Bruce Leslie Petty (23 November 1929 – 6 April 2023) was an Australian political satirist, sculptor and cartoonist.Bruce Petty Profile
,

The Age ''The Age'' is a daily newspaper in Melbourne, Australia, that has been published since 1854. Owned and published by Nine Entertainment, ''The Age'' primarily serves Victoria (Australia), Victoria, but copies also sell in Tasmania, the Austral ...

, accessed 13 September 2008 He was a regular contributor to Melbourne's ''

'' newspaper. His intricate images have been described as "doodle-bombs" for their free-association of links between various ideas, people and institutions. ''Age'' journalist Martin Flanagan wrote that Petty "re-invented the world as a vast scribbly machine with interlocking cogs and levers that connected people in wholly logical but unlikely ways." He received a Silver Stanley Award from the Australian Cartoonists' Association; an AFI Best Documentary Director prize;

Melbourne Press Club The Melbourne Press Club (MPC), is a not-for-profit association of journalists in the city of Melbourne, Australia. It runs the annual Quill Awards for Excellence in Victorian Journalism. Governance MPC is a not-for-profit association of journal ...

's Quill Lifetime Achievement Award; and the Most Outstanding Contribution to Journalism Walkley Award.

Early life

Petty was born on 23 November 1929, at

Doncaster Doncaster ( ) is a city status in the United Kingdom, city in South Yorkshire, England. Named after the River Don, Yorkshire, River Don, it is the administrative centre of the City of Doncaster metropolitan borough, and is the second largest se ...

, a suburb of

Melbourne Melbourne ( , ; Boonwurrung language, Boonwurrung/ or ) is the List of Australian capital cities, capital and List of cities in Australia by population, most populous city of the States and territories of Australia, Australian state of Victori ...

Work

Petty began working for the Owen Brothers animation studio in Melbourne in 1949, before moving to the UK in 1954. His cartoons were published in ''

The New Yorker ''The New Yorker'' is an American magazine featuring journalism, commentary, criticism, essays, fiction, satire, cartoons, and poetry. It was founded on February 21, 1925, by Harold Ross and his wife Jane Grant, a reporter for ''The New York T ...

'', ''

Esquire Esquire (, ; abbreviated Esq.) is usually a courtesy title. In the United Kingdom, ''esquire'' historically was a title of respect accorded to men of higher social rank, particularly members of the landed gentry above the rank of gentleman ...

'' and '' Punch''. On his return to Australia in 1961, he worked at first for '' The (Sydney) Daily Mirror'', '' The Bulletin'' and ''

The Australian ''The Australian'', with its Saturday edition ''The Weekend Australian'', is a broadsheet daily newspaper published by News Corp Australia since 14 July 1964. As the only Australian daily newspaper distributed nationally, its readership of b ...

'' before joining ''

'' in 1976. In

1976 Events January * January 2 – The International Covenant on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights enters into force. * January 5 – The Pol Pot regime proclaims a new constitution for Democratic Kampuchea. * January 18 – Full diplomatic ...

, the animated film ''

Leisure Leisure (, ) has often been defined as a quality of experience or as free time. Free time is time spent away from business, Employment, work, job hunting, Housekeeping, domestic chores, and education, as well as necessary activities such as ...

'', of which he was the director, won an

Academy Award The Academy Awards, commonly known as the Oscars, are awards for artistic and technical merit in film. They are presented annually by the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences (AMPAS) in the United States in recognition of excellence ...

for the producer Suzanne Baker (the first Australian woman to win an Oscar). "When I got it, the Oscar went to the producer. We got a picture of it, a very nice gold-framed picture." (''The Age'', 22 June 2004) Petty made a number of other animated films including ''Art'', ''Australian History'', ''Hearts and Minds'' and ''Karl Marx''. Petty also created a number of "machine sculptures" with the most famous being a piece known as "Man Environment Machine" (fondly known as the "Petty Machine") that was a feature piece of the Australian Pavilion at World Expo '85 at Tsukuba, Japan. In 2007, he received the AFI Best Documentary Director prize for the documentary '' Global Haywire'' which he wrote, directed and animated, as well as the Best Documentary Sound prize; this documentary tries to unravel the global pattern that leads to an understanding of how the world came to be as it is today, and is based on interviews with intellectuals, students and journalists. Petty's 2008 book, ''Petty's Parallel Worlds'', is a retrospective collection of editorial cartoons from 1959 to the present, street sketches done on assignment around the world, and etchings. Those of Petty's cartoons that depict themes such as the economy, international relations or other social issues as complicated interlocking machines (that manipulate, or are manipulated by, people) have been likened to Rube Goldberg machines or Heath Robinson contraptions. Petty died on 6 April 2023, at the age of 93.

