At that first gathering they electedCecil Hartt,the first staff artist atSmith’s Weekly,as founding president. Hartt,like his cartooning contemporaries,was considered to be as handy with a glass as he was with a pencil,which may be whyThe Bulletin writer Henry Lawson called the collective “Beerhemians”.
On Wednesday,the Australian Cartoonists Association,as it is now known,will celebrate a century to the day since its formation in a display of more than 70 works at the State Library of NSW.
A Century of Satire includes work by May Gibbs,Mr Squiggle creator Norman Hetherington,Sydney Morning Herald cartoonists John Shakespeare,Alan Moir and George Molnar,theFinancial Review’s David Rowe andThe Age’s Bruce Petty.
NSW Minister for the Arts John Graham will open the show,which pays tribute to the association whose members’ behaviour was so outrageous at their 1924Black and White Artists Ballthat further artists’ balls were banned from the Sydney Town Hall.
It was a particularly blokey profession until World War II,when female cartoonists Mollie Horseman and Joan Morrison,known as the “Smith sisters,” began drawing. Since then,the likes of Jenny Coopes,Fiona Katauskas and current ACA president,The Sydney Morning Herald editorial cartoonist Cathy Wilcox have dominated the field.
“Cartoonists of the early 20th century were often skilled and self-taught in many areas. The cartoonists ofSmith’s Weekly wrote articles and poetry and were often part of a cohort of other fine artists,like Norman Lindsay,” Wilcox says.