Joseph Lee
Drawing
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Victoria and Albert Museum
London, United Kingdom
It belongs to the collection, but is not on display at present.
- Checked
- 7 days ago
- In this state since
- Sep 25, 2026
- Source
- The museum's own collection data
About the work
This illustration was originally published in the magazine The Bystander, 11th August 1926, when the play Down Hill transferred to London's Prince's Theatre from the Queen's Theatre where it had opened the previous June. It depicts the revue star Julia Blue, played by Phyllis Monkman, with her dresser Minnie played by Jessie Bateman, in Act II, scene 1, set in the dressing room of the fictional Casino Theatre where the actress is plagued by lovestuck suitors. The play concerns the fate of Roddy Berwick, an English schoolboy played by Ivor Novello, who is expelled from school and falls in love with Julia Blue, who reciprocates his feelings only when he wins forty thousand pounds on a horse race. The play was directed by the actress Constance Collier who wrote the play with Ivor Novello under the pseudonym David L'Estrange.
Read on
The Yorkshire-born cartoonist Joe Lee learned his skill via Percy Bradshaw’s Press Art School correspondence course. When unable to finance his training as an architect at the Royal College of Art, he turned to illustration. After producing his first cartoon for The Bystander in 1920 he quickly developed as a freelance artist, and by 1921 was described by The Strand Magazine as ‘the youngest of the men of his craft who have now an established reputation’. Lee contributed to a variety of periodicals, and between 1934 and 1966 worked for The Evening News where he created the hugely popular ‘London Laughs’ series, which has been credited as the first non-political topical cartoons in the UK. After almost 9000 cartoons – the longest running daily cartoonist in history – he retired to Norwich in July 1966 but continued to produce political cartoons three days a week for the local Eastern Daily Press and work for comics. In 1963 he was presented with an award for Special Services to Cartooning by the Cartoonists’ Club of Great Britain.
Victoria and Albert Museum
Particulars
- Accession number
- S.19-2008
What it shows
In the catalog
Sources
- Victoria and Albert Museum: the museum's own open data · fetched 7 days ago
- Image: Victoria and Albert Museum — © Victoria and Albert Museum, London
