Whilst in his early twenties, Philip Stuttard spent a few years as a freelance cartoonist, frequently contributing to The Daily Mail. He eventually moved to London where he specialised as an airbrush artist, painting onto almost anything and everything: trash cans, motorcycle petrol tanks, personal computers, guitars, stage backdrops, leather jackets, t-shirts, baseball caps and even the plaster on a salesman's broken leg!

In 2001, he moved back to his native Yorkshire, and it was whilst surrounded by the beautiful dales and moorlands that he started sculpting animals and 'tall men in flat caps': 'I try to portray the funnier side of life, and I'm sure many would agree that real life can be much times more amusing than fiction!' he says.

Here we feature two great collections inspired by the work of Philip Stuttard:

Local Heroes
'The characters which I create for the Local Heroes are light-hearted snapshots of working-class men in everyday life, from times not too distant in our memories, hopefully capturing that little bit of nostalgia which many of us recall fondly from our past'.

Sheep 'n' Dales
'My observations of animals enable me to draw upon a situation and turn it into something quite quirky. Sheep lend themselves perfectly. To me, sheep are comical and inoffensive creatures that keep themselves to themselves, just standing around in fields all day long, daydreaming—but dreaming about what?

'In view of my work, I hope that the next time someone sees a sheep, they will never see them in the same light again!'