{"title":"Anderson, Martin aka Cynicus","description":"\u003cp\u003e\u003cstrong\u003eMartin Anderson (1854-1932)\u003c\/strong\u003e, better known by his pseudonym Cynicus, was a Scottish artist, political cartoonist, postcard illustrator, and publisher.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eMartin Anderson was born in Leuchars, Fife, in 1854. After his mother, Margaret Martin, separated from his father, she moved with her children to Cambuslang, Glasgow. Anderson studied at Glasgow School of Art under Robert Greenlees, in Ingram Street Glasgow. On leaving he worked as a designer at a calico printer.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eWhen he was 19, he founded The St. Mungo Art Club in Glasgow, intended to be an alternative to the grander Glasgow Art Club. In 1877, he began to provide small illustrations for serial stories in the short-running News of the Week. In 1878 his painting The Music Lesson was accepted for the Royal Scottish Academy's annual exhibition. In 1879, age 24, he decided to move to London, (\"to study art proper\" he explained in an 1894 interview in The Sketch).\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eIn 1880 he was invited to join John Leng and Co., (the publisher of titles such as the Dundee Advertiser, the Evening Telegraph, People's Journal, and The People's Friend), as its staff artist. Accepting the position, Andersen became the first such artist to be employed by any daily newspaper in Britain (until then daily newspapers were un-illustrated). He moved to Broughty Ferry near Dundee.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eIn 1881, as a freelance artist, he began contributing cartoons and illustrations to the comic weekly The Quiz, an imitation of the magazine Punch. For his illustrations in The Quiz he used the pseudonym \"bob\", but in November 1887 he adopted a second pseudonym, that of \"Cynicus\", and began to move away \"from the safe and trivial to the dangerous and powerful realm of politics\".\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eA series of cartoons titled The Satires of Cynicus appeared in The Quiz in 1888. In 1890 he decided to publish a collected edition of his more controversial subjects. The Quiz cartoons were redrawn in a larger size and hand coloured. They were published in six monthly parts, each part containing two full-page cartoons. However, they did not sell well.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eIn 1891, he moved back to London in an attempt to get his work noticed, taking a shop in Drury Lane, with the sign \"Cynicus Publishing Company\" over its door and with prints of his cartoons displayed in its windows. The Satires of Cynicus began to attract public attention and increasing sales. The edition was limited to 1000 copies, and by the end of 1891 it was almost out of print.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eIn 1891, he began contributing work to the Pall Mall Budget, as well as to The Idler and Ariel or the London Puck, yet another rival to Punch.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eA second book, titled The Humours of Cynicus, again containing many reworked The Quiz cartoons, was partwork published starting in September 1891. The complete 1000-copy edition of the complete volume sold for 25 shillings, with a 100-edition deluxe version priced at 2 guineas. In 1892, he began work on another collection, Symbols and Metaphors. It was also issued in parts, like its predecessors. A cheaper edition of The Satires of Cynicus was published in June 1892, and there were also later reprints of it.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eIn the late 1890s a new market for his products was quickly emerging – that of picture postcards. In 1898 Anderson began working for Blum \u0026amp; Degan where he designed court-sized postcards. In 1902, after the Post Office allowed divided back postcards, picture postcards became very popular and also began to be widely collected.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eIn 1902 Anderson decided to form his own company. The \"Cynicus Publishing Company\" was incorporated as a limited company and began publishing colour postcards by the second half of 1902. Initially, the company did exceedingly well. However, by 1908 the mass-market popularity of postcards began to decline and the company suffered from dwindling profitability. In 1911 the North of Scotland Bank forced the company to liquidate its assets. Its stocks of prints and original artwork were sold by the bank for a fraction of their true value and without any thought for their proper market: they were sold in a second-hand furniture salesroom rather than to art dealers in Edinburgh and London.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eIn 1912, after the collapse of the Cynicus Publishing Company, Anderson set up the \"Cynicus Art Publishing Company\" based in Leeds (the home of several postcard publishers), and began reissuing his old postcards and designing new ones. About 100 different postcards are known to have been printed by the Leeds company until 1914.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eThe outbreak of war put an end to the seaside postcard market in Britain, and Cynicus Art Publishing Company was forced to close. In 1915 Anderson moved to Edinburgh, leasing a basement shop in York Place. The printing plates for his postcards were sent from Leeds – but for uncertain reasons, and without the knowledge of Andersen, they were sold for scrap.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eIn 1915 he created an allegorical anti-war poster entitled War!: in a pyramidal composition, a crowned Mammon sits on a throne, tossing away the Nation's wealth to an ecstatic crowd clutching sacks marked \"War Profits\"; a semi-naked Lust caresses him, famine and disease sit at her feet; Justice and Parliament stand bound and gagged; the Lamp of Truth is extinguished by censorship; the Church encourages the slaughter. In the foreground, a bloody river carries away the bodies of the dead while bankers grab the bank deposits of the dead.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eThis poster was displayed in his shop window until he was warned he could be interned without trial under the terms of the Defence of the Realm Act (DORA). The poster was removed from view, but was made into a postcard which sold well.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eIn 1924, his Edinburgh shop was destroyed by fire, everything inside it was lost, and he did not have the funds to repair and restock it. He retired to his castle-like mansion in Balmullo to live in increasing poverty. A final edition of The Satires of Cynicus was published in 1926.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eIn 1930 he wrote \"Memoirs of Cynicus\", published in 12 instalments in the Glasgow Evening News.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eHe died suddenly on 14 April 1932 and was buried in the Martin family grave in Tayport Old Churchyard. The funeral was never paid for and his grave is unmarked, without a tombstone.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eHis mansion in Balmullo was extensively vandalised after his death.\u003c\/p\u003e","products":[{"product_id":"anderson-martin-aka-cynicus-1854-1932-the-scapegoat","title":"Anderson, Martin aka Cynicus (1854-1932) - The Scapegoat","description":"\u003cp\u003eThe Scapegoat was an illustration for Cartoons Social and Political by Martin Anderson, aka Cynicus 1893.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eThis download consists of 1 image in JPEG format that is 600dpi and 3409 pixels wide by 4571 pixels tall.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eThe picture is out of copyright and in the public domain, so you are free to use it in whatever way you'd like, including commercial use.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eRead more about \u003ca href=\"https:\/\/publicdomainimagelibrary.com\/collections\/anderson-martin-aka-cynicus-1854-1932\" title=\"Martin Anderson aka Cynicus\"\u003eMartin Anderson aka Cynicus\u003c\/a\u003e.\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"Digital Download - 1 image","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":51013329420618,"sku":null,"price":0.8,"currency_code":"GBP","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0776\/7965\/7290\/files\/Anderson_MartinakaCynicus_1854-1932_-TheScapegoat_main.jpg?v=1751629734"}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0776\/7965\/7290\/collections\/Anderson_Martin_aka_Cynicus_1854-1932-777390.jpg?v=1749371390","url":"https:\/\/www.publicdomainimagelibrary.com\/collections\/anderson-martin-aka-cynicus-1854-1932.oembed","provider":"Public Domain Image Library","version":"1.0","type":"link"}