Barack Obama turned fifty on August 4. I guess the most common reaction to this piece of information is something like “Well.. good for him.” Or that’s what I was thinking, anyway. Still, it made me look up the Obama cartoons on toonpool.com (full list here). While doing so I noticed, that Mr. Obama rose to global fame about the same time that our site went online and has, in a way, accompanied us ever since
The first Obama cartoon was posted on January 9, 2008, not quite two months after toonpool.com was opened to the public. I have to admit that I’m not really sure about this particular cartoon’s meaning. Still, browsing through over 1700 Obama cartoons brings up a few memories and gives some insight into the way in which editorial cartoons and caricatures develop. If you would like to take a look into three years of political cartoons, here’s a rough timeline. [Unfortunately, the links in the titles are not permanent - things will change as soon as new Obama cartoons are added, but everything should be fine for couple of days]
Phase One : Democratic Primaries (~Januar-June 2008) [Wikipedia]
A lot of fierce battles between Obama and Clinton here. I really liked the Monty Python cartoon. Some apparently thought that McCain would profit from this.
Phase Two : Obama VS McCain (~June-October 2008) [Wikipedia]
A lot of cartoons about everyone idolizing Obama here. This was also the time when he traveled to Berlin. And the time Sarah Palin showed up. On a sidenote: I remembered people talking about Obama walking on water.. but John McCain?!
Phase Three: Winning the Elections (November 2008) [Wikipedia]
Boy, were cartoonists enthusiastic about this. By January, a couple of people began to get tired of it, though.
Phase Four: Obamacare (~August 2009- March 2010) [Wikipedia]
We have cartoons about its unsuspected difficulties, its cost, and – of course – about “death panels” (in case you forgot about those: more Wikipedia).
Phase Five: The Nobel Peace Prize (October – December 2009) [Wikipedia]
Phase Six: Nuclear Disarmament (April 2010) [Wikipedia]
There weren’t too many bad things people had to say about New START.
Phase Seven: The BP Spill (April-July 2010) [Wikipedia]
The “walking-on-water” thing was used a couple of times here. By the way.. does anyone know what things are like on the Gulf Coast?
Phase Eight: Midterm Elections (November 2010) [Wikipedia]
People who hadn’t heard about the Tea Party movement definitely did after November 2.
Phase Nine: Osama Bin Laden (May 2011) [Wikipedia]
If we have learned one thing from this, it’s that “Obama” sounds almost like “Osama”.
Phase Ten: The Debt Ceiling (~July-August 2010) [Wikipedia]
It was a wild ride, but we are safe now, right?
title image by Tjeerd Royaards
]]>Unfortunately, neither really sad nor really good news are suited for funny cartoons. Cartoonists need the middle ground. Here are a couple of cartoons on the Prague treaty: 1,2,3,4. Then, there are also some that put their focus on Obamas statements on nuclear retaliatio earlier this week: 1,2,3. And there’s Medi Belortaja’s unusual caricature of the President.
Introducing…
Brazilian-based artist Beto has posted two small sketches that I really like: the elderly Batman and the hot dog lady. Look at how the old lady seems to be enjoying the hunt – I bet she set her poodle on the wiener. Beto’s actual cartoons make a nice use of colors, both digital and ‘manual’. Check out the pattern on the blanket in the grandmother and the wolf cartoon. Which is a great cartoon, too. Also take a look at the sheperd’s facepalm in the black sheep cartoon. Not because of the coloring but because it’s such a great twist to the attitude you would normally expect from a good sheperd.
Raffa, AKA Rafael Carasco is from Equador. He does black and white cartoons and illustrations in a very distinct style. And he has some great visual ideas. Jut look at the blabla organ, the oil-milking top hat guy and the computer virus. Although I am kinda wondering what they guy is going to use the plunger for. Raffa has also done a cartoon on the Catholic child abuse issue and God knows I’m fed up with those. But, once again, a good visual idea saves the day.
Cartoons of Interest
This week’s favourite is “Mountain” by Alves – because Bizarroworld is somewhere up there.
