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February 2013

Cartoonists Draw a Grim Picture of Egypt's Future

This article originally appeared on the website of RNW.

'Two years after the revolution – where is Egypt going?' is a question the world is waiting to see answered. It is also the question of the latest edition of the 360 Degrees project, organised by Radio Netherlands Worldwide, Cartoon Movement and their Arabic media partners. Readers are sending their reactions via Twitter and Facebook, and cartoonists use the tweets and comments as inspiration for cartoons.
 
Where am I going?
0833-130128 Egypt (Sabra)_small“No one knows where Egypt is going, I don't have an answer to the question,” Egyptian cartoonist  Mohamed Sabra tells RNW. Sabra's cartoon “Where am I going?” shows that even the famous 1928 statue 'Egypt's Renaissance' is confused. This cartoon was selected for the project. “Every time we think we are finally moving in the right direction, something happens to prove the opposite,” says the cartoonist.
 
Badr-Eddine Ali wrote the Facebook comment on which Sabra based his cartoon: “We are not yet at the time of getting the fruits, because the fruits of the revolution don’t have the strength to achieve development and prosperity. The Egyptians have to prove to the people who love this beautiful country that they can meet the challenge and have the patience so that Egypt can pass through this crisis.”
 
Germs and insects
BertuccioliNot everyone is this patient, some are calling for a new revolution. “When you remove 30-year-old furniture of course you need to cleanse the place against germs and insects, the revolution of January 25th 2013 is the disinfection against germs,” tweeted @eng_amgad2011. Italian cartoonist Enrico Bertuccioli went to work on this reaction.
 
Between military and religious rule
Several readers show their fear of being ruled by the Muslim Brotherhood.
 
EladlThe new government is making the same mistakes as the old regime, according to Egyptian cartoonist Doaa Eladl. She shows the Brotherhood as a bull running for the (red) chair that symbolizes power. In another cartoon, she expresses the future of Egypt as a dark cave between two bad choices: military or religious rule.
 
No way back
Cartoonist Bernard Bouton expects that freedoms will decrease, especially for women. He symbolized the tweet 'Egypt is going on a one way railway' from Mohamed Abouwafia with a classical Egyptian picture, where men are walking on a railway consisting of women.


0834-130128 Egypt (Bouton)_small
And Palestinian cartoonist Fadi Abou Hassan drew a giant voting box in green, the colour that symbolizes Islam, and writes that Islam will seize power in Egypt.

 

Hassan
Their colleague Mohamed Sabra thinks people both in and outside of Egypt are too afraid of the Muslim Brotherhood. “Everything they do is seen as dangerous,” he says. “But just because they are Islamist, doesn’t mean they are extremist. Give them a chance.”
 
Hold on together
MurtadhaIt all depends on Egyptians' ability to reach a compromise, tweets @cruser1991: “Egypt holds on to a rescue rope and it is tight to its maximum. The question is whether Egyptians hold together like threads of a strong rope or will they split up like threads of a worthless rope and Egypt will fall?”
 
What does the rescue rope look like? Saad Murtadha from Iraq offers several choices.
 
Pyramids
Alexander Dubovsky used the same 'rescue rope' tweet for his cartoon: a life boat hanging from the pyramids. Many other cartoonists also used the pyramids in their drawings: a quick way to make clear which country they are talking about – and what they think that country is heading for.
 

360Degrees, #360D, poses a different question each week giving RNW’s Arabic readers the chance to have their say on major issues.


New Shirt Design: Passport

Ares Shirts

No one is illegal.

We have added a new design to our t-shirt webshop. This cartoon about migration is by Cuban artist Ares; it was made for the Sphere Project, to promote minimum standards in humanitarian assistance. By ordering this shirt, or any other items, you're helping us to build a sustainable future for editorial cartooning:

EU shop
UK shop
US shop

Don't like the shirts we picked? You can design a product yourself with this cartoon. And if you'd like to have a specific cartoon (over 700 available) to put on a shirt, bag or hoodie, drop us a line by email, and we'll be happy to help.

 


Sunday Times Cartoon Controvery - An Overview

Cartoon-Sunday-TimesA cartoon by Gerard Scarfe, published in the Sunday Times last Sunday, has rekindled the ongoing discusssion about the right (the necessity, even) of cartoons to insult, and the limits to this right. The cartoon depicts Benjamin Netanyahu building a wall, using blood for mortar. The moment of publication coincided with Holocaust Memorial Day. The cartoon was met with outrage, and accused of being anti-Semitic, especially because the blood would refer to blood libel, a mythic belief that drinking human blood is part of Jewish religious rituals, often referred to in cartoons about Israel that appear in the Arab press. This latest controversy gives a good overview of the debate about cartoons and freedom of expression in general, and mocking Israel in particular:

Procartoonists.org (the blog for professional UK-based cartoonists) notes that it is rare for a journalistic publication to apologize, and that 'any regret expressed has been directed towards the timing of publication'. However, Rupert Murdoch, the publisher, did issue a public apology for a 'grotesque offensive cartoon'.

