‘I Do Wish They Would Keep Politics Out Of Art’

Bio

Geoffrey Raynor Hook OAM (1928 – 2018)

Better known as Jeff Hook, Jeff was an Australian artist and editorial cartoonist Jeff was married to Pauline from 1961 and had five children After attending St Virgil’s College, Hobart, Jeff started as a cadet press artist on the Hobart Mercury and completed a course in graphic arts at the Hobart Technical College (now Tasmanian School of Art, a faculty of the University of Tasmania) which included tuition in fine arts under Jack Carington Smith, Margaret Chandler, Harry Buckey and Edith Holmes Geoff has travelled widely in the course of work, including the U.K., Europe, the United States, Vietnam, and China

He started his career as a press artist and part-time cartoonist on The Mercury, drawing under the name “Jeff” He moved to Melbourne and started at The Sun News-Pictorial in 1964 Jeff became the full-time cartoonist for The Sun News-Pictorial (later to be merged with the afternoon newspaper The Herald to become the Herald Sun) soon after It was shortly after that Jeff started hiding in his cartoons what became his “trademark”—a fish hook—and looking for the hidden fish hook became a widespread morning pastime amongst readers of The Sun News-Pictorial Jeff first gained international recognition in 1967 for his cartoon about the end of the Six-Day War, “The three wiser men”, which was republished widely outside of Australia, including in The Times In 1987, Jeff won the award for Humorous Illustration in the Australian Black and White Artists Club’s Bulletin Awards

Also in 1987, Jeff won the award for the Best Political Cartoon at The International Cartoon Festival at Knokke-Heist, Belgium, and in 1991 he won the award for Best Press Cartoon at the same Festival Jeff retired from the daily Herald Sun in early 1993, but continued to freelance doing a regular editorial cartoon for the Sunday Herald Sun while devoting his time primarily to painting This continued until the year 2000, when he largely stopped cartooning after holding his first exhibition at the Australian Guild of Realist Artists (AGRA) gallery and pursued his love of painting full-time he especially enjoys sketching and using the watercolour medium Since then, Jeff widely exhibited at regional art shows and galleries in Australia, and held a second exhibition at the AGRA Gallery in 2005 Over the course of his career, Jeff did numerous cartoons and illustrations for papers, magazines and 46 books, including two children’s books Harry the Honkerzoid and Planet of the Honkerzoids written by one of his sons, Brendan, and a children’s book of his own, Jamie the Jumbo Jet, which was first published in the mid-1970s, and revised and reprinted in 1998 After retiring from full-time cartooning, Jeff was awarded the Australian Black and White Artists Club’s Silver Stanley Award for lifetime achievement in 1998, and on 20 March 2009, he was awarded a lifetime achievement award by the Melbourne Press Club In January 2012, he was awarded an Order of Australia Medal for “service to the print media as a political and social commentator, and as a cartoonist”.

Affiliations

Jeff was a Life Member of the Australian Black and White Artists Club (now Australian Cartoonists’ Association), Life Member of The Melbourne Press Club, Life member of The Media, Entertainment and Arts Alliance, Life Governor of the Royal Victorian Institute for the Blind, and a Patron of the Amputees Association of Victoria. He was also a member of the Australian Guild of Realist Artists and the Peninsula Arts Society.

Geoff’s work is represented in international cartoon collections, and several corporate collections in Australia, as well as the collection of political cartoons at the National Museum of Australia in Canberra, and more recently Geoff has just completed extensive interviews for the Oral History Collection at the National Library of Australia, Canberra Open access with the library to tape and transcript is available.