There was no shortage of big world events this year for our cartoonists to respond to, which is reflected in the record number of cartoons that were uploaded to Cartoon Movement: over 10,000! And as usual, we've also run a number of cartoon-related projects. Here are some of our highlights this year:

We didn't publish a ton of comics journalism in 2022 (we are currently working on a new comic in partnership with the University of British Colombia), but if you've missed it, do check out the one we did publish: Hustling Day in Silicon Savannah. Made in cooperation with LSE, and drawn by renowned Kenyan artist Maddo, the comic focuses on the gig economy in and around Nairobi, We even made a short trailer for it!

May 3 (World Press Freedom) is always an important day for cartoonists. This year, we organized an exhibition together with the Dutch Ministry of Foreign Affairs in the of The Hague City Hall. Just Speak! featured cartoons that visualize the major challenges that face us in the 21st century.

Over the summer, we ran a project for Oxfam International about the growing inequality in the world. This cartoon by Luc Vernimmen was one of those selected to be used in an awareness campaign. You can see all the cartoons that were submitted on our project page.

Together with media museum Sound and Vision The Hague and Dutch press agency ANP, we organized an exhibition of international press photos and editorial cartoons, chronicling the first 100 days of the invasion of Ukraine. Framing the War portrayed the first hundred days of the war through the lens of international news photographers and through the pen of international cartoonists.

In the fall, we did a project together with the University of East Anglia, focusing on humanitarian journalists, an influential group of journalists defying conventional approaches to covering humanitarian crises. The cartoon below is by Miguel Morales Madrigal; check out all the cartoons that were submitted on the project page.

For our research project, Cartoons in Court, we organized an event at the Central University in Budapest, inviting renowned Hungarian cartoonist Gábor Pápai to come and talk about the difficult circumstances for political cartoonist in Hungary under the increasingly oppressive regime of Victor Orbán.

If you're interested in reading more about what we've done in 2022, you can check out our editorials. And be sure to check out our top 10 cartoons of 2022.

See you next year!

The end of the year is fast approaching, so it’s time for our selection of the best cartoons of 2022. December 15 is an extra special day for us, as Cartoon Movement went live on this date in 2010, making us 12 years old today! We hope to bring you great international cartoons for many years to come!

In 2022, a whopping 10,080 cartoons were uploaded to Cartoon Movement. It is beyond difficult to select 10 cartoons from this immense pool of satire. It also means a lot of subjects were left out, like the resignation of Boris Johnson (and then Liz Truss), the death of Queen Elizabeth and the US midterms, to name just a few.

The tradition selection of 10 cartoons is based on what did well with our audience, what we think were the most important subjects of the year that must be included and which ones we as editors liked a lot. It's far from objective, but we hope you enjoy them nonetheless!

Equal rights

This cartoon by Cuban cartoonist Raimundo Llerena Ferrer shows how inequality starts at birth.

I come in peace

This cartoon by Martin Chren was made the day following Putin's invasion of Ukraine, capturing perfectly the gap between Putin's rhetoric and his actions.

Save Ukraine

This cartoon by Khalid Cherradi addresses a point that many cartoonists made when commenting on the invasion of Ukraine. If African refugees, the people in conflict-torn countries like Syria or Yemen, or the people living in Gaza got even half of the attention that Ukraine got in 2022, they would be a lot better off.

Russian insomnia

We can't predict the future, but the war in Ukraine could well be known as Putin's folly in future history books. Many cartoonists have drawn this folly, but this cartoon by Dutch cartoonist Hