When I got on the subway today, I saw a woman I wanted to draw. I studied her quickly because something about her countenance made me think she would get off soon. I started to draw her, and sure enough, she got off at the next stop. But I had retained enough in my head to finish the drawing.
Here is the finished sketch.
And here is a video grab of the drawing as it happened.
For almost two decades, I have been a member of Cartooning for Peace, an international organization based in Paris. It began in 2005 at the United Nations in NYC, and I was invited to be there to speak about the power of cartoons in helping foster understanding and peace. This initiative is very dear to me, as I always hope that my drawings can bring people together and encourage dialogue. This is what CFP is all about.
I was honored this past fall when they asked if they could use one of my drawings for an animation, in conjunction with numerous French Media companies.
I had the honor and pleasure of being interviewed the other night by Rose Horowitz for her initiative, Women To Follow.
The New Yorker now has something called the “Daily Cartoon” that runs every weekday on their website. Often it’s a political drawing, but not always. The one above is one I drew on Nov 11th, 2022 during the January 6th Committee final hearings. The magazine asked to use it for their Daily. But they didn’t run it at the time and I thought, great, there will not be a moment in time when this will work well. Low and behold: the GOP has created more chaos in the House these last two days. So The New Yorker ran it today and yesterday.
Drawing political for a weekly publication is tricky, you have to find a way into the subject that is somewhat timely and that will last. Hopefully it can last more than a day, and become an “evergreen.” That often means looking at the big picture, not just about that day or that moment. The above cartoon could run at any time, when it comes down to it, and I think it will be understood in 20 years—but who knows. Maybe we won’t have any political parties anymore then! I hope we do, because if we don’t, that might mean we are a dictatorship….
I grew up in Washington DC during Watergate, so I am partial to political art and drawings and always dreamed of doing it. Herblock of the Wapo and Gary Trudeau of Doonesbury were my inspriations!
Cartoons are a great way to get ideas to people.
Here was my first New Yorker cartoon about politics. 1983. It might not be evergreen. Do any of you recall what the basis of my teasing Walter Mondale was?
I wrote an article for the Washington Post, interviewing 7 cartoonists for The New Yorker about their thoughts on gender and their work drawing humor and drawing bodies…including their own!
I found what they said fasicnating, and I even drew small comics to highlight some of the artist’s ideas. Here are two samples:
Scholastic, in partnership with the Herblock Foundation, invited me to speak on zoom to 600 high school students about the different formats available for budding cartoonists. At the end, I drew for them! It is part of a series of courses they offered recently. I loved doing it, sharing what I know, and hope the students did too.
