Millar Watt with an illustration for Sphere,
London, 1922
WELCOME to this site featuring the comic strip POP and its pioneering creator John Millar Watt.
Millar Watt, as he was known, was an artist whose work exceptionally, embraced no less than four genres of commercial and fine art : Cartooning, Illustration, Advertising and Painting.
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His cartoon creation POP was lauded “The Champagne of British humour” making loyal fans amongst readers of the British tabloid Daily Sketch from its introduction in May 1921. Thereafter, worldwide syndication brought POP to readerships around the globe from 1929 until the paper's subsumption into its sister paper, The Daily Mail in the early '70s.
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Millar's daily drawing of POP's exploits engaged his daily readers on a universal theme, that observation of the ebb and flow of life that is not uncommon among artists. He maintained an equivalently demanding career in illustration and advertising which kept him at his drawing board well into retirement. In this way Millar's work was inspired by, and drew inextricably upon life with his wife and children, later grandchildren, and the work of three generations of his artist family also features in these pages.
John Millar Watt and steed, Amiens, France 1917. Millar recalled that his horse bolted when the flash-bulb exploded for this photograph.
Born in 1895, Millar was of that era of young people whose early careers and aspirations were set aside in favour of war service. Millar served on the front lines of the French and Italian Fronts throughout World War One.
Despite being mustard-gassed on Vimy Ridge, he survived and on his return home and to work, he reentered the clamour of London's Fleet Street. Millar resumed his apprenticeship in a leading advertising agency, recalling being given all the research jobs the other artists did not want. At lunchtimes he was amused when artists vied for tables with the boys from the printing houses at the cheap and cheerful cafe, Lockharts. Millar recalled how the waiters yelled the orders down the dumb-waiter shaft in Italian-Cockney. He answered an advert in the Times newspaper by the editors of the ’Sketch, who sought to rival the popular cartoon feature of their chief competitor the 'Mirror.
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As a young artist, one of Millar's chief motivations was to enhance his earnings as an apprentice designer in the advertising industry and fledgling illustrator of periodicals.
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Also he wished to marry his sweetheart Amy, a painter from Devon whom he had met in evening classes at St Martin's School of Art.​
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My Wife. Oil on canvas board by Millar Watt.
The pottery vase reappears in a painting of hydrangea blooms by Louise Watt
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Amy Sewing. The Studio, Dedham
Oil on canvas. Millar Watt c1927
When first married, Amy Watt modelled for this 1924 Sphere cover by Millar Watt.​
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Millar was one of the few cartoonists who drew his cartoon strip single-handed. Many British and American cartoonists drew in teams, sharing the work of collecting material for jokes and the drawing too.
Throughout his life he worked as a freelance artist, working first from a studio in Fleet Street then from home in Essex.
POP was demanded six days a week plus extra work for children’ supplements in the Sunday edition. Still he found the time to keep up his obligation to draw POP and be current
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in his other spheres of commercial work. Much later, when this aspect of his work became dominant, Millar made a final decision to stop drawing POP for the 'Sketch.
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In his long career post-POP he produced designs for many household brands, including Sainsbury's, Shell, Cherry Blossom boot polish, Rowntree’s sweets, an iconic sunburst-motif for Sunblest bread whose derivative is still emblazoned on bakery lorries today, and a long-standing campaign for Ben Truman IPA.
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This aspect of his work is featured here.
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Cover of the 1932 POP annual.
Each annual was given a title that lampooned one aspect or other of POP's idiosyncrasies. Millar selected 100 or so strips from the originals drawn each year for the publication, and it was advertised on sale each November.
Millar and Amy made their first move to their own home, a modernist inspired design of a house whose main feature was a first floor studio with vast windows overlooking the same views of Dedham Vale that Constable had painted. Studio space was a feature in a succession of homes that supported and encouraged the art of his family : wife Amy Watt, daughter Mary and a large walled garden to corral their younger son George. His granddaughter Louise was fascinated by Millar’s illustrative work, that kept him busy well into retirement.
Millar was less well known as a fine art painter, although whenever he could find time to try, his paintings were hung in the Summer Exhibition and local art shows.
There are notably longer records of participation at both St Ives and Ipswich Art Club shows. As a youth before the First World War he made extended study of classical and world art, and was quietly expert in the methods of Old Master painters. His own life-sized copy of Titian’s Bacchus and Ariadne hung in the family dining room for decades.
The common denominator in his work across all four genres of commercial and fine art was his ability to create sustained interest and richness both in mono’ and colour work. He retained always, the enthusiasm for illustrating the texts he was first given as a young man, and he eventually specialised in illustrating historical fiction both for adult and younger readerships.
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He was meticulous with research in a pre-digital age; and this enriched the compositional grace and authenticity of each artwork. The scintillating colour he used was highly effective; long admired and much emulated by successive generations of action strip artists. That thrill of visual abundance that was so intrinsic to Millar's work is evident still, from adventure artwork to animated movies.
Broadsheet advertisement for Shell, 1961.
Advertising and illustration work post-WWII increased when Millar gave up drawing POP.
Rookery Farm.
Both Millar and Amy found their neighbour’s farm buildings and the Vale of ancient trees a compelling study in paint. Public Collection.
Millar’s illustrations for the Robin Hood adventure books of the 1950s are widely used to date, in licensing sales worldwide.
Tributes to the creator of POP
from friends and cartoonists published in a double page spread Daily Sketch c1946