Tuesday is “look day” at The New Yorker. That means cartoonists go in to the magazine on 42nd street, ride the elevator to the 20th floor and show their cartoons to the cartoon editor, Bob Mankoff. Mankoff may hold a few cartoons from each cartoonist to take to a meeting with David Remnick later in the week. The two editors then decide our cartoon fate for the week. Then, most of us go out to lunch at a great little restaurant in Times Square called Pergola. This week was much the same except more cartoonists than usual showed up– I didn’t photograph as many as I wish I had. A documentary film is being made about our profession, and we just had to be there. They filmed us eating too. Doesn’t it sound like a fantastic film?
On 3 May 2012 I was honored to be present at the awards ceremony for the first International Prize of Cartooning for Peace. Kofi Annan, Honorary President of Cartooning for Peace and Pierre Maudet, Mayor of the City of Geneva, Jean Plantu, cartoonist for Le Monde, and Patrick Chappatte, cartoonist for the International Herald Tribune presented the prize to four Iranian artists, representing a new generation of brave and talented artists. Their names are Firoozeh Mozafarri, Kianoush Ramenzani, Hassan Karimzadeh.
@Kianoush/Cartooning for Peace
@Mana Neyestani/Cartooning for Peace
@Hassan Karimzadeh/Cartooning for Peace
I was on the jury, and it was difficult to decide what cartoonist(s) should receive the prize. There are many artists working to help speak to freedom of the press. But in the end we chose these four artists for the beauty and strength of their work and their bravery in speaking out in the face of difficulties. I also believe that Firoozeh Mozafarri is representative of a voice of women journalists around the globe. A voice very much in need of being heard.
Meanwhile, from May 3 to June 3, 2012, the public can see drawings of the award-winning Iranian artists along Lake Geneva. The exhibition Drawings for Peace 2012 will also feature a hundred cartoons from cartoonists around the world on the themes of freedom of expression, the Arab spring and the situation of women today.
Winners: Kianoush, Firoozeh, Hassan (Mana was unable to attend)
Cartoon Marriage, the book I did with my husband, Michael Maslin, based on our life together as New Yorker cartoonists, is in the process of becoming a television show. Just last night we heard that ABC Studios bought the script as written by the wonderful and talented Terri Minsky (Lizzie McGuire and Less Than Perfect creator). It all began about a year ago, when actress Jennifer Garner saw our book (via our agent David Kuhn) and fell in love with the idea. The show will be produced by Jennifer’s production company, Vandalia Films. We are thrilled. To read about it, go to Deadline Hollywood, or Hollywood Reporter
So far, it’s been a fun and wild ride interacting with Hollywood. All good so far. I love entering into new fields, trying new things. We got to meet Terri Minsky for a day at our home, and it was great fun. She is hilarious and thoughtful and I know is writing a wonderful script. We are crossing our fingers for the next step! My hope is that the world is ready for another terrific comedy with lots of playful humor, and it will become a show that brings laughs and diversion.
Last week, I heard from my a cartoonist friend of mine from Corsica, Manfruelli Batti, that a Libyan street artist/cartoonist named Kais al-Hilali had been killed by Quaddafi supporters after drawing a caricature of the leader on a Benghazi street wall. I put out a call to my international cartoonist friends, and gathered a number of poignant cartoons on this tragedy. The New Yorker created a slide show of the cartoons, I wrote some copy and it was posted on their News Desk Blog. Here it is. There is nothing like the power of cartoons to speak to an issue.
cartoon by Riber Hansson of Sweden
Those of us born before 1990 work hard to keep up with technology, we weren’t born into it. I love twitter, tumblr, email, FB, and I was born well before then. But it will be interesting to see how the upcoming generations will be different because of the Internet. Will they physically be different from bending over phones? Will their brains work in new, as-yet- to-be-understood ways? Will their handling of cyber-etiquette be so ingrained as to further distance us from them? Just when we were able to trash the music divide that existed with parents when I was young–my children and I share music tastes– along comes the Internet. I text with my daughters frequently, but I am not able to email my computer-less father. The Internet is not only changing us in both good in bad ways, it is changing how the generations co-exist.
Last December, I delivered a talk for TED. In fact it was the first ever TEDWomen and was a great event. I met many amazing, dedicated men and women whose work is to help women around the globe. The editors at TED just released the video of my talk.
Writing the talk took over a month. It began as long speech, and I spent weeks pairing it down to the six minutes I was allotted. I also worked with a very talented coach, Trisha Bauman, who helped be understand many new (to me) key elements for successful public speaking and performance. While I have given numerous talks over the years, this was the first one that I felt I should memorize. In fact, memorization really frees you up, and allows you to connect with the audience and with what you are saying much more naturally.
The audience at the conference was wonderful. In fact you can hear me laughing with them because I was so taken aback by their loud spontaneous laughter. It was great. Many of the other talks were (rightfully) serious, and I sense that the audience was looking for relief, which I provided. While many of the other speakers were serious with touches of humor, I was humorous with an underlying note of serious. My favorite way to be.
