Full-page newspaper cartoons were pretty common in the United States during the first half of the 20th century. Today they are mostly extinct, which is a pity because the size of the page allows for amazing and innovative art. Germany, on the other hand, never had a really strong tradition of newspaper comics. Luckily, some papers began to publish large-sized comics a few years ago. One of them is the German version of monthly newspaper Le Monde diplomatique. Fifty comics origally published in Le Monde diplomatique have now been anthologized in a beautiful book named “In 50 Comics um die Welt” (“Around the World in 50 Comics”).
The title’s “Around the World” aspect not only refers to the newspaper’s title, it is also a hint towards the wide range of artists found in the book. Each comic page was designed by a different artist, about half of them from Germany, the oher half from all over the world. There are, for example, pages done by Berlin-based artist ATAK, Finnish designer Leena Kisonen and US illustrator J. Otto Seibold (left).
Artwork and subject matter of the comics are as diverse as the contributing artists. There’s some commentary on current events, as shown in the two examples given here (the awesome baisse bear below, by the way, is by German artist Lisa Röper). Other cartoons are moreof the storytelling kind or showa Dada-ish kind of humor. Jens Bonnke’s “Petit Alphabet Allemand”, for example, tells us that “G” is for “Gesichtswurst” and “O” for “Ou-Ha!”. As a whole the comics could be described as ‘somewhat artsy’ and very often the distinction between comic, cartoon and illustration is blurred.
In most cases, the captions are in German although there are some comics without words and a few ones in English. While the verbal content is definitely worth exploring – take, for example, the sound bites included in the Seibold piece – the sheer visual impact of the pictures already makes the book worthwhile. The innovative visual design of these comics points out parallels to early precedents such as George Herriman’s Krazy Kat or Winsor McCay’s Little Nemo. Still, each one of them also shows the impact of avantgarde and underground comix. Being roughly the original size (34 x 23 cm), the cartoons are printed on heavy tan paper, which I am sure looks even better than in the original newspaper version.
Maybe it’s just wishful thinking, but aren’t full-page / full-color cartoons a way to help both traditional newspapers looking for something that makes people buy the print edition and for cartoon artists looking for wider distribution? Well.. I hope that more newspapers adopt this feature and, until this happens, I recommend Le Monde diplomatique‘s anthology.
Bofinger, Karoline (ed.). In 50 Comics um die Welt. Berlin: Reprodukt, 2010. pp 64. 29 Euros.
Exhibition
June 4 to 26, 2010
Galerie Neurotitan
Haus Schwarzenberg
Rosenthaler Str. 39
13127 Berlin
Opening Hours:
Monday through Saturday 12 am to 8 pm, Sunday 2 pm to 7 pm
Tags: book review, In 50 Comics um die Welt, reprodukt, Rezension
Oh, ja! Sowieso ein sehr erfreuliches Phänomen “le monde diplomatique” .
Freut mich, dass Ihr dieser tollen Publikation Aufmerksamkeit zollt!
Der Empfehlung kann ich mich nur nachdrücklich anschließen
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