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Blog Syndicate

Andy Singer’s Panel Cartoons in the Editorial Cartoon Spot

Editorial page editors typically reject anything new and different from editorial cartoonists. Unusual styles and formats are just not what editors want to see. Editors like cartoons that look like what they think editorial cartoons should look like – which leads to lots of cartoons that look much the same.

I’ve been a big fan of Andy Singer’s self-syndicated, altie “No Exit” panel for years, and I’ve been encouraging Andy to try his hand at more traditional editorial cartooning. Andy’s panel has content that is socially conscious, like an editorial cartoon, but it is not the right shape, and it is wordy, and it doesn’t have caricatures of politicians and the panel format with a title is simply not something editorial page editors will consider putting in their daily editorial cartoon hole.

What to do? Andy wanted to be on the editorial pages but was committed to continuing the “No Exit” panel. Then he gave me a new pitch, saying, “Daryl, you know, when I put two of my panels next to each other it becomes the shape of an editorial cartoon, and if I do two panels that are on the same topic, and color them, it looks like one big editorial cartoon.” The idea looked interesting to me. The result is rather stylistically different than what editors are used to but Andy’s new editorial cartoon format looks like wordy, multi panel editorial cartoons, and editors seem to be accepting them. The connection between the two panels might be a stretch, but no one seems to notice. So far, so good.

A number of comic strip cartoonists, Like Dan Piraro and Wiley Miller, have been doing their cartoons in both strip and panel format for years. Andy’s work has some format advantages over most magazine gag cartoonists’ work; Andy’s panels are topically editorial cartoons to start with, and he doesn’t have a classic gag cartoon style with a caption at the bottom, which would be more difficult to reformat. Still, it may be that some other socially conscious panel or gag cartoonists could develop a new market by finding a procedure to reformat their ongoing work as editorial cartoons. Andy Singer is the trailblazer.

One of Andy’s new, combined format cartoons for the editorial pages. With the same characters and consistent color and format, it looks right as a single editorial cartoon and is proving popular so far.

Here are a couple more new editorial cartoons from Andy. Follow Andy’s work on Cagle.com here.

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Blog Syndicate

Palestinian Daggar Eyes

In old time comics there was a great thing where, when a character gives a dirty look the cartoonist would draw knives, or daggers, coming out of their eyes, pointing at where they are looking. Urbandictionary.com defines it this way:

When someone who tries to intimidate another person, they will flinch quickly towards that person, and exercise a quick widening of the eyes, in effort to scare away the supposed moron who tried to intimidate them in the first place. Usually, the kid who gives the dagger eyes is much more adapted to survive through mockery, and this action helps to scare off possible douche bags who try to scare the dagger eyed kid.
In Hawaii they call it “stink-eye”. With all the stabbings, “dagger eyes” worked for me.
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Blog Syndicate

Zits and ISIS-ISIL-Daesh

It is pretty common for editorial cartoonists to draw parody cartoons with the Peanuts characters. Lucy pulling away the football is a political cartooning standard. I wonder why it is always Peanuts, and not other strips that find their way into editorial cartoons – so, here’s my Zits-ISIS-ISIL-Dash-Zits cartoon.

I’m a big Zits fan.  I have two Zits originals, that I bought at charity events, hanging on the wall in my house.  Borgman and Scott are brilliant, although I don’t think they’d ever draw Jeremy joining ISIS, so … sorry about that. Kids and ISIS – always a surprise, huh?

I’m headed off to Ukraine next week and I won’t be drawing cartoons for a while. Hold your breath until I get back!

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Cartoons

ISIS Zits Parody

ISIS Zits Parody © Daryl Cagle,CagleCartoons.com,Zits,newspaper,sunday strip,comic strip,Jerry Scott Jim Borgman,ISIS,ISIL,Daesh,Middle East,Islam,Islamic Extremist,Syria,Iraq,Libya,terrorist,homegrown terrorist,Jeremy

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Blog Columns

France, Cartoonists and Murder

I woke up this morning to the news of the terrorist attack on the Charlie Hebdo Magazine office in Paris. Twelve people were killed and eleven wounded, including two of my French cartoonist friends, Tignous and Wolinski. Cartoonists around the world are grieving.

