The Artists ’Corner

Sun (Auckland), Volume I, Issue 139, 2 September 1927, Page 12

The Artists ’Corner

LIVINGSTONE HOPKINS — “HOP,” OF THE “BULLETIN”—THE GRAND OLD MAN OF AUSTRALIAN CARICATURE

A MID-SUMMER’S NIGHT’S MEMORY 4 USTRALIANS, the wide world over, still regret the death of Livingstone Hopkins, the grand old man of Australian caricature. Though American born, there was never a better known Australian than the genial “Hop,” as he always signed himself. For 37 years he contributed humour, remarkable in originality, to the pages of the “Bulletin,” and when he laid down his pen, so that he might enjoy a few years of quiet after an exceedingly active life, Australia was undoubtedly the poorer. “Hop” never really grew old; the years never, in the words of the psalm-

ist, condemned him. Spiritually, at 82, he was a youth. The fund of good-humour and the facility for fun were inexhaustible. To tlie credit of “Hop,” let it be said, his victims never bore ill-will. The first time I met the famous cartoonist was* at the Mosman home of William McLeod, of “Buletin” fame, and one of “Hop’s” inseparable companions. Mrs. McLeod, by the way, was known to her reading public as Connor O’Brien, and originally, I believe, came from Auckland. “HOP” AND WALTER It: was one of those glorious Australian nights, when mother # sky, in the eagerness of desire, a myriad of gems scintillating in her blue-black tresses, seemed to embrace the whole earth. . . . On the lawn Walter Kirby, the Auckland-born tenor, sang. The sweet notes tumbled one. .after the other, so it seemed, out over the tops of the silent gum-trees, and re-echoed over the heads of cigarette puffing lovers ensconsed in the sterns of madly racing ferry-boats in the bay below. It was too much for “Hop.” The very witchery of the night seemed to enter into his old veins.

| Somehow, it seemed right that Kirby i should be singing “E Lucevan le I Stelle,” a love-lorn Mario telling of the beautiful star-strewn night when i he first met Tosca. j As the last crescendo floated away ! into the distance “Hop” advanced upon | the tenor. With that reaction to i which all artists respond Kirby immediately broke into a lilting rondo. Together, the cartoonist walkingstick in hand, they executed, with much gusto, a fandango. Livingstone Hopkins was then over SO. THE THIRTEENTH CHILD The thirteenth of a family of 14 children, Livingstone Hopkins was born in Ohio in 1846. His school days ended contemporaneously with the Civil War. By “assisting various people at various capacities at varying rates of pay until he got big enough to go to the war,” as he put it, he did see a little of the campaign. Years after he returned to the spot where he was knocked over by the kick from the very first shot fired from his musket! After work on an American country newspaper he contributed to such journals as “Scribners,” “Puck,” “Judge” and the New York “Graphic.” His foot was well on the first rung of the ladder of success when W. H. Traill, then managing-director of the “Bulletin,” induced him in 18S3 to come to Sydney. Some time afterwards Phil May. found the “Bulletin,” and Hopkins and he became firm friends. When May returned to London in ISB7 the sole charge of the pictorial section of the “Bulletin” was vested in the American, and for years his drawings regularly appeared in its pages. Time was when a caricature from the pen of “Hop” was regarded as a signal honour. George Reid, Henry Parkes and George Dibbs were a notable trio who “suffered” at the hands of the caricaturist. His “Little Boy from Manly,” the small lad with the curls and the pantaloons, has for many years personified Australia. Though it is now some years since “Hop” played a really active part in Australian art, he never entirely laid aside his pen. In the summer-house of his Mosman garden, the old man worked with his drawings. Only the favoured few, however, ever saw the interior of “Hop’s” Holy of Holies. With the death of Livingstone Hopkins goes a definite art phase in Australia. Men like Traill, Archibald and others builded even better than they knew, when they induced men of the calibre of Hopkins and May, to join the “Bulletin.” —ERIC RAMSDEN.