when he went on a rowing holiday in France with the song writer James Molloy and other friends. When Molloy published a book on the group's adventures Sambourne's drawings were used to illustrate it.

Sketch from holiday in Scottish highlands

1874
Our holiday in the Scottish Highland: Following the success of "French Rivers" Punch sent Sambourne and another member of staff, Arthur a'Beckett, on a walking holiday in the Scottish Highlands. The resulting illustrations show a great improvement in Sambourne's landscape sketches.

Illustration from the Water babies

1880
The Water Babies: The publisher Macmillan asked Sambourne to illustrate a new edition of Charles Kingsley's "The Water Babies".
He did not begin to work on the 100 illustrations until January 1882 and seemed hesitant to adopt one particular style for the book. Some drawings, like this one, were in the early, fanciful style, others were pure realism.

Roy as a Water baby

1884
Photographs of Roy /Drawings of Tom: By 1884 Sambourne realised how useful photography could be to an artist. His children Roy and Maud made ideal models for the characters Tom and Ellie in "The Water Babies".

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