Influences

Petty said in the foreword to ''Parallel Worlds'' that he was a

humanist Humanism is a philosophical stance that emphasizes the individual and social potential, and agency of human beings, whom it considers the starting point for serious moral and philosophical inquiry. The meaning of the term "humanism" ha ...

and socialist, mentioning visits to

Nicaragua Nicaragua, officially the Republic of Nicaragua, is the geographically largest Sovereign state, country in Central America, comprising . With a population of 7,142,529 as of 2024, it is the third-most populous country in Central America aft ...

and

Cuba Cuba, officially the Republic of Cuba, is an island country, comprising the island of Cuba (largest island), Isla de la Juventud, and List of islands of Cuba, 4,195 islands, islets and cays surrounding the main island. It is located where the ...

in the early 1960s, and feeling the influence of

Colin Wilson Colin Henry Wilson (26 June 1931 – 5 December 2013) was an English existentialist philosopher-novelist. He also wrote widely on true crime, mysticism and the paranormal, eventually writing more than a hundred books. Wilson called his p ...

's '' The Outsider''.

Personal life

Petty was married firstly to ABC journalist and film critic Julie Rigg. They had two sons. In 1988 he married author

Kate Grenville Catherine Elizabeth Grenville (born 1950) is an Australian author. She has published fifteen books, including fiction, non-fiction, biography, and books about the writing process. In 2001, she won the Orange Prize for Fiction, Orange Prize for ...

, with whom he had a son and a daughter. He and Grenville separated, and Petty then partnered with the bookseller Lesley McKay.

Awards

*2001: Silver Stanley Award by the Australian Cartoonists' AssociationAcademy Award-winning cartoonist Bruce Petty dies at age 93
''

ABC News ABC News most commonly refers to: * ABC News (Australia), a national news service of the Australian Broadcasting Corporation * ABC News (United States), a news-gathering and broadcasting division of the American Broadcasting Company ABC News may a ...

'', 6 April 2023. Retrieved 7 April 2023 *2007: AFI Best Documentary Director prize and Best Documentary Sound prize for '' Global Haywire'' *2009:

's Quill Lifetime Achievement Award *2016: Most Outstanding Contribution to Journalism award,

Walkley Awards The annual Walkley Awards are presented in Australia to recognise and reward excellence in journalism. They cover all media including print, television, documentary, radio, photographic and online media. The Gold Walkley is the highest prize and ...

Filmography

* ''Hearts and Minds'' (1968) * ''Australian History'' (1971) * ''Art'' (1974) * ''

'' (1976) * ''Magic Arts'' (1978) * ''Karl Marx'' (1979) * ''Megalomedia'' (1983) * ''Movers'' (1986) * ''Money'' (1998) * ''The Mad Century'' (2000) * '' Human Contraptions'' (2002) * '' Global Haywire'' (2007)

Books

*
Australian artist in South East Asia
' / Bruce Petty with introduction by Ronald Searle (1962) *
Petty's Australia fair
' / Bruce Petty (1967) *
A portfolio of Petty
' / Bruce Petty (1969) *
The best of Petty
' / 1968, Ed. Ron Smith *
The Penguin Petty
' (1972, ) *
Petty's Australia: and how it works
' / Bruce Petty (1976, ) *
The Petty age
' / Bruce Petty (1978, ) *
Petty's money book
' / Bruce Petty (1983, ) *
Women and men
' / Petty (1986, ) *
Bruce Petty's the absurd machine
' / Bruce Petty (1997, ) *

' Bruce Petty (2008, Ed. Russ Radcliffe, )

References

General references

Conversation with Bruce Petty
(1972 sound recording) - interviewer, Hazel de Berg
Interview with Bruce Petty, cartoonist and filmmaker
(1996 sound recording) - interviewer, Ann Turner
Portrait of Bruce Petty
(picture) by Virginia Wallace-Crabbe

External links

from ''

''
Three Cartoonists
- transcript of Andrew Denton’s ABC interview with cartoonist Bruce Petty, Bill Leak and Patrick Cook

of ''Global Haywire'' in ''

The Sydney Morning Herald ''The Sydney Morning Herald'' (''SMH'') is a daily Tabloid (newspaper format), tabloid newspaper published in Sydney, Australia, and owned by Nine Entertainment. Founded in 1831 as the ''Sydney Herald'', the ''Herald'' is the oldest continuous ...

'' * * {{DEFAULTSORT:Petty, Bruce 1929 births 2023 deaths The New Yorker cartoonists Cartoonists from Melbourne Australian animators Australian animated film directors Australian humorists Australian satirists Australian magazine cartoonists The Age (Melbourne) people 20th-century Australian sculptors Australian male sculptors Directors of Best Animated Short Academy Award winners Jim Russell award winners