Toni Le Busque's black, white & coloured doodles

Summer is on its way and so are these styles.

Mon, 06 May 2013 07:22:51 -0400

Summer is on its way and so are these styles.

Justine admires my work. Here she is seen in the act.

Wed, 24 Apr 2013 08:12:00 -0400

Justine admires my work.
Here she is seen in the act.

Your Very Very Dark Days

Tue, 23 Apr 2013 14:49:26 -0400

Your Very Very Dark Days

Tiny tweaks can lead to big changes.

Fri, 05 Apr 2013 09:18:58 -0400

Tiny tweaks can lead to big changes.

I was talking to Tall Lee one night and he told me he was...

Mon, 18 Mar 2013 19:30:00 -0400

I was talking to Tall Lee one night and he told me he was writing his life story and that everyone should write one.
So I did.
However, I didn’t write a typical, long winded 300 page thing going into great detail about toilet training and school bullying and drunken escapades and sham marriages.

I wrote very short paragraphs and illustrated them accordingly.
Much less time consuming and much more amusing, for the author and the audience.

So now, I too think everyone should write their life story in this way.

In fact, coming soon are my friend Andrew’s The Truth, The Half Truth and Nothing Like The Truth.
He writes, I illustrate.

In the meantime, here, read some reviews of mine, Pictorial Recollections of a Life Partly Spent.

And now buy a copy.

You never know, you might be in it.

Four Letter Words are Good.

Mon, 11 Mar 2013 14:58:02 -0400

Four Letter Words are Good.

When the sun comes out, so do the pastels. The first pastel of...

Fri, 08 Mar 2013 12:37:09 -0500

When the sun comes out, so do the pastels.
The first pastel of the season is a portrait of a plant my friend Andrew gave me.
I thank Andrew for the plant.
Who I should thank for the sun is not clear.

Remember being a child and doing something you thought really...

Fri, 01 Mar 2013 16:06:43 -0500

Remember being a child and doing something you thought really worthy, exciting, something that made you feel happy, pleased with yourself?
Like a drawing, and then you show it to an adult, or a teacher who proceeds to criticise, belittle and pick fault.
I was reminded of this today.
And then the following came to mind-

HAD I the heavens’ embroidered cloths,
Enwrought with golden and silver light,
The blue and the dim and the dark cloths
Of night and light and the half light,
I would spread the cloths under your feet:
But I, being poor, have only my dreams;
I have spread my dreams under your feet;
Tread softly because you tread on my dreams.

W.B. Yeats (1865–1939)
“He Wishes For the Cloths of Heaven”

So lets remind ourselves to encourage rather than embarrass, inspire rather than intimidate, delight in rather than dismiss.

And if you can’t say something nice, you can…..(see above photograph)

Join The Club, tonilebusque.com/the-club, and you mayhaps win a...

Fri, 01 Mar 2013 03:39:18 -0500

Join The Club, tonilebusque.com/the-club, and you mayhaps win a copy of my new comic book, Pictorial Recollections of a Life Partly Spent.

It’s the comical version of my enthralling life.
If you know me, you might be in it.
Have a look, it’s here-bit.ly/XKqwtw

Happy Friday!

Today I uploaded this pictorial version of my life to...

Sat, 23 Feb 2013 15:04:50 -0500

Today I uploaded this pictorial version of my life to completelynovel.com.
It’s fascinating and you can buy your own copy to see if you are in it.
Not that many people other than me feature in it.
Some people do, but not as many as I’d like.
I wanted it to be short, not some godawful overly-long drawn-out dull thing.
So it’s only 80 pages but you could double that to 160 if you’re of a mind because each story also has an illustration to accompany it.
Get it.
You won’t be disappointed.
Or you might be, if you’re expecting to be in it and you’re not.
Or you might be disappointed that you are in it and don’t really want to be.

Here it is.

My life story, Pictorial Recollections of a Life Partly Spent...

Thu, 21 Feb 2013 17:36:01 -0500

My life story, Pictorial Recollections of a Life Partly Spent is done.
It’s POD and there will also be an e version coming shortly.
But, you know, who wants an ebook when you can have the smell of paper in your nostrils?
Well, uh, lots of people, it seems.
Therefore very shortly there will be 2 versions of this utterly thrilling 80 page combination of doodle and word.

Here’s what a man called Jeff said about it-
“Toni, just been reading your pictorial life jottings on the bus on my ipad….comic and tragic in equal measure, but mostly had me crying with laughter and spluttering out loud…quite brilliant…and fascinating.”

So, very soon you’ll be able to order your own copy.
I’ll alert you when it’s ready.

I’m working on the print version of my life story.It will...

Fri, 15 Feb 2013 09:26:30 -0500

I’m working on the print version of my life story.
It will be available on.

If you’d like to know when it’s ready, so you can buy a copy, here’s the link.

Today’s good thing was beginning a new drawing. It’s...

Tue, 05 Feb 2013 07:34:54 -0500

Today’s good thing was beginning a new drawing.
It’s a different size to what I usually do, but I found a frame with some mount in it so I’m drawing to fit the frame.
Approx 23cm by 58, I’ve asked Facebook friends for their favourite 4 letter words.
Bang
Fuck
Fool
Shit
Word
Good
Muff
Cunt
All the old favourites are there, along with pool and mate, from the lovely Shandy, always thinking laterally.
So, here is bang, as in ‘bang em under’.
The next?
Maybe baby….who knows.
But bang baby has a nice ring!
Bang
Baby
Ring
Nice
See, whenever you open your mouth, a four letter word falls out.

