Funny Pages Phasing Out Female Artists

The latest warning signs for some female artists began last fall. Suddenly, their work began disappearing from many American comics pages.

An announcement started hitting the pages of newspapers dotted around the country: the USA Today Network, owned by Gannett, was “standardizing” its comics across more than 200 publications. One of those newspapers, the Coloradoan, published a list of comics, batched in groups, that it said made up Gannett’s new lineup of options.

What began to concern some cartoonists and industry observers: None of the dozens of comics listed as print offerings for Gannett papers was actively being created by a woman artist.

Just three strips in Gannett’s list of print comics have a credited woman: “For Better or For Worse,” which creator Lynn Johnston says is in reruns; “Luann,” by writer-artist Greg Evans and his daughter, co-author Karen Evans; and “Shoe,” by artist Gary Brookins and Susie MacNelly.

Michael Cavna, for The Washington Post, covers the disappearance of women cartoonists from newspaper pages.

Michael talks to Hilary Price, Georgia Dunn, Stephanie Piro, Lynn Johnston, Karen Evans, and King Features President C. J. Kettler. Kettler, along with Stephan Pastis, talk more about the general State of The Art:

“[A]re we in the same place we were in 2008? Definitely not,” Pastis said of the growing obstacles. “We are not even where we were in 2020.”

_{feature image is from Breaking Cat News by Georgia Dunn who will report on this story in her week of March 18 dailies}