by Liam Shearer

Most people don’t know this, but before he was the “cool” Beatle and the quintessential legendary “rock star” with the quintessential problematic personal life, John Lennon studied art at the Liverpool Art Institute for three years.

So, when we occasionally come across examples of him drawing – for example, the childhood doodles on the Walls and Bridges album cover or the minimalistic self-portrait printed on more merchandise (both licenced or otherwise) than any single human being could ever enjoy – we often forego the thought that these works could hold hidden nuances.

But these simple doodles are pretty fascinating. Take, for example, the way in which Lennon draws his own nose. It’s been printed numerous times that he famously grew up feeling very self-conscious of his iconic pointed nose, and his preoccupation with it is evident by even a brief notice of the profoundly pointed triangle which consistently is a feature of every single portrait. Or look at the way he frequently draws himself curled around his wife, Yoko Ono. Endearing to some, but psychologists could absolutely have a field day with those ones.

Most of all though, there is a definite surrealism which makes some of these drawings quite compelling, much in the same way that “sitting on a cornflake, waiting for the van to come” is considered an example of his lyrical genius. He draws a guy sitting, facing a wall, with some four-legged creature scaling the wall in agony. They’re usually a bit strange, sure, but you just can’t look away.

ST.ART does not own any of the images above