His 1972 Christmas card An Opera House in Every Home, a humorous take on Jørn Utzon's World Heritage-listed building is a well-known work.
From June 1930 Thake showed with 'The Embryos,'[6] a group that included Raymond Lindsay, a son of Norman Lindsay, Constance Parkin (then the holder of the National Gallery Travelling Scholarship), Margaret Crombie, Shiela Hawkins, James Flett, Herbert McClintock, and Nutter Buzzacott; and in the Contemporary Group, Melbourne with George Bell, Daryl Lindsay, Isabel May Tweddle, Evelyn Syme, Ada May Plante, Arnold Shore, William Frater and Adrian Lawlor from 1932 to 1938,[7] and with the Contemporary Art Society from 1926 to 1956 and concurrently, he worked in commercial art as art director for the advertising firm Paton until 1956, producing work for clients including Pelaco shirts.
[10] By 1960 his work included illustrations for the Australian quarterly Manuscripts,[11][12][13][14] design works included the Australian Pavilion at the Wellington Centennial Exhibition in New Zealand that opened on 8 November 1939 at the outset of the Second World War,[15] covers for the literary journal Meanjin,[16] designs for stamps, and concise medical diagrams he produced in the course of his employment from 1956 in the University of Melbourne’s Visual Aids Department where he remained until his retirement.
[18]The Bulletin described his Across the Paddocks shown in the Victorian Arts and Crafts the Melbourne Town Hall in October 1930 as "a color cut of mushrooms that look as solid as tree stumps," [19] while Arthur Streeton in The Argus, in associating Thake's with Margaret Preston's prints, wrote deprecatingly that "they strike a different note, and ,,, may have their admirers.
"[20] McCulloch notes that "his sensitivity towards the dispossession of Aboriginal people in his works in particular has been brought to light since his death, and there has been a growing interest in his wonderful Christmas card linocuts, produced from 1941 to 1975.