Cartoon ideas from an opinion piece by John Bridgland continuing his exploration of the South Australian government exploitation of Adelaide’s 189-year-old park lands estate. Transparency campaigner and former SA senator Rex Patrick exposes the cozy relationship between Premier Malinauskas and the daily News Corp (Murdoch) newspaper The Advertiser …
Cartoon ideas from the Adelaide session of the Independent Review of the AUKUS Submarine Contract. More at the Australian Peace and Security Forum.
‘Hello Simon–we probably talked 40 years ago when you designed the letterhead/Annual Report for Fitzroy Community Health Centre in Melbourne. I’m attaching an example of that excellent collaboration as a reminder.
I’m now involved in setting up ‘Friends of Community Health’ to resuscitate the community activism of those early times 🫤.
I’m also attaching our information sheet/hand out that needs some illustration/ lightening up.best regards, Terri Jackson (former Manager of FCHC)’
The 2026 Pacific Islands Forum Women Leaders Meeting, 3-5 June, Suva Fiji: ‘Current economic shocks and escalating security and social pressures – deepening poverty, reducing jobs and increasing vulnerability, impacts which fall hardest on women, youth, children and persons with disabilities’.
I attended the meeting remotely, through Zoom. Here are some of the cartoons from the three days of presentations.
The city of Adelaide is ringed by parklands. Laid out in its original design they were to be ‘a place for everyone’. However, particularly in recent years, they are being whittled away by encroaching developments. One indicator is the destruction of trees and habitat: 585 trees have just been felled for the redevelopment of the North Adelaide golf course, 400 trees will have gone for the new Women’s and Children’s Hospital (built on the parklands!) and about 45 trees will be removed for the MotoGP circuit ….
For much more on this, see the Adelaide Parklands Association website.
The FLAME Festival – 8-10 May this year – is a biennial community event in Wallaroo, Kadina and Moonta, the three historic Copper Coast towns, Yorke Peninsula, South Australia. here are some cartoon sketches from the weekend.
Friday: as the sun set on Wallaroo Beach the Nharangga Dreaming Story Winda The Owl was told by local students with song, dance, lanterns and large glowing puppets.
Saturday at the Kadina Showgrounds …
Sunday at Queens Square, Moonta …
In 1984 the Victorian Council of Social Service published Yoland Wadsworth’s Do It Yourself Social Research. as the back cover of the second edition said: “This introduction to social research methods became a runaway bestseller when it was first published. For fifteen years it has been used by students and professionals in sociology, social work, community development, education, health , welfare, psychology, management, environmental studies, legal studies and many other fields.”
This project was an education for me, an important stage in my cartooning development. Yoland Wadsworth knew exactly what the illustrations needed to depict: she understood how text and illustration combine to communicate with the reader.
Two further books followed: Everyday Evaluation on the Run and Human Inquiry for Living Systems. Now, just over 40 years since Do It Yourself Social Research Routledge has reprinted the revised and updated set – including revised covers and many of the illustrations : ‘This 3-volume collection of path-breaker Yoland Wadsworth’s crucial work will assist new generations in conducting research effectively at every stage’.
The ‘Swiss Cheese’ safety model. One of the cartoon illustrations developed with Dr David Low for the Australian Pollution Research Network report Improving Child Safety in Public Parks and Playgrounds: a case study on hazardous chemical use in the City of Clarence, along with other cartoons used in their anti-pesticides campaigns.
Ten years ago in South Australia as part of the Nuclear Fuel Cycle Royal Commission: SA citizens’ jury votes against storing nuclear waste. A demonstration of the real value of the citizen jury process. The AUKUS agreement with South Australian involvement in the building and maintenance of nuclear submarines challenges the citizen jury vote in 2016.
For a post on the 2016 Citizen’s Jury see here.
Simon Kneebone - cartoonist and illustrator 