It's hard not to agree with George Orwell, who said that "Advertising is the rattling of a stick inside a swill bucket".

I was asked by a small magazine to do a full page illustration to accompany an essay on advertising. They had a minuscule budget, but said I could do anything I wanted - they didn't even need to see a sketch. At the time, I was alarmed by all the ads for "male enhancement" that were suddenly seemingly everywhere. They would often come blaring from the car radio as I drove my kids to nursery school. Was this some kind of new epidemic? Was I next?? Then I remembered that one of the aims of advertising is to convince people that they need to buy the cure for ailments they don't have.

This piece ran in the magazine, and then it quietly disappeared, never publishing another issue. I like to think I had a little to do with that...