Kayleigh's art wows popular comedian

A TALENTED Ripon Grammar School artist was overjoyed to receive a commission from her favourite comedian when she met him after a show in London.

Year 13 student Kayleigh Yarker, who has sadly had to cope with the death of her beloved grandfather and aunt, along with the suicide of a close family friend during her time in sixth form, said: “I am bouncing off the walls with joy”.

The 17-year-old, from Ripon, queued up for more than an hour to see Australian stand-up comedian John Robertson after his performance at London’s Comicon comic book fan convention.

When she showed him some of her Japanese-style animation work, Robertson, known for his high-energy, improvisational style, was instantly impressed.

“He’s actually commissioned me to design, make and paint him a skateboard based on his comedy show, The Dark Room,” said Kayleigh.

“So, I get to make a cool skateboard based on nerd comedy, with spikes on it! I don’t know why, but the idea of adding spikes to a skateboard makes me weirdly happy.

The teenager, who plans to set up her own online art store to sell her work, added: “I think this is really cool and I’m super hyped up about it considering he’s my favourite comedian.”

Kayleigh, taking A-levels in maths, design technology and art, has an unconditional offer to study production design for stage and screen at the Northern School of Art.

While studying for her A-levels Kayleigh has suffered the death of her grandfather, Bob, last summer and aunt, Olive, in April, along with the suicide of family friend, Jimmy, on New Year’s Day.

The keen costume and prop maker now plans to travel in Japan during a gap year before taking up her art college place.

She started learning the language through online tutorials in sixth form as her love of the country grew: “It started with my love of Japanese animation and listening to shows in Japanese rather than English, but it’s honestly just such a beautiful language.”

PHOTOGRAPHS: Kayleigh, top; her favourite skateboard deck; a sketch of three characters from the anime My Hero Academia; her denim jacket design; a scene from Moriarty The Patriot