Anshel Pfeffer, columnist for Israeli daily newspaper Haaretz, has written an interesting piece arguing  the cartoon of Netanyahu isn't anti-Semitic in any way, pointing to the fact that there is no reference at all to the Jewish religion in the cartoon. Read the article for three additional reasons why the cartoon should't be considered anti-Semitic.

BBC radio hosted a rather lively debate between Jewish Chronicle editor Stephen Pollard, and Guardian cartoonist Steve Bell, to which you can listen here. It is an interesting, if sometimes chaotic, discussion, with some good points raised. Steve Bell argues that a similar cartoon with Assad instead of Netanyahu would have evoked no reation at all, while Stephen Pollard states it is the right of the media to publish these kinds of cartoons, but they should be aware of the consequenses.

In our own newsroom, Egyptian cartoonist Sherif Arafa responds to the controversy with this cartoon.

 


New Cartoonist: Aprilus

April
Translation: 'Evil be to him who evil thinks.'

Aprilus is a cartoonist from Quebec, Canada. His work appears in the magazine À Bâbord, Jounral Ensemble and Le Mouton Noir. He was a finalist in the Grand Prix of Independent Journalism 2012, in the category editorial illustration. Check out his website to see more of his cartoons, and illustrations as well: www.aprilus.com


360 Degrees: Football and Violence

A new week of our project 360 Degrees. For three months, our cartoonists will be drawing cartoons based on your tweet on a certain theme. Check out the cartoons that were selected in the previous weeks here. This week's theme is about football (or soccer, for people from the US):

Why is there so much violence around football (soccer), and are there ways to put an end to the violence?

 

Ndula

Image: Victor Ndula

Tweet your perspective including the hashtag #360D, and your tweet will appear in our project newsroom, and could be the made into a cartoon by our professional cartoonists. Every week the two best cartoons will be published on our homepage, and by Radio Netherlands Worldwide, as well as various media partners in the Middle East. If the cartoon based on your tweet wins, you win a high quality art print of the cartoon, or a t-shirt with the winning cartoon.


Behind-the-Scenes: Morhaf Youssef

Youssef

In this edition of Behind-the-Scenes, the series where we take a look at how cartoonists work, we visit Syrian artist Morhaf Youssef. Morhaf employs mixed techniques, using acrylic and water colors in some of his cartoons, and digital coloring (with Photoshop) in others.

Because of the conflict in Syria, Morhaf currently resides in Jordan. Here are some shots of his studio:

Youssef

The animation below shows the making of the cartoon at the top of this post. Be sure to turn on the sound, because there is a nice soundtrack included:

 


New Shirt Design: Child's Play

ChildLabor
In underdeveloped countries, thousands of children are forced to work.

We have added a new design to our t-shirt webshop. This cartoon about child labord is by Colombian artist Elena Ospina; it was made for the special project 360 Degrees. By ordering this shirt, or any other items, you're helping us to build a sustainable future for editorial cartooning:

EU shop
UK shop
US shop

Don't like the shirts we picked? You can design a product yourself with this cartoon. And if you'd like to have a specific cartoon (over 800 available) to put on a shirt, bag or hoodie, drop us a line by email, and we'll be happy to help.


Partnership: Nieuwe Liefde

DNLIn addition to our collaborations with magazines such as the New Internationalist, 360 Magazine and Amnesty International Denmark, we are starting a new partnership with Dutch magazine Nieuwe Liefde ('New Love' in English). Nieuwe Liefde is a magazine on culture, religion and politics; two of the main themes they try to cover are 'social affairs' and 'urgent art'. Needless to say our cartoons and comics will fit the mission.

We kick off our cooperation with a series of interviews with a number of our cartoonists. They will talk about cartoons that have gotten them in trouble. All the interviews will appear in the magazine, and will also run in English here on the blog. The first interview will be published towards the end of February.

 

 

The cartoonists interviewed are: Sabaaneh

Crazy Crab - China 

Kianoush Ramezani - Iran

Dario Castillejos - Mexico

Aristides Hernandez (Ares) - Cuba

Jeremy Nell - South Africa

Amr Okasha - Egypt

Eray Özbek - Turkey

Sergei Tunin - Russia

 


Egypt: Two Years After the Revolution

A new week of our project 360 Degrees. For three months, our cartoonists will be drawing cartoons based on your tweet on a certain theme. Check out the cartoons that were selected in the previous weeks here. This week's theme is about the revolution and the future:

Two years after the revolution… Where is Egypt going?

Derveniotis
'Awakenings' by Spiros Derveniotis

Tweet your perspective including the hashtag #360D, and your tweet will appear in our project newsroom, and could be the made into a cartoon by our professional cartoonists. Every week the two best cartoons will be published on our homepage, and by Radio Netherlands Worldwide, as well as various media partners in the Middle East. If the cartoon based on your tweet wins, you win a high quality art print of the cartoon, or a t-shirt with the winning cartoon.