A Sidford artist has published a book of cartoons, sketches and drawings which is now on sale in local bookshops.

Lawrence Gunn's book Cartoons Mostly; Mostly Coloured is a collection of quirky pictures, including some commissioned works and many others that are based on his own observations.

He said: "I take my cue from people watching, a sense of the absurd, sheer silliness, prompt words, lateral thinking and a vaguely jaundiced view of the world and its affairs."

He will donate any profits from sales of the book to Devon Air Ambulance.

Lawrence said he is neither an artist nor a cartoonist by trade, but has drawn and painted all his life.

He said: "My earliest recollection is of an event that took place before I started school. I had seen the local undertaker leading a horse-drawn hearse and was fascinated by the scene. I sat at mum’s kitchen table drawing it on a piece of paper in which cheese had been wrapped – paper was hard to come by after the war. A visiting policeman admired my art and gave me his indelible pencil as a reward. I have it still."

He started work in 1958 as a studio junior in a London advertising agency and learned to produce visuals, layouts, paste-ups, finished art, airbrushing and typography. After 20 years in the London advertising scene he gave it up to take a degree and become a teacher of maths and English.

But he continued producing, and selling, artwork. He said: "My commissioned work has been posters, price lists and such for local businesses, chapels and the like. My wife taught infants and I produced a deal of artwork for her to use as teaching aids.

"I am more inclined towards graphics than painting and use different mediums as and when.

"My most recent commission has been for a contemporary whose verses tend to be in the vein of those of Pam Ayres. In the last four years I have illustrated over 200 of her poems. This has been a labour of love."

He added that his book, Cartoons Mostly; Mostly Coloured, 'has no message and no function other than to be looked at and, I hope, enjoyed by a wider audience'.

It is available from Paragon Books and Winstone's in Sidmouth.