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Henry Mayo Bateman was born to an English family in Sutton Forest, New South Wales in 1887. His father owned an export and packing business in Australia but in 1889 the family returned to England.

Bateman studied at the Westminster School of Art and the Goldsmith's Institute. His first cartoons appeared in The Royal Magazine and The Tatler. He began contributing to Punch Magazine in 1906.

On the outbreak of the First World War, Bateman joined the London Regiment but after falling ill in 1915 he was discharged. Over the next few years Bateman had cartoons published in Punch Magazine, The London Magazine, The Bystander, The Strand Magazine and The Humorist.

By the 1930s Bateman was recognised as one of Britain's leading cartoonists and was earning over £5,000 a year for his work. Bateman was one of the first graphic artists to adopt a cinematic approach. One critic has argued that Bateman episodic format was "closely parallelled in the silent movie, such as the slow build up to a climax or denouement, and a new emphasis on gesture and facial expression".

Bateman published several books including A Book of Drawings (1921), More Drawings (1922), Bateman (1931) The Art of Caricature (1936) and On the Move in England (1940).

During the Second World War Bateman produced posters for the British government. Henry Mayo Bateman died in 1970.

 

H. M. Bateman, Ministry of Health poster (1942)

 

 

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