Geoff "Jeff" Hook

Geoff "Jeff" Hook (born in Tasmania on December 27, 1928) is a retired Australian cartoonist.

Geoff is married to Pauline since 1961 and has five children.

Career

Starting as a cadet press artist on the Hobart Mercury, he completed a course in Graphic arts at the Hobart Technical College which included tuition in Fine Arts under Jack Carrington-Smith, Margaret Chandler, Harry Buckey and Edith Holmes. He started his career as a press artist and part-time cartoonist on the Hobart Mercury drawing under the name "Jeff". He moved to Melbourne and started at The Sun News-Pictorial in 1964. Geoff became the full-time cartoonist for The Sun News-Pictorial (later to become the Herald Sun) soon after and in 1967 first gained international recognition 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".

It was shortly after starting at The Sun News-Pictorial that Geoff started hiding in his cartoons what became his "trademark", a fish hook, and looking for the hidden fish hook became a widespread morning past-time amongst readers of The Sun News-Pictorial.
[
Gary Ablett's return to the Geelong Football Club.] Later, in 1981, Geoff won the award for humorous illustration in the Australian Black and White Artists Club's Bulletin Awards. In 1987 Geoff 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. In 1998, Geoff was awarded the Australian Black and White Artists Club's Silver Stanley Award for lifetime achievement.

Geoff retired in early 1993, leaving the daily Herald Sun and freelanced doing a regular editorial cartoon for the Sunday Herald Sun until the year 2000, when he largely stopped cartooning and began pursuing his love of painting full time. Over the course of his career Geoff has done 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.

Affiliations

He is a Life member of the Australian Black and White Artists Club, Life Member of The Melbourne Press Club, Life member of The Media Arts and Entertainment Alliance, Life Governor of The Royal Victorian Institute for the Blind, and a Patron of The Amputees Association of Victoria. He is also a member of the Australian Guild of Realist Artists.

External links

* [http://www.abwac.org.au/stanleyshistory.htm Stanley Award's History]
* [http://www.geoffhook.com geoffhook.com]