12/28/10 - The Year in Review - Political Cartoons

2010 - it's been quite a year! Let's see the one you like! (Cartoonists send me your toons as well to post here.) Blog members feel free to append to this post or readers can add comments with links to their images! 

I just saw this one (We work, They Profit) on an Iraqi Student Solidarity site and it has that classic power of old style political cartooning - with strong allegorical types represented. Let's just take a nice long look at the form - and not obsess about the message or the speaker, shall we?

If you buy that this is a dying art - think again!  You need to study history and look at some of the great examples of this important art form! As long as we have corruption, waste, ignorance, intolerance and greed we will have a place for these brave critics who hold up a mirror to our lifestyle and politics.

01/14/10 - Editorial Cartoons Haitian Earthquake

Daryl Cagle's excellent site:

http://blog.cagle.com/news/2010/01/13/live-blog-haiti-cartoons/

Some selected cartoons about the disaster in Haiti:

Helicopters - Cartoon by Daryl Cagle - msnbc.com

Helping Hand - Cartoon by Steve Breen - San Diego Union-Tribune

Voodoo Spike - Cartoon by John Cole - The Scranton Times-Tribune

Pat Robertson - Cartoon by Bruce Plante - The Tulsa World

This last is one is for real: see the link to the video:
http://www.rightwingwatch.org/content/robertson-blames-haiti-earthquake-pact-devil

11/14/07 - Spanish Editorial Cartoonists Fined

Some of you may be following this controversial case about an embarrassing depiction of Spain's Crown Prince and his wife. This cartoon on a news magazine cover seems to be tapping into a ground swell of great dissatisfaction with the royals by the citizenry of Spain. The two men who drew and wrote the caption for the cartoon are being charged with slander and defaming the crown.

Is this a case of freedom of the press or just some uncouth folks trying to sell their paper? - you decide.

Here is a link to the story of the cartoonists legal judgment from BBC News.

11/03/07 - UK Law School Hosts Panel Disucssion on KY Kernel Editorial Cartoon

Who says editorial cartoons are no longer influential or relevant?

Not anyone who has been following the events before, during and after the publication of a Kentucky Kernel (University of Kentucky's student run, independent newspaper) editorial cartoon you know that there was quite a lot of fallout to the depiction of UK's Greek System as somehow analogous to a slave auction. Previous to that cartoon running the newspaper had reported on the Jena-6 case, "Taboo Subjects in Race Relations", segregation in the UK Greek system, and covered a meeting of the UK Greeks to discuss the segregation that persists between black and white fraternities/sororities. I strongly encourage any interested to go to www.kykernel.com site and look through the articles and stories preceding the October 5th edition of the newspaper. This really helps to put some of this in perspective. Here is a link to some of the online comments the Kernel received.

I am greatly pleased to see someone has the courage to host an open discussion about the issues that have been raised these past few weeks! Here is the information sent out by the UK Law School about their program: "When Is Race a Laughing Matter?" (A title I take objection to, by the way. Editorial cartoons are serious works and their primary purpose is not to amuse to but to illuminate.)

Colleagues,

The Law School's Diversity Committee, under the leadership of Professor
Melynda Price, has put together a program that arises out of and expands
upon the issues raised by the Kernel cartoon. It is titled "When is Race a
Laughing Matter? A Community Discussion of the Kernel Cartoon Controversy."
Melynda has put together a very interesting group of panelists with varying
thoughts on the topic.

On behalf of the College of Law, I invite you to attend In addition, would
you be willing to arrange for the posting/distribution of the attached
flier.

We have plenty of room for students and faculty as the program is being held
in the Courtroom of the Law Building. It begins at 6:00 p.m. on Monday,
November 5th.

Here is a PDF flier for the event. Here is a link to the campus guide map showing the location of the College of Law Building, where I suppose the "courtroom" is located.

I find great parallels between this and the furor that arose from the Danish Cartoons that many Muslims found offensive last year (see previous post). Lexington Herald Leader Editorial Cartoonist and Pulitzer Prize winner, Joel Pett, is scheduled to be present on the discussion panel that includes Brad Fletcher, the UK Law student who wrote and drew the cartoon.

10/04/07 - How does something I draw get into a magazine?

Mike Lynch (caricature pictured left), in addition to being a blogger, is a magazine cartoonist. His clients include Reader's Digest, Playboy, Wall Street Journal, Harvard Business Review, TheLadders.com, the New York Daily News and many others. He's also the National Cartoonists Society National Representative.

In a recent article on his blog, Mike shares the answer to the question "How does something I draw at home, on a board, get into a magazine like Harvard Business Review?" The article is a bit cartoon focused, but many of the points raised would be equally applicable to making a comic pitch. Good reading on either side of the creator fence.

Check out the full article here.

09/05/07 - See You in the Funny Papers?

The attention diverting image on the left will link you to a great blog on comics by Steve Duin of The Oregonian. Nice that they value the medium enough to have a regular columnist assigned to cover it! You can read a review about Craig Voe's mag there as well.

Meanwhile, our local paper, the Lexington Herald-Leader, is running a request on their website for input about the comics they run in the paper. Stop by and enter your votes. This is great that they are asking, but the ballot system they are using seems a little restrictive.

How about we look at the big list of comic strip options? There a lot of great strips that don't get much attention: Liberty Meadows, Spiderman, Little Orphan Annie, you can probably remember some that you thought had gone away or are no longer produced. Here is a link to some of the best comic strips you have never heard of. Below is a partial list (let me know what I have missed) of the offerings from some of the comics syndicates:

• King Features: http://www.kingfeatures.com/features/comics/comics.htm
• United Media: http://www.comics.com/
• Tribune Media Syndicate: http://www.comicspage.com/
• Creators Syndicate: http://www.creators.com/comics.html
• United Features: http://www.unitedfeatures.com/ufsapp/home.do
  

Oh, and while we're at it let's look at Editorial Cartoons - do you think they want our input on that? Here's some links to some of the leaders in that form of cartooning:

• The Washington Post Writers Group: http://www.postwritersgroup.com/edtoons.htm
• Tribune Media Syndicate: http://www.comicspage.com/ed_comics.html

I encourage all readers of this blog to contact your local paper and let them know you are interested in what they run, how they choose to display it (have you noticed the comics page space just keeps shrinking?) and that you want local content as well as the syndicated stuff!

For local area blog visitors, I don't have specific names or emails (yet!) for you all to send your messages to - in the meantime here is a link to the contact us web form for the Herald-Leader. Let them know what you want to read! Start a list here as a comment - we can summarize the suggestions and forward on to the powers that be. Viva La Revolucion!