With a general election looming, ‘Queen Makes Corbyn’s Mind Up’, a cartoon published in The Times in 2015 that shows HM beating Jeremy Corbyn about the head with her handbag, seems in hindsight to have been a particularly topical lot. It sold for £8000.
Scarfe’s ‘Famous Old Bag’, image of Margaret Thatcher was a major success, selling far in excess of estimate at £17,000, but a number of the sale’s other top bids were made for illustrations that Scarfe made in connection with his work on the Pink Floyd rock opera of 1979, Another Brick in the Wall.
Shown above also is an illustration of ‘The Teacher’ that made £18,000.
Estimated at £100,000-150,000 but left unsold was Scarfe’s controversial charcoal drawing of the aged Winston Churchill during his final appearance in the House of Commons. Commissioned by The Times, it was not in the end used because they thought “…Churchill’s wife, Clementine, would be upset when the paper dropped through the letter-box in the morning”, says Scarfe.
In 2008, it was shown in Scarfe’s Hung, Drawn and Slaughtered exhibition in the House of Commons and remained there until very recently.
