Geoffrey Mark Clement Huskinson (25 September 1935 – 8 March 2018) was an English cartoonist and first-class cricketer. His cartoons found prominence from the mid-1970s, featuring in many exhibits, books and newspapers.
| Personal information | |||||||||||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Full name | Geoffrey Mark Clement Huskinson | ||||||||||||||
| Born | 25 September 1935 Langar, Nottinghamshire, England | ||||||||||||||
| Died | 8 March 2018 (aged 82) Menorca, Spain | ||||||||||||||
| Batting | Right-handed | ||||||||||||||
| Bowling | Leg break | ||||||||||||||
| Relations | Geoffrey Huskinson (father) | ||||||||||||||
| Career statistics | |||||||||||||||
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Source: Cricinfo, 15 February 2019 | |||||||||||||||
Life and career
editThe eldest of four children, Huskinson was born at Langar Hall to the first-class cricketer Geoffrey Huskinson, Sr. and his wife, Carmen Imogen de las Casas, who was the daughter of a Spanish nobleman from Cuba.[1] He began to lose his hearing aged ten, shortly before attending Ampleforth College.[1] It was his deteriorating hearing that sparked his interest in drawing. Unable to concentrate in class, he began doodling on his desk.[1] After leaving Ampleforth, he was offered places at Slade School of Fine Art and the Ruskin School of Drawing and Fine Art, but accepted a place at Edinburgh College of Art.[1]
His time there was brief, with Huskinson moving to New Zealand where he worked on a sheep station until 1955.[1] He returned to England, where he bought a farm in Lincolnshire.[1] Huskinson played a first-class cricket match for the Free Foresters against Oxford University at Oxford in 1959.[2] He had little success in what was his only foray into first-class cricket, scoring 3 runs in the Free Foresters first-innings before being dismissed by David Russell, while in their second-innings he was dismissed by David Sayer for 7 runs.[3] He married Judith Chadfield in 1961, with the couple having three sons.[1] During this period he worked for Aveling-Barford as their representative in Africa and the Middle East, before leaving in 1967 when the company was taken over by British Leyland.[1]
He took up art once more in the mid-1970s, initially specialising in portraiture and sculpting.[1] He later exhibited some cartoons he had drawn, and decided to focus as a cartoonist after they sold out within 30 minutes.[1] He exhibited across the world between 1980 and 2007, and was regularly selling over 3,000 prints a year.[1] His illustrations filled a number of books, most prominently those about horse racing and cookery.[1] His wife died in 2007, with Huskinson briefly marrying Sue Ward, who ran his dealing network.[1] In 2014, he moved to Menorca to live by the golf course at Son Parc,[1] where he died in March 2018.
Family
editHis great-grandfather was Thomas Bayley, the Member of Parliament for Chesterfield. His sister, Imogen Skirving, was killed in a road accident in 2016 when she came to visit Huskinson in Menorca.[1]
References
edit- ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l m n o "Mark Huskinson, comic illustrator – obituary". The Daily Telegraph. 14 April 2018. Retrieved 15 February 2019.
- ^ "First-Class Matches played by Geoffrey Huskinson". CricketArchive. Retrieved 15 February 2019.
- ^ "Oxford University v Free Foresters, 1959". CricketArchive. Retrieved 15 February 2019.