At a talk about his work in his hometown of Brockley, political cartoonist Martin Rowson reminisced on one unfortunate part of his work: Death threats.

“The death threats I've received from outraged readers over the years have always been via email, and don’t count”, he said.

Martin has lived in London since his was born 59 years ago, and moved to Brockley in 1985 and eventually to Ladywell while continuing his work as a cartoonist.

His award-winning work around Brexit and other political events is featured regularly in The Guardian and he got to talk about his work on Monday (April 30), at the local community arts festival Brockley Max.

Given the politically charged nature of his work, he did say the prospect of an exhibition near his home where people might know him is “frightening”.

He said: “These people probably know where I live, which is always a worry.”

On the death threats he added: “These are invariably teenagers in their bedrooms in their mom's house somewhere in Utah. They don't have passports. They cannot even begin to imagine where - or even what - Lewisham is.”

He has actually done some political cartoons about Lewisham too: “I did some cartoons for the Campaign to save Lewisham Hospital A & E, as well as one for The Guardian of Jeremy Hunt trying to smother the A&E department with a pillow”, he said.

“There's also another one of former mayor Steve Bullock as a Bull(ock) in a China Shop. The trouble with working for national newspapers is you always have to go for the biggest national story - and local papers don't employ nearly enough cartoonists.”

That is not his favourite political cartoon he’s ever drawn. “I think my favourite one is from the 1997 election, when I drew Tony Blair as the Andrex puppy - it's got everything you need for a good cartoon: politics, animals, a nice pun and toilet humour.”

Brockley Max will continue to hold events over the next few weeks, including a lesson on the art of caricatures with Martin on June 7.