John Goodall artwork • watercolour • drawing • for sale Playing tennis

British watercolorist, illustrator, and writer John Strickland Goodall became particularly well-known for his picture books like The Adventures of Paddy Pork. Because these books, except for the title page, contained no text, children were encouraged to create their own stories based on the illustrations. This also made them easy to sell abroad. Born into a family with a long medical tradition, Goodall's father reluctantly allowed his son to pursue an artistic education at the Royal Academy of Arts in London after he had demonstrated an exceptional talent for drawing at Harrow School. Goodall worked for a time for the Radio Times, founded in 1923 as the world's first program guide for radio and television. He subsequently illustrated magazines like The Bystander and children's books by Edith Nesbit. He also illustrated books with village scenes by author Dora Saint, who wrote under the pseudonym Miss Read, and published a series of his own books. Goodall remains a beloved artist to this day, with the Victorian and Edwardian eras as the main theme in his work.