Comedian Billy Connolly's drawings

Funny lines: Billy Connolly's debut drawing collection

The actor and comedian spent two years creating the drawings for his first public collection after discovering his love of art in drizzly Montreal

• The Born on a Rainy Day drawings are available as limited-edition prints from Castle Galleries

guardian.co.uk, Wednesday 14 March 2012 15.37 GMT

Walkies
Born on a Rainy Day is a series of six pen-and-ink drawings based on characters from Billy Connolly's imagination Photograph: Billy Connolly

Sandy & Andy McKay
This is the first time Connolly's art has been exhibited since he began sketching while on tour in Canada in 1997. Photograph: Billy Connolly

The Man in the Long Grass
Connolly recalls that it was on a visit to an art shop in Montreal on a dull, cold and rainy day that the urge to draw took hold. Photograph: Billy Connolly

Blue Angel
'Art, for me, bears no relation to comedy or music,' says Connolly. Photograph: Billy Connolly

Pink Tie & Hanky
'With a film, comedy show or music you expect people to be critiquing, watching, assessing. Art is different.' Photograph: Billy Connolly

Happy New Haircut
'Each drawing has taken its own path and begins to come alive as the viewer creates their own unique narrative,' says Connolly's gallerist Andrew White. Photograph: Billy Connolly

The drawings are available as limited edition prints from high street art gallery chain Castle Galleries, as well as a small number of independent galleries. Photograph: PR