John Spooner, LLB (Monash) practised as a lawyer for three years before he commenced drawing for the “Age” newspaper in 1974, finally leaving the Law altogether in 1977. John has presented many exhibitions and won many awards for his prints and drawings, including the following: 1982 Walkley Award. 1984 Two man exhibition, prints and drawings, with fellow artist Peter Nicholson, Powell Street Gallery, Melbourne. 1982 Spooner: Drawings Caricatures and Prints, published by Thomas Nelson. In the period 1985/1986 Spooner was the winner of five Stanely Awards, including the Black and White Artist of the Year gold Stanely Award. 1986 Co-winner Mornington Peninsula Print Aquisitive Award. 1986 Co- winner of the Fremantle Print Prize. 1989 Bodies and Souls, a book of his drawings, caricatures and prints, published by Macmillan, forward by Barry Humphries. 1994 Spooner was awarded two Walkely Awards for Best Illustration and Best Cartoon. 1996 Solo exhibition John Spooner-A Survey, Prints Drawings and Paintings 1987 - 1996 was held at the Westpac Gallery. 2000 Solo exhibition Recent Thoughts at George Adams Gallery, (Victorian Arts Centre) showing paintings, cartoons and printmaking. 2000 Solo exhibition at McClelland Gallery (Victoria): Prints, Paintings and Cartoons from the Year 2000. 2003 Received the Graham Perkin Award for Australian journalist of the year, Quill Awards. 2004 Solo Exhibition – Etchings, Cartoons & Paintings at Chrysalis Publishing Gallery and Studio, Melbourne. 2007 Solo Exhibition – New Works at Chrysalis Gallery and Studio, Melbourne. Spooner’s works are represented in the Collections of The National Gallery of Australia, National Library of Canberra, The National Gallery of Victoria, The Victorian State Library Art, Ballarat Gallery, The Melbourne Cricket Club Museum and in other public and private collections throughout Australia and internationally. His publications include the book A Spooner in the Works, published in 1999 by Text Publishing, comprising cartoons, prints and paintings.
Stewart W Franks, B.Sc. Hons, Ph.D. (Lancaster, UK) is a hydro-climatologist who is the foundation Professor of Environmental Engineering at the University of Tasmania, Hobart. Stewart’s research interests centre on the quantification and reduction of uncertainty in environmental modelling and hydro-climatic risk assessment, including modelling land surface – atmosphere interactions for atmospheric/climate models. He has published extensively on the role of ENSO, IOD and PDO on Australian flood, drought and bushfire risk. He is currently President of the International Commission on the Coupled Land-Atmosphere System (ICCLAS), a commission of the International Association of Hydrological Sciences (IAHS). The remit of the commission is to organise symposia and workshops on dealing with hydrological variability and the interactions between the land surface and the atmosphere. A special focus is directed toward building knowledge and capacity in developing countries. Stewart has edited a number of books documenting examples of historic hydro-climatic variability across the globe.