Alfred Ernest Walter George Aris (1882- 1963) was a highly prolific commercial illustrator in the first half of the 20th century. He studied at the Bradford School of Art and, later, at the Royal College of Art in London. He began his career as a portrait artist and art teacher, working in watercolour and charcoal and wash, and exhibited his work at the Royal Academy, Royal Society of British Artists and the Royal Institute of Painters in Watercolours. By 1909, Aris was illustrating for magazines such as The Graphic and writing and illustrating children’s books. He wrote and illustrated over 170 books (the majority published by Humphrey Milford and Hodder and Stoughton) and contributed illustrations to a further 250 titles. His illustrations were also used for advertisements, cigarette cards, games, jigsaw puzzles and seaside postcards. In 1934 Cadbury’s commissioned Aris to design the Cococubs, a collection of animal characters to be given away free with their children’s cocoa. It was hailed as one of the greatest advertising schemes of the time, with an estimated 300,000 children collecting them.

Aris produced this drawing for a story, ‘The Mystery of Rusty Kettle Cottage’. A stylish crane fly in a top hat observes the newly-weds as they settle into their new home. Aris contrasts whimsical draughtsmanship with bold spatters of colour. An almost identical design appears on the cover of another book, That Little Red Robin, published by Humphrey Milford about 1920.