Peter Arthur Firmin (born 1928, Harwich, Essex) is an English artist and animator. He was the founder of Smallfilms, along with Oliver Postgate. Between them they created a number of popular children's TV programmes, The Saga of Noggin the Nog, Ivor the Engine, Clangers, Bagpuss and Pogles' Wood.
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He trained at Colchester School of Art in Colchester and Central St Martins College in London. He worked in a stained glass studio and worked as a lecturer.
It was while he was teaching at the Central School of Art (later Central St Martins College) that Oliver Postgate came looking for, as Firmin puts it: "…someone to illustrate a television story – someone who was hard up and would do a lot of drawing for very little money".[1] They immediately 'clicked' and went on, in due course, to form Smallfilms.
Most of Smallfilms' animation was done in a farmyard barn in Blean near Canterbury in Kent. Firmin is an illustrator. He has written and illustrated two main books and illustrated many others including Seeing Things, Postgate's autobiography.
Firmin also co-created, with Ivan Owen, the British TV puppet legend Basil Brush in 1963. He made the first Basil Brush puppet using a real fox tail.[2]
In 1994, Firmin provided an illustration for a British postage stamp (SG1804) featuring characters from Noggin the Nog. It was one of a set featuring characters from British children's literature. He produced further illustrations for the advertising campaign to publicise the set of stamps.[3][4]
He was awarded an honorary MA by the University of Kent on July 17, 1987. In 2011 it was announced that Firmin was to be awarded the Freedom of the City of Canterbury in recognition of his "outstanding work."[5]
Firmin is married to Joan, who knitted the Clangers from vibrant pink wool.
They have six daughters:[2] Charlotte is also an illustrator; as is Hannah, known for her book jacket illustrations for Alexander McCall Smith's The No. 1 Ladies' Detective Agency series; Josie, who runs hand-painted china shops in London and Canterbury; Katy, Lucy, and Emily, the youngest, who appeared in the opening sequence of Bagpuss, and is an artist living in Whitstable.
The Firmins still live on the farm in Blean, Kent, where Smallfilms produced their programmes.
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