CARTOONIST REMEMBERED
Alan King had wit and passion
The Ottawa Citizen's longtime editorial cartoonist Alan King once described his craft as the “scruffy offspring of art and journalism.”
King was a master of that unruly child, both entertaining and maddening readers during his 17 years as lead cartoonist. His richly illustrated ink drawings regularly skewered politicians, pomposity and hypocrisy.
“Editorial cartoons,” he once wrote, “speak louder, more sharply, and with less forethought than most forms of newspaper commentary: It is their glaring defect and great advantage.”
A classically trained pianist and self-taught artist, King went on to a career as an illustrator, graphic designer and art teacher after leaving the Citizen in 1998. He died earlier this month from unexpected complications following heart surgery. He was 73.
“He was very passionate about many things, and excelled at all of them,” said his sister, Gayle Dudeck.
Former Citizen art critic Nancy Baele remembered King as a suave and urbane colleague: “He was just so bright and so funny, you couldn't help but enjoy his company,” she said.
Born Sept. 16, 1947, in Belfast, Alan King came to Canada with his family when he was two. The family settled in Whitby, Ont., where his father, Alfred, an RAF veteran, worked for the Frigidaire company.
Alan took an early interest in music and joined St. John's Anglican Church so he could play its organ. The minister allowed him to practise every day after school. He was mostly self-taught since his family couldn't afford music lessons, much less a piano, until he was 13.
His parents were so impressed with their son that they had his IQ tested: He scored 143 — a level associated with genius — and skipped a grade. They also allowed him to paint a giant seascape on their living room wall. “It was a huge oil painting: People would stop on the sidewalk to look in the window,” Dudeck said.
When his parents installed a piano in the kitchen, Alan practised relentlessly. His siblings often begged him to stop so they could watch TV nearby. “He just played non-stop,” remembered his sister, Elaine Bird.
At the University of Western Ontario, King studied piano, organ and English, but decided a career in classical music was not for him. So he turned his attention to drawing, something he had done compulsively all his life.
“Trying my luck as an artist was a long-shot, but I thought I'd give it a go,” he said.
King read how-to books, and practised drawing and painting every day. Overcoming self-doubt, he launched a career as a freelance artist before landing a job as an illustrator, art critic and book reviewer at the Citizen in 1979.
He became the paper's full-time editorial cartoonist a few years later. On King's office wall, he hung a sign quoting British statesman Lord Chesterfield: “Ridicule is the best test of truth.”
Montreal Gazette editorial cartoonist Terry Mosher, known as Aislin to his legion of readers, called King a skilled and thoughtful cartoonist. “They were instantly readable,” Mosher said of King 's cartoons. “He had a strong visual sense and he got right to the point: You have to do that in cartooning.”
“He was just an amazing draftsman,” said former Globe and Mail writer and cartoonist Warren Clements. “He was very authoritative with his lines: He knew exactly what effect to go for and how to achieve it. It was delightful, his work.”
Former Citizen columnist Charles Gordon said King engaged local issues in his work more than most cartoonists. “Alan was extremely well-read, well-informed and held really strong opinions,” he said.
Early in his career at the Citizen, King also played a starring role in one of the paper's most infamous promotions. In 1981, the paper launched what it called The Gold Rush: It hid $5,000 worth of gold in the city and invited readers to find it. King published daily illustrations that gave readers clues as to its location.
They proved confounding. Some treasure hunters tried to tunnel into the Innes Road detention centre; others dug up the boardwalk on Dow's Lake. Gatineau police stopped a man searching the station basement for gold; others were discovered pulling insulation out of air conditioners at Ottawa police headquarters. Fights broke out between competing gold seekers.
The police demanded an end to the mayhem, and King was ordered to make his cartoon clues more obvious. Days later, the gold was finally discovered in a tree beside a ski trail.
King's newspaper career ended in 1998 following a clash with managers installed by the Citizen's then owner, Conrad Black, whom King had featured in an unflattering cartoon soon after the media baron bought what used to be the Southam Newspaper chain. The cartoon depicted an enormous Black devouring Southam papers with a thought bubble that read, “I can't believe I ate the whole thing.”
King did not share the right-wing views of the paper's new proprietor, and he frequently butted heads with editor Neil Reynolds, who had to approve King's cartoons before they were published.
The relationship fractured for good when Reynolds spiked a cartoon that King had drawn, mocking Hockey Night in Canada's Don Cherry. Reynolds called it “nasty.” King refused to draw another cartoon for the next day's paper, a move Reynolds regarded as insubordinate.
When Reynolds demoted him to illustrator, King quit the paper and warned other cartoonists to be wary. “Attempts at rational debate are regarded as mutinous insolence,” King wrote, “and deviations from the ideological line of the editorial board as evidence of mental deficiency.”
He donated 700 of his cartoons to Library and Archives Canada.
After the Citizen, King reinvented himself as a commercial illustrator, designing coins for the Royal Canadian Mint and stamps for Canada Post. In 2013, he moved to Toronto and embraced new challenges in web design and digital art. He taught art classes at George Brown College and was an active member of the Arts and Letters Club of Toronto.
He cycled everywhere, and it was while on a 40-kilometre bike ride that he first noticed the shortness of breath that would eventually lead to his heart bypass surgery.
Twice married, he is survived by his two sisters and two children, Christopher and Chloe.