Industry news for the professional cartoonist
Darrin Bell took a jab at Republican Senator Jim Bunning through is Candorville strip earlier this month in response to Bunning’s complaints that the New York Times had committed treason by publishing a story about anti-terrorism programs used to track international money.
I’ve been following the Orphan Works Act and it looks like it’s making good speed through the House. Over a Cagle’s blog, he’s posted a stirring story from Michiko Stehrenberger, a cartoon illustrator and character designer who took on a big tobacco company who used her work illegally. Because of current copyright law, she was able to win, but if the Orphan Woks Act were in effect she would have never had a chance.
This two panel cartoon begins with the turtle character stepping on something in tall grass and ends with a question, “What makes a bite thats shaped like a crescent moon?”… I remember at the time defending Johnny on ToonTalk as the crescent is a common symbol/cliché used on outhouses and that people were inserting their own views into the strip, but now with this strip, I’m thinking that perhaps Johnny is capable of these clever puns (verbal or visual).
News-Tribune and Cagle Cartoons.Lester drew Uncle Sam holding a copy of the Times that featured a front page with the headline “All the Treason Fit to Print” and the subhead “U.S. Anti-Terror Program: Details Inside.”… He added that the letter that “really gave me second thoughts” was from former Democrat Publisher Carrol Dadisman, who wrote: “In more than 50 years of various responsibilities for newspapers and editorial pages, I’ve defended a lot of editorial cartoons.
The New York branch of the Polish American Congress has just branded “Doonesbury” creator Garry Trudeau a bigot. The May…
According to this site, a Mercedes-Benz dealership in Atlanta paid for a full-page ad in the Atlanta Journal-Constitution to apologize…
On the heals of Steve Benson’s Haditha cartoon comes Mike Luckovich’s cartoon on torture etiquette that has generated 18,000 votes on an online poll (Mike’s cartoons usually generate only 1,000) according to Editor and Publisher.Public Editor Angela Tuck, in a column Saturday, took issue with its timing, and claimed the “symbolism clearly overshadowed the intent.” The cartoon showed a hooded figure holding an American flag while reading a book on torture etiquette to an al-Qaida member.Not by design, it appeared just above photos of two Americans killed by insurgents in Iraq this week, whose bodies were brutalized, probably after they died.Tuck wrote: “Luckovich had that brutality in mind when he drew the cartoon, which was meant to criticize U.S. military leaders for allowing torture tactics, such as waterboarding (making prisoners feel as though they are being drowned) at Guantanamo Bay….’
Daryl Cagle invited readers to email him with their opinions regarding Steve Benson’s Marine Corps cartoon. He received over 300 responses.We asked for it, and we got it – more than three hundred responses to the Benson cartoon below.
In our mailbag …. .:Bloggers stoked reaction this week to a June 7 cartoon by The Republic’s Steve Benson.
With the release of Ann Coulter’s new book, she’s generated a lot of press and controversy over some of the things she has written – and a few are questioning the reaction from the public who’s knickers were in a complete twist when ultra-liberal Ted Rall made some of the same points earlier…. Editor and Publisher writers Dave Astor and Greg Mitchell have asked Universal Press if any newspapers have cancelled their subscriptions to Coulter to which they replied no.Is there an example of a media bias or the power of imagery over words?
While some Muslims do not make or show images of Mohammed because of the biblical laws against graven images, there is a long history of portraits of Muhammad in Islamic art. …… Perhaps because not talking about it gives them a convenient rationalization — religious tolerance — for not showing the offending Danish cartoons.
Signe Wilkinson, editorial cartoonist for the Philadelphia Daily News, was one of the most vocal American cartoonist earlier this year during the Danish/Mohammad cartoon riots. The debate is still raging and Signe is still the go to person for comments and reaction.Over at Islam Online there is a Point/Counter-Point wherein Signe takes on Felicity Arbuthnot a British journalist and activist on the topic of whether there should be limits on freedom of expression when it comes to the sacred in religions.
In summation, he accuses most cartoonists as failures and the reason why cartooning will never be considered a legitimate art form.The basic nobility of that cause innoculates (for the most part) cartooning against the accusations that it is a vocation filled with practitioners (98% male and white) who couldn’t draw their way out of a paper bag if their life (or their profession) counted on it.Imagine turning on the Olympics and seeing 78% of the figure skaters fall on their asses…. Individual cartoonists deserve respect, but just because they earn it doesn’t mean a positive residue should trickle down upon anyone who puts nib to paper, had a cartoon published in the Anchorage Antler and manages to squeeze into a tux for the National Cartoonists Society Reuben Awards.For cartoonists to believe that respect would be a given when the vast majority of them would fail to push any aesthetic envelope or embrace even a modicum of visual experimentation is as audacious as it is self-delusional.
The Association of American Editorial Cartoonists has posted the schedule and agenda of their annual conference that will be held this June 7-10 in Denver. The Danish cartoon will dominate two sessions and will also include two national figures: U.S. Sen. Gary Hart (D-Col., 1974-86) and National Public Radio’s Scott Simon.Visit the AAEC for more details.Hat tip to E&P for pointing out the schedule.
After the LA Times ran a story quoting comic strip heavy weights Berkeley Breathed, Wiley Miller questioning the future of the American Comics page, the discussion has been spreadign to other publications.Today on CNN.com, they have a story called “Who reads the comics anymore?”… On the one hand they want younger readers which would require hip-per, edgier features like “Pearls Before Swine” and “Get Fuzzy,” but such features are lost on the older generation that is the bread and butter of the newspaper subscriptions.From Tom Daning, managing editor for United Media:”They’re looking for something new and edgy, but many of their readers are over 35,” he says.