Award honours work of Animalia illustrator Base

Swinburne University in Melbourne has awarded an honorary doctorate to Graeme Base, one of Australia’s most popular children’s book illustrators.

Swinburne chancellor Graham Goldsmith presented Base with the award for his outstanding contribution to children’s literature at a graduation ceremony on 12 August.

Base studied graphic design at Swinburne in the late 1970s, and worked briefly in advertising before publishing his first illustrated book for children, My Grandmother Lived in Gooligulch, in 1983. Unusually, the book was accepted by the first publisher that Base approached with the illustrated manuscript.