James Kemsley (15 Nov 1948 – 3 Dec 2007)

Jimmy Bancks (10 May 1889 – 1 July 1952)

 

James Charles "Jimmy" Bancks was born today in 1889. A prolific cartoonist in the early twentieth century is most well known for creating Australia's most long surviving newspaper cartoon Ginger Meggs.

2013 in Review: Jason Chatfield

What have been your personal cartooning/comics highlights of 2013?

I was really pleased to see more amazing work from the Aussie comics industry in the 2013 ACA Year Book. Ginger Meggs finally got picked up by the Herald Sun, Courier Mail and Adelaide Advertiser in print and online which is a big boon for his daily Aussie readership. Universal finally assigned me an editor, Josh Peres, and a bunch of marketing for getting Meggsie out there to newer young audiences. I’ve been making Meggs a bit more accessible to audiences beyond his traditional 40-80 y-old demographic. The style is slowly evolving as well which I’m enjoying. 

What are some of the comics/cartoonists you've enjoyed in 2013?

Big congrats to Anton Emdin for his Comic Book Artist of the year win for his work doing movie parodies in MAD. As a MAD fanatic, it’s huge to see an Aussie kicking goals overseas in such a huge publication.

What is something non-comics that you have enjoyed in 2013?  

Technically it’s still comics, but I finished the new Ginger Meggs website at www.gingermeggs.com and my own website at jasonchatfield.com  It took a lot of fiddling, and they’re still works in progress (aren’t they all) but I’m pretty happy with them.

I’ve been doing stand-up gigs every week this year and have moved from just doing support spots to headlining and MCing comedy clubs. It’s been a great way of dragging me away from the drawing board! 

What are you looking forward to in 2014?

I’m looking forward to finishing the graphic novel I’ve been working on with writer Paul Goddard for the last 4 years.

 jasonchatfield.com

Paper Trail

Fred the Clown Copyright 2012 Roger Langridge

Fourplay String Quartet's score for Roger Langridge's Fred the Clown comic Nowhere Special that was performed at the Graphic Conference in 2011 is receiving an encore performance today at 12:30pm (Sydney, Australia time) as part of the TedxSydney Conference.

You can catch a live stream of it here.

Langridge has calculated streaming times for other locales:

2am-3:30am Saturday morning,  British Summer time
9pm-11:30pm Friday in New York
6pm-7:30pm Friday in Los Angeles
1pm-2:30pm Saturday in New Zealand

Nice Day For A War Copyright 2012 Chris Slane and Matt Elliot

Chris Slane and Matt Elliot's Nice Day For A War was a recent winner of Children's Book of the Year and Children's Non-Fiction Award at the 2012 NZ Post Book Awards. Slane has also announced their book has gone into a second printing.

More info on Nice Day For a War here.

Interview with Sydney cartoonist Queenie Chan from 2012 Adelaide Oz Comic-Con.

Professor Jane Chapman speaking at Macquarie University last year with her 'Uncurated' lecture 'Comics and the representation of female war-time bravery in Wanda the War Girl (Australia) and Paroles d'Etoiles (France)'. As well as Wanda creator Kathleen O'Brien Chapman also speaks briefly about Sydney cartoonist Moira Bertram.

From the MacQuarie University description of her lecture,

Professor Jane Chapman from the University of Lincolnshire will present Comics and the representation of female war-time bravery in Wanda the War Girl and Paroles d’Etoiles. During the Second World War, an Aussie comic strip character called Wanda the War Girl was more popular than Superman: servicemen even painted her picture on their planes and tanks. What is the appeal of representation of women in 1940s comics as a subject? Why does historical nostalgia attract so many exhibition visitors? 

Wanda The War Girl from Perth Sunday Times 1943

 

Yoinked from Jason's Yfrog, here's Ginger Meggs cartoonist Jason Chatfield and Garfield creator Jim Davis at the Ruebens in Las Vegas.

New Zealand produced Online Magazine Werewolf is worth checking in on monthly with sporadic cartooning updates. Writer Mike Brown and Illustrator Mat Tait are producing some especially beautiful comics here.