Please, please also note this one by Karlo about things that are missing in our lives. And a cartoon version of Eward Hopper’s “Morning Sun” which does a great job in transporting Hopper’s use of light to vector art.
]]>Although there is a steady supply of cartoons on the war in Afghanistan (there, I said it), there have been surprisingly few on Thursday’s International Conference in London. In fact, there are only two cartoons directly concerned with the conference, both of them by Afghan cartoonist Shahid Atiqullah. It seems that Apple Computer’s new gadget, the iPad, has inspired more artists (1,2,3,4,5,6). Probably that’s because the whole Afghanistan business doesn’t really offer new topics – see this week’s Cartoons of Interest section.
A few more cartoons have been done on Barack Obama’s first year in office. And – with a varying degree of schadenfreude – they all paint a pretty gloomy picture. There is Tjeerd Royaards’ explosive cake, Klaus Stuttmann’s gory magic show, Fredy Rodriguez’ new version of the campaign slogan and Joel Barbee’s dead fish.
Introducing…
David Toth is from Budapest. He does amazing illustrations (take this flyer, the diving bell guy or this lab scene) as well as narrative bits that, as far as I can see often include chicken (here & here). They make me wish I had taken Hungarian instead of French. If anyone feels like translating: I would love to learn about the mystery behind this couple’s conversation, the lab assistant’s mumbled curses or the word’s spoken at Snow White’s funeral.
It was Thomas Hollnack’s cardboard cut out-like mutant deer that got me in the first place. They say it knows eternity, and who am I to argue. The old-school dinosaur is a bit too adorable for my taste but it’s probably abest-selling geek shirt. Thomas also does nice cartoons about piranhas and the vegetarian option or busy stones. The latter reminded me of Volkertoon’s “Steine” (relatively language neutral strips: here, here & here.
Cartoons of Interest
This cartoon by Rodrigo was published originally on December 25 2009. It still works a month later and probably would have worked any time during the last five years. Strictly speaking it’s a Christmas cartoon (I just now noticed that the bomber is leaving “ho ho ho” vapor trails). But you don’t need an occasion to give away presents. I just love the boy’s face. And the fathers face. And the GI’s face…This cartoon is such a nice and absurd commentary on the whole “more troops” business. I am sure that there is a considerable number of Afghan people who would welcome “more troops” and soldiers are cool as long as you are not too closely involved in their soldiering business. Which I fear a lot of people in Afghanistan are. On the other hand, the outcome of this policy is just as uncertain as “less troops”, “exactly the same amount of troops” or “more engineers” would have been. To me, the GI’s face reflects the uncertainty individual soldiers must feel upon arrival. Just like Christmas puppies.
The Berlusconi cartoons are pretty uniform in their evaluation of the court’s decision – no one seems to like that little rich guy. As you would suspect, a lot of them come from Italy. Some, unfortunately, exceed my language skills and the Google translator (my Italian is basically French with an accent). So, if anyone could translate one of these, I’d be happy. Cartoons without words or even in English are easier. I liked the way these two by Uber and Matteo Bertelli correspond if you ignore that it’s Lady Justice in one cartoon and Italia Turrita in the other.
As a whole, the cartoons express some hope that Signore B. will finally feel the consequences of his actions (take either one of these). And then there is this one that shows Lady Justice dropping her blindfold and as a consequence all that makes justice just. I don’t know if this was intended or not.
The Obama cartoons differ in their interpretation of the event but, as a friend pointed out to me, a lot of them replicate toonpool.com’s well-established categories of opinion. There are those that emphasize the hope for change (this one and this one). There are those that concentrate on aggressive American foreign policy (here and here). There are those that… dislike Obama (here). And there is George W. Bush winning the prize.
Finally, there are two cartoons that manage to include Silvio and Barack (here & here).
Cartoons of Interest
My favorite this week is “Execution” by Easterby. It’s a very classic cartoon – banana republic-style military executions definitely are cliché cartoon settings. And a similar joke has been made in several films and TV programs (with a blind guy instead of an executionee). But I still laughed. Take that, innovative humor.
Paul Hellmich
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