Americans treat editorial cartoons as a trivial daily joke in the newspaper – in France, editorial cartoons and loved and respected. The Louvre has a branch museum devoted to cartoons; imagine if the Smithsonian had a cartoon museum, that’s the way cartoons are revered in France.

My new editor.

 

“Charlie Hebdo” is a silly name; it is a weekly magazine filled with editorial cartoons, easily found on news stands everywhere in France. “Hebdo” means “weekly” in French, and “Charlie” comes from France’s love for the comic strip “Peanuts” and Charlie Brown – therefore “Charlie Hebdo.” The top cartoonists in France vie to be on the pages of Charlie Hebdo.

There are cartoon festivals all over France – the best one for political cartoonists is in the small town of St Just le Martel; I’ve been attending for years, along with other cartoonists I syndicate. The townspeople pitch in to throw a festival for the editorial cartoonists every year; villagers put cartoonists up in their homes, and they award a live cow to the “Humor Vache” cartoonist of the year. One greatly respected winner of the cow was Georges Wolinski, a brilliant cartoonist with a masterful loose, swishy, wordy style, highly respected by the French. We were fellow cow winners, having a beer together last October; it is hard to imagine that he is gone.

The Charlie Hebdo cartoonists are a diverse group of charming characters; they are the heart of the French cartooning community. There are not a lot of editorial cartoonists. We get to know each other; the murders are a blow that strikes close to all of us.
The Charlie Hebdo artists were energized and incensed by the Danish Muhammad cartoon fracas a few years ago. French cartoonists have a macho attitude, seeing themselves on the front lines of a free speech debate. One Charlie Hebdo issue, touted as “edited by the Profit Muhammad” had all blank pages. One Charlie Hebdo cover featured a drawing, by French cartoonist “Luz” of the magazine’s publisher/cartoonist “Charb” having a sloppy kiss with a Muslim Man, under the headline “L’Amour plus for que la haine” or “love is stronger than hate.” Charb was among those killed in the terror attack.

Terrorists have no sense of humor. Cartoons loom large in the Arab world, typically on the front pages of Arab language newspapers. It is no wonder that our cartoons seem to bother the terrorists more than our words. Sitting behind a beer with Charlie Hebdo cartoonists, the talk often turns to Islamic extremeists and their assaults on press freedoms. No one can doubt that editorial cartoonists are leading the fight for press freedoms now.

Today we are are grieving, but as we move forward, I hope that our cartoons won’t be chilled by these murders and that the cartooning community will step up to this challenge with even more brilliant and insightful work – I’m sure the French cartoonists will do that; they are my heroes.

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Cartoons

Obama and Predator Drone

Obama and Predator Drone © Daryl Cagle,MSNBC.com,President barack Obama, Predator drone, military, war, covert, terrorist, kiss, love, leaks, kill list

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Cartoons

Underwear Bombers

Underwear Bombers Color © Daryl Cagle,MSNBC.com,KIRIT RADIA,Nigeria,Fruit of the Loom,grapes,leaves,leaf,apple,muslim,islam,extremeist,Northwest Airlines,underweat,panties,shorts,skivvies,chones,excplosives,bomb,underwear bomber,terrorist,terrorism,plane

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Cartoons

Carter and Hamas

Carter and Hamas © Daryl Cagle,MSNBC.com,Khalid Meshaal, Jimmy Carter, Ehud Olmert, Israel, President, Hamas, Middle East, Mid East, terrorist, Gaza, dogs, pee, sniff butt

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Cartoons

Osama And Paris Hilton

Osama And Paris Hilton © Daryl Cagle,MSNBC.com,Osama Bin Laden, Paris Hilton, Zawahiri, terrorism, terrorist, terror, afghanistan, jail, DUI

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Cartoons

Shoot the Doggie

Shoot the Doggie © Daryl Cagle,MSNBC.com,Iraq, Fallujah, military, dog, Islam, religion, ambulance, mosque, gun, soldier, army, terrorist, Shiite, minaret, baby, terrorism, war, puppy, shoot