Works by cartoonist and Leeds graduate Steve Bell are to go on show at the University of Leeds in April, marking 25 years of Bell’s famous Guardian strip, ‘If…’.

The exhibition – Steve Bell does Art – will run in the University Gallery from April 10 to June 16. It will feature over 350 of the best known ‘If…’ strips, including those published during the Falklands War shortly after Bell joined the Guardian and which helped to make his name.

In addition, there will be over 30 of Bell’s art pastiches, which copy well-known artworks or draw on the style of famous artists. References include artists such as Michelango, Rembrandt, Goya, Hogarth, Gainsborough, Turner and Ford Madox Brown.

Bell began his cartooning as a student at Leeds in the 1970s, producing posters for the Film Society before his graduation in 1974 in Fine Art.

Head of the School of Fine Art, Dr David Jackson, said: “The course at Leeds is grounded in art history, so all our students become conversant with a wide and diverse range of artists and their work. We like to think this breadth of knowledge will have served Steve well in his work and are delighted to have an exhibition of his cartoons in Leeds in this anniversary year.”

Following his graduation, Bell taught art for a short time in Birmingham, but soon left to follow a freelance career as a cartoonist, working for – among others – New Statesman, Punch, NME, City Limits and Private Eye. One of his first strips was ‘Maggie’s Farm’ in London’s Time Out magazine, which was condemned in the House of Lords as ‘an almost obscene series of caricatures’.

The Guardian approached Bell when the paper was looking for a British strip to run alongside Gary Trudeau’s ‘Doonesbury’ and the first ‘If…’ strip appeared in November 1981. ‘If…’ has proved consistently successful and controversial and Bell has been producing cartoons as the paper’s editorial and political cartoonist since 1990.

He has created many lasting images of politicians over the years – such as John Major as a pathetic ‘Superman’ with his underpants over his trousers and John Prescott as a simple-minded bulldog.

In a recent interview, Bell said: “I step over the line quite a lot but I think, well, you have to. It’s almost your duty to do it if you can.”

Bell was named Cartoonist of the Year in the British Press Awards in 2003 and has been won numerous awards from the Cartoon Arts Trust, the What the Papers Say Awards and the Cartoonists’ Club.

The Gallery is in the Parkinson Building on Woodhouse Lane and is open from 10am to 5pm, Monday to Friday.

For more information, contact Pete Morton on 0113 343 5273.

For images from the exhibition, contact the University Press Office on 0113 343 4031.

Photocall: The University Gallery will be open for photos at 2pm on Friday April 7.

Notes to Editors:

STEVE BELL BIOGRAPHY:

Steve Bell was born in 1951 in London, raised in Slough, studied art in Middlesbrough and Leeds and worked briefly as a teacher in Birmingham before becoming a freelance cartoonist in 1977.

His original strip cartoon Maggie’s Farm appeared in Time Out and City Limits magazines from 1979 until 1987 and, since 1981 he has written and drawn the If… strip in the Guardian.

Since 1990 he has produced four large free-standing cartoons a week on the leader pages of the Guardian, which now appear in full colour.

His work has been published all over the world and he’s won numerous awards, including the What the Papers Say Cartoonist of the Year in 1993, the XXI Premio “Satira Politica’ (Grafica estera) Forte Dei Marmi, Italy 1993, the Political Cartoon Society Cartoon of the Year Award in 2001 and Cartoonist of the Year in 2005, the British Press Awards Cartoonist of the Year in 2002, the Cartoon Arts Trust Award Best Strip cartoonist and/or Best Political Cartoonist eight times, the Channel 4 Political Humour Award in 2005 and the Political Studies Association Best Political Satire Award in 2005.

He has also received honorary degrees from the Universities of Sussex and of Teesside. With Bob Godfrey he has made a number of animated cartoons for TV, including a cartoon biography, Margaret Thatcher – Where Am I Now? broadcast on Channel 4.

He has had over twenty five books published, the latest being a cartoon autobiography of George Bush called Apes of Wrath and an anthology If… Marches On to be published this spring by Methuen.

His work was recently part of an exhibition 'Tauchfahrten/Diving Trips - Drawing as Reportage' at the Kunstverein in Hannover and the Kunsthalle in Duesseldorf. He has had major retrospective exhibitions of his artwork at Sussex University in 1996 and at the Barbican Centre in London in 1999.