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Michael Leunig (born 2 June 1945), often referred to as Leunig, is a noted Australian cartoonist. His best known works include The Adventures of Vasco Pajama and the Curly Flats series. more...

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He was declared an Australian Living Treasure by the National Trust of Australia in 1999, and he currently lives in central Victoria, Australia.

Biography

Leunig, a fifth generation Australian, was born in East Melbourne, Victoria, grew up in Footscray and went to Maribyrnong High School before entering an Arts degree at Monash University. His first cartoons appeared in the Monash University student newspaper Lot's Wife in the late 1960's. He was conscripted in the Vietnam War call-up but he registered as a conscientious objector.

After Monash Leunig enrolled at the Swinburne Film and Television School and then began his cartoon career. He has noted that he was firstly interested in making documentaries before finding his feet with cartooning.

In the early 1970s his work appeared in the satirical magazine Nation Review, Womans Day, London's Oz magazine, and also various newspapers of that era.

The main outlet for Leunig's work has been the daily Fairfax press, The Sydney Morning Herald and The Age (Melbourne) newspapers published in Australia. In recent years he has focussed mainly on political commentary, sometimes substituting his simple drawings with reproduced photographic images with speech balloons attached. The Australian Broadcasting Corporation has also provided airtime to Leunig to discuss his views on a range of political and philosophical issues.

Leunig's cartoons

Leunig's drawings are done with a sparse, quavering line, usually in black and white with ink wash, the human characters always drawn with exaggerated features. This style served him well in his early years, when he gained a loyal following for his quirky take on social issues. He also made increasingly frequent forays into a personal fantasy world of whimsy, featuring small figures with teapots balanced on their heads, grotesquely curled hair and many ducks.

He has revealed in past interviews that the music of The Beatles inspired his early work, along with European cartoonists and The New Yorker's absurdist writer and cartoonist James Thurber (as well as dogs and ducks).

In his latest cartoons, Leunig frequently satirises Western society's core ideals; including but not limited to Americanisation, capitalism, consumerism, corporate success and more recently warmongering, in a snide proclamation against the War on Terror. Of particular note are his recent parodies of political matters, especially those concerning Australian Prime Minister John Howard and United States president George W. Bush. This has earned Leunig the title of "Political cartoonist", though this is misleading, as only some of his works are political in nature and/or reference.

Read more at Wikipedia.org