We spent the weekend in Conversano, a town in southern Italy that hosts Lector in Fabula, an annual European cultural festival. Leading up to the festival, Librexpression, an organization dedicated to cartoons and freedom of speech, organized a cartoon contest with the theme power and information in the digital age. First prize was awarded to Nikola Listes from Croatia, and we're proud that second and third prize went to two of our members, Emanuele Del Rosso and Fadi Abou Hassan respectively.

In addition to the award ceremony, the festival also featured a cartoon exhibition of the best cartoons sent in for this exhibition and a panel discussing last year's news through satire, featuring Marco De Angelis from Italy, Tjeerd Royaards from the Netherlands and Doaa Eladl from Egypt.

(Photo by Francesco Paolo Gassi)

The winning cartoons

1st prize - Nikola Listes

2nd prize - Emanuele Del Rosso

3rd prize - Fadi Abou Hassan

Visit the website of Librexpression to see the 15 best cartoons, as selected by the jury. Here are some additional photos of the festival:

Panel discussion with Doaa Eladl, Marco De Angelis and Tjeerd Royaards. Photo by Mimmo Donghia.

Cartoon exhibition. Photo by Antonio Giancaspro.

The award ceremony.

Fadi Abou Hassan from Norway.

Doaa Eladl from Egypt. Photo by Mattia Ramunni.