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Pearl Harbor 1941 – Cartoonists’ Take of the Time

Augustus J. Robinson, Boston Daily Globe Below are some editorial cartoons from the days following the December 7, 1941 attack on Pearl Harbor (80 years ago today).[Note: offensive caricatures and a term for the Japanese people is used in a few of the cartoons. They have not been ignored here and presented as part of […]

CSotD: Rebuilding from the Past

Juxtaposition of the Date(Andy Marlette – Creators) (Walt Handelsman)I remember taking angry phone calls in the newsroom on a December 7 in the early ’90s because we hadn’t acknowledged the date on Page One. It wasn’t my decision: I only got the calls because, as the business writer, I was there before noon, which left me […]

Michael Leunig and Newspapers’ Retrenchment

© Michael LeunigDateline: Australia Leunig who has worked for The Age for decades has recently seen a decrease in his cartoon work. While he still files for Spectrum, the Saturday Age’s arts and culture lift-out, he is no longer drawing for its weekday issues.  The decision came after Leunig posted a cartoon that has been widely […]

Calvin & Hobbes Tops Poll for Next Musical

© TCAMultiversity Comics asked its readers to take a poll: Last night saw NBC air Annie Live!, a new version of the classic musical Annie, based off of the classic comic strip “Little Orphan Annie.”  [But] we got to thinking: what other comic strip should get a musical? Now, we already have You’re a Good […]

Court Sketch Artists Draw Ghislaine Maxwell as Ghislaine Maxwell Draws Court Sketch Artists

A COURTROOM sketch artist in the Ghislaine Maxwell sex trafficking trial has told of the bizarre moment the socialite twice turned around to draw her. Illustrator Elizabeth Williams, who has been sketching people in court for 40 years, was at a pre-trial hearing in November when Maxwell began staring at her while drawing. © Associated Press/Elizabeth WilliamsElizabeth […]

CSotD: Doleful Variants on a Theme

Michael Ramirez (Creators) is not the only cartoonist to ask this question, but I particularly like the snow-globe imagery, which echoes the quarantine concept. It might have been presented as a Juxtaposition with Martyn Turner‘s piece, but they pose the overall question in very different terms, with Ramirez being metaphorical while Turner is direct.The quick answer, […]

Reviews and Remembrances

We ran an obituary for cartoonist Jerry Palen last week. But…  Many people knew him as a fellow rancher, others through his iconic characters Elmo and Flo in his syndicated comic strip “Stampede,” the most widely syndicated cartoon in both the U.S. and Canada. Still others will remember Jerry Palen as the sculptor, artist and […]

NFL Illustrated

So I’m watching the Cowboys and the Saints on Thursday Night Football halfheartedly when on the screen pops up a comic artist’s idealization of some National Football League player. “The whole mission is to exaggerate features of players,” Hartley said. “There’s no way Drew Brees is that buffed out, but [we wanted to] kind of […]

CSotD: Peeves and Plaudits

Harry Bliss (AMS)  lives about 20 miles south of me, which makes us neighbors, since he no doubt comes up here to the Big City (population 13,623) for anything more exotic than milk and bread.We have, however, never met, which is much of the appeal of country living: Robert Frost wrote disapprovingly of good fences […]

Kevin Cannon Draws Winter Carnival Buttons

[T]he four official buttons of the 136th Winter Carnival were designed by local cartoonist and illustrator Kevin Cannon. He most recently designed the 2021 Minnesota State Fair poster. According to the Saint Paul Festival and Heritage Foundation: The Saint Paul Winter Carnival [since 1886] is the oldest winter festival in the United States. It predates […]

Suppressing Comics: When They Didn’t All Go Pogo

above: Before and after syndicate mandated changes. During the 1950s, Walt Kelly created the most popular comic strip in the United States. His strip was about an opossum named Pogo and his swamp-dwelling friends. It was also the most controversial and censored of its time. Long before Garry Trudeau’s Doonesbury blurred the lines between the […]

18th-Century Hogarth and The Woke Culture

Tate Britain in London has defended the approach taken in its Hogarth and Europe exhibition (until 20 March 2022) following a wave of criticism focused on wall labels written by contemporary commentators, which one critic described as “wokeish drivel”. The museum’s director, Alex Farquharson, tells The Art Newspaper that “Tate Britain has both the confidence […]

CSotD: Life Imitates Art Imitating Foolishness

Tank McNamara (AMS) not only gets a laugh regularly but also merits a “Wait, what?” from time to time, since it uses absurd exaggerations to spoof actual stories, but doesn’t always have to.This is one of those latter times. The Staples Center, home of the NBA’s Los Angeles Clippers, is indeed about to change its […]

David Apatoff & The Artistry of Political Cartoons

Political cartooning today is challenged by two trends: The disintegration of intelligence and substance in politics The disintegration of taste and skill in drawing. David Apatoff, at Illustration Art, discusses The Art of The Editorial Cartoon.… But achieving a reliable likeness is not the goal of the best political cartoons.  The real artistry lies in […]

Los Angeles Times Discontinues 9 Chickweed Lane, GoComics Erases Dec. 1 Episode from Internet

The Los Angeles Times served notice to its readers that it will no longer carry Brooke McEldowney’s 9 Chickweed Lane comic strip.Since November 22 the comic strip has been featuring The Outer Space Adventures of Flight Lieutenant Charge Chucker, RAF, with Chapter One focusing on Pen Sallywright, Space Slattern.© Brooke McEldowneyThe current strip format contains […]

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