Rowel Boyd Friers ''MBE'' ''PPRUA'' (13 April 1920 -21 September 1998) was a cartoonist, illustrator, painter and lithographer.

Early life and career

Friers grew up in the Lagan Village area of

Belfast Belfast (, , , ; from ) is the capital city and principal port of Northern Ireland, standing on the banks of the River Lagan and connected to the open sea through Belfast Lough and the North Channel (Great Britain and Ireland), North Channel ...

near the Ravenhill Road. He was apprenticed to the Belfast lithographic firm S. C. Allen and Co, and studied at the Belfast College of Art from 1935 to 1942. He began publishing his cartoons in the 1940s. He began concentrating on political cartooning with the advent of

The Troubles The Troubles () were an ethno-nationalist conflict in Northern Ireland that lasted for about 30 years from the late 1960s to 1998. Also known internationally as the Northern Ireland conflict, it began in the late 1960s and is usually deemed t ...

in the late 1960s. His work appeared in '' Punch'', the ''

Radio Times ''Radio Times'' is a British weekly listings magazine devoted to television and radio programme schedules, with other features such as interviews, film reviews and lifestyle items. Founded in September 1923 by John Reith, then general manage ...

'', '' London Opinion'', the ''

Daily Express The ''Daily Express'' is a national daily United Kingdom middle-market newspaper printed in Tabloid (newspaper format), tabloid format. Published in London, it is the flagship of Express Newspapers, owned by publisher Reach plc. It was first ...

'', the '' Sunday Independent'', '' Dublin Opinion'', '' the Northern Whig'', the '' News Letter'', ''

The Irish Times ''The Irish Times'' is an Irish daily broadsheet newspaper and online digital publication. It was launched on 29 March 1859. The editor is Ruadhán Mac Cormaic. It is published every day except Sundays. ''The Irish Times'' is Ireland's leading n ...

'' and the ''

Belfast Telegraph The ''Belfast Telegraph'' is a daily newspaper published in Belfast, Northern Ireland, by Independent News & Media, which also publishes the Irish Independent, the Sunday Independent and various other newspapers and magazines in Ireland. Its e ...

''. Aside from cartooning, Friers was a leading figure in the Ulster Watercolour Society, and his oil paintings hang in the

National Portrait Gallery National Portrait Gallery may refer to: * National Portrait Gallery (Australia), in Canberra * National Portrait Gallery (Sweden), in Mariefred *National Portrait Gallery (United States), in Washington, D.C. *National Portrait Gallery, London ...

, the gallery of the

Ulster Museum The Ulster Museum, located in the Botanic Gardens in Belfast, has around 8,000 square metres (90,000 sq. ft.) of public display space, featuring material from the collections of fine art and applied art, archaeology, ethnography, treasures ...

, and many other collections. He illustrated more than 30 books, including John Pepper's Ulster dialect books and an American edition of the works of

W. B. Yeats William Butler Yeats (, 13 June 186528 January 1939), popularly known as W. B. Yeats, was an Irish poet, dramatist, writer, and literary critic who was one of the foremost figures of 20th-century literature. He was a driving force behind the ...

. He was a keen actor and television performer, with a talent for mimicry, serving as President of the Ulster Association of Drama Festivals and appearing regularly on chat shows. The interior walls of the waiting room in the old McCartney veterinarian clinic on the Upper Knockbreda Road in Belfast were decorated by him with large scale illustrations of pets and their owners in a mix of humorous and educational situations. He was awarded the MBE in 1977. He was President of the Royal Ulster Academy of Arts from 1993 to 1997.

Death and legacy

Friers died in

Holywood Holy Wood or Holywood may refer to: Places * Holywood, County Down, a town and townland in Northern Ireland ** Holywood, County Down (civil parish), a civil parish in County Down, Northern Ireland ** Holywood railway station (Northern Ireland) ...

County Down County Down () is one of the six counties of Northern Ireland, one of the nine counties of Ulster and one of the traditional thirty-two counties of Ireland. It covers an area of and has a population of 552,261. It borders County Antrim to the ...

on 21 September 1998. His funeral was attended by a large crowd, including politicians from both sides of the sectarian divide - the

SDLP The Social Democratic and Labour Party (SDLP; ) is a social democratic and Irish nationalist political party in Northern Ireland. The SDLP currently has eight members in the Northern Ireland Assembly ( MLAs) and two members of Parliament (MPs ...

's Lord Fitt and the DUP leader, the Reverend

Ian Paisley Ian Richard Kyle Paisley, Baron Bannside, (6 April 1926 – 12 September 2014) was a loyalist politician and Protestant religious leader from Northern Ireland who served as leader of the Democratic Unionist Party (DUP) from 1971 to 2008 and ...

. He is survived by his wife Yvonne (née Henderson), daughter Vivien and sons Jeremy and Timothy.

References

Obituary from ''The Independent''

External links

Rowel Friers gallery at Windows to Ireland
{{DEFAULTSORT:Friers, Rowel 1920s births 1998 deaths Editorial cartoonists from Northern Ireland Artists from Belfast Members of the Order of the British Empire Alumni of Ulster University Alumni of Belfast School of Art Members of the Royal Ulster Academy Belfast Telegraph people