The idea for this drawing leaked out of an earlier work called, You My Friend Are a Four Letter Word And It Is Not Love.

“This is what I’m stitching on my @craftivists...

Tue, 29 Jan 2013 18:19:00 -0500

“This is what I’m stitching on my @craftivists #ImAPiece - think it’s something my MP could do with pondering…”

I’m not, but I made this badge today for my studiomate and comrade, Laura.

She came across the phrase in one of my drawings and I think I came across it in a TED talk, don’t remember which one now.

There are some kinds of white that I like. The white hot sun on...

Mon, 21 Jan 2013 02:59:40 -0500

There are some kinds of white that I like.
The white hot sun on white pool steps at midday.
White walls in a bedroom.
All white crockery.
White sheets and white tee shirts.
White shirts.
Cockatoos.
And now I also like powdery white snow.

*This drawing was done in Florida. A4 pastel.

‘The shallow recover quickly. You cannot bruise a...

Sun, 20 Jan 2013 04:18:22 -0500

‘The shallow recover quickly. You cannot bruise a pillow.’

Someone spilled coffee all over a pile of my prints. Rather than...

Mon, 14 Jan 2013 09:51:54 -0500

Someone spilled coffee all over a pile of my prints.
Rather than get mad, I got cutting.
I’m preparing new works out of old.
Like cutting the legs off a pair of jeans and patching the holes in the arse with cut up floral shirts.
Cutting, glueing, drawing and stamping.
These are a few of my favourite things.

I have made a decision and it goes like this- If someone came to...

Thu, 10 Jan 2013 12:01:59 -0500

I have made a decision and it goes like this-

If someone came to my art studio with a picture of say…Van Gogh’s Wheatfield with Crows and asked me to do a drawing of it I would say no.

Fact is I can’t do what Van Gogh does because I don’t see things like he does.

I don’t ‘do’ what he ‘does’.

My skill set doesn’t match his.

So I would most likely send the person off to someone who could or would copy Wheatfield with Crows.

Alternatively I would say to them that I will do them a Wheatfield with Crows but not like the one Van Gogh did.

I would base a drawing on Van Gogh’s Wheatfield with Crows, or I would look at a design they had drawn up and ‘collaborate’, but I wouldn’t try to copy it for them.

Because that’s compromise.

And if there’s one thing I do know about myself, it’s that when it comes to drawing I have never compromised.

I might not sell a lot, but I don’t sell out.

Anyway, the point I’m making is that I haven’t been applying that rule to tattooing.

Up until now.

I may not get a lot of tattooing work because of this decision, just as I may not sell a lot of drawings, but from now on, if you get a tattoo from me, you’ll know it’s an uncompromised piece of my art.

Because even though my tools and materials may change to suit my purpose, when it comes down to it, I am, above and beyond everything else, an artist.

You know how JK Rowling wrote Harry Potter in a cafe,...

Sat, 05 Jan 2013 12:27:38 -0500

You know how JK Rowling wrote Harry Potter in a cafe, right?
I’ve decided to write the pictorial version (I’ve already done 30 installments) of my life in the Whetherspoons in Witney.
I wanted to do it sitting underneath the big drawing about sheep and blankets and so on that they commissioned me to do, because with one eye on history, I thought it might at some point sound cool to say I had written/drawn a book whilst sat under the sheep drawing.
But the table was occupied.
So today I was sat there on a stool at one of those high tables, with my note books in front of me, drinking coffee and drawing/writing, when this woman comes up and says-
“Do you have a table free for 4?”
“Um, I don’t know,’ I say, turning to look around me at tables, ’there might be one, but I don’t work here,”
She goes-“Oh, sorry. You look all official there, writing and stuff.”
And I go, “Oh, dear, I think I’m going to have to rethink the whole shirt/waistcoat/tie look.”
And then I start laughing, and then she does too.
Then I offer her my table.
But she says no, it’s fine.
Then her and what I presume are her family walk off toward the back of the pub and I go back to drawing and looking official.

Saturday night I went to a birthday party-Mine.It was one of the...

Wed, 02 Jan 2013 06:23:01 -0500

Saturday night I went to a birthday party-Mine.
It was one of the best parties I’ve attended and I threw it.
Though me having thrown it makes no difference.
It’s the attendees that make a party.
I could have thrown a party and invited a bunch of wankers to it.
Instead I invited my friends.
I realise I have a quite extraordinary group of diverse and interesting friends.
Many thanks to Mr and Mrs Northern Soul, Laura and Daniel, who set the decks up on the hob and Dj-ed in the kitchen.

Thanks to Ems and Maddie and E-Bei for the cakes.
I also made some new friends, lovely people who Hari brought with her.
They’re from Brooklyn, USA.

Kat from Brooklyn said that it was a better party than house parties in NYC.
And she liked these pictures that were hanging in the toilet, so as she left I slipped them into her bag.

That my drawings about shit and farts and wee will hang on a wall in Brooklyn really appeals to me.