2023

A cartoon about the rise of Artificial Intelligence. We see three horsemen of the apocalypse casting a wary eye over a possible fourth member, represented by Microsoft's "Clippy" paperclip icon, sitting on a paperclip horse.

I thought I might make use of a short break to post some of my cartoons from the year that was. Perhaps a couple that didn’t make it into the regular end-of-year collections from Scribe (Best Australian Political Cartoons) or the Museum of Australian Democracy (Behind the Lines).

I haven’t posted here for awhile. It is clear the place could use a bit of a spring clean! I will have to speak to the manager.

A cartoon on the state of policy debate in Australia, particularly with regard to housing, where current problems have been decades in the making.

A cartoon about the war crimes defamation case launched by Ben Roberts-Smith. Not the result he was hoping to drink to.

A cartoon explaining the way carbon offsets work.

A cartoon about the Voice referendum, the outstretched hand of Yes being met by the closed fist of No.

A cartoon with Father Christmas trying to take in the enormity of the destruction of Gaza.

To support their work in Gaza you can donate to Médecins Sans Frontières (Doctors Without Borders) here.

A cartoon marking the National Apology to victims of Thalidomide and their families. Drawing a cartoon about the national apology to thalidomide survivors and their families, it’s easy to get carried away by the many fine and heartfelt words spoken on the day. Politics puts its best face on during occasions like these. But then you read the timeline of Thalidomide Australia’s interactions with the Australian Government as they doggedly sought recognition and action over many years. Every national apology, every national gain, only comes at the end of a long, long fight from below. That will have to sit as my lesson from 2023.


In scrolling through my digital notebook to pull out a few cartoons from this year, I’ve also spied a couple of rough sketches that never got drawn up for print.

Sketch of Australian Rules footballer Ron Barassi, as playing coach for Humanity FC, giving the team a half-time spray.

This one was drawn after the death of Ron Barassi, a celebrated captain and coach in Australian Rules football. Barassi is the player whose name is given to the imaginary geographical line (upon which I live) that roughly divides Australia between it’s rugby-loving and Aussie Rules regions. He was a legendary player for the Melbourne Demons who switched clubs, which brought to mind an image of him taking on a role with Humanity FC.

The other “in memoriam” sketch I found is of the great Australian cartoonist Bruce Petty.

A cartoon of Bruce Petty as the instructor at cartooning TAFE, having popped the hood on a late-model earth and fascinated with the complicated engine beneath.

It is impossible to overstate the influence of Bruce Petty on cartooning in this country. He was curious about the world, and surveyed everything with a critical, democratic, humanist eye. Watching him draw was like watching him think, his arm a direct extension of his brain. With a piece of paper and a felt-tip pen Bruce would take a line for a walk to see where it might end up, cutting and pasting the elements back together afterwards to give the reader a more direct route to the final destination.

For half a century, no one in our game drew the big picture bigger, in all its messy and contradictory complexity. Cartooning is a terribly reductive medium. It purports to distill things to their essence, but more often than not it succeeds only in reducing things to simplistic and vulgar distortions. Bruce’s work seems to have been a lifelong experiment in trying to say things simply without rendering the world simple.

Like Barassi for football, Petty for Australian cartooning is in our First 18, and probably our captain-coach. Without the angry sprays at half time, obviously. Bruce would’ve understated the team’s predicament with a wry smile and dry comment. I imagine everyone sucking on orange quarters and standing around the whiteboard, trying to follow along as Bruce quietly took a pen and triangulated every player’s position to the quantum level.


Thanks to all those who bought posters, prints or cards of some of my pictures via RedBubble this year. I don’t think I managed to put up anything new this last 12 months, but I’m hoping to get back to a few drawing projects outside of political cartooning in 2024. I’ll post stuff here when it materialises, and post any news on my Mastodon and Instagram accounts.

I am no longer an admin of the Coast is Calling poster collection on RedBubble, so if you want to contact me about those please email me directly rather than through RedBubble’s BubbleMail.

Thanks also to my peers in the Australian Cartoonist Association, who awarded me “Stanleys” for editorial cartooning, humorous illustration and as cartoonist of the year in 2022, and to the Museum of Australian Democracy, who picked me as their political cartoonist of the year for 2022.

All the best for the new year.

Rough sketch of the Monaro Highway, looking towards Canberra.

Circus Oz 2018

Spare a thought for the editor of Australia’s annual political cartoon anthology who regularly finds Australian politics imploding right on deadline.

Cover, Best Australian Political Cartoons 2018

This is the 16th edition of Russ Radcliffe’s annual survey of Australian politics, as drawn by the nation’s cartoonists. Russ writes a handy introductory essay on the year that was, and includes a liberal helping of political quotes to accompany the collection of cartoons.

Available in all good bookshops etc, or via the publisher Scribe.

Cartoon, Lord of the Flies in the Liberal Party room Cartoon, Liberal Party mutiny

And one more, drawn after the anthology deadline, to complete a leadership triptych…

Cartoon, Cirque du Scomo

(The Canberra Times, 24, 25 August, 6 November, 2018 | Gallery of most recent cartoons)

Free Ramón Esono Ebalé

Artists around the world are campaigning for cartoonist Ramón Esono Ebalé, imprisoned without charge in Equatorial Guinea since September 16.

Share your artwork in support of Ramón on social media using the hashtag #FreeNseRamon

You can check out Ramón’s excellent work here. Some of it features Equatorial Guinea’s President “Obi”, who seized power in a coup way back in 1979.

Imagine drawing the one Prime Minister, say Tony Abbott, for 38 years straight. Good grief.

Campaigning for the release of Turkish cartoonist Musa Kart

Photo: front page of Turkish newspaper, Cumhuriyet

My cartoon on the cover of the Turkish national daily Cumhuriyet, in the panel where their cartoonist Musa Kart’s cartoon should be.

Photo: blank cartoon panel, following the arrest of Turkish cartoonist Musa Kart

Musa was arrested and jailed pending trial in early November, along with a number of his journalist colleagues, as part of President Erdoğan’s post-coup crackdown on critical voices in the media.

Photo of Turkish cartoonist Musa Cart, October 2016

While he remains in jail, Cumhuriyet is filling Musa’s panel with cartoons of solidarity from around the world.

Cartoon: in solidarity with jailed Turkish cartoonist Musa Kart

“At least 81 journalists are imprisoned in Turkey, all of them facing anti-state charges, in the wake of an unprecedented crackdown that has included the shuttering of more than 100 news outlets. The 259 journalists in jail worldwide is the highest number recorded since 1990.” A special report from the Committee to Protect Journalists by Elana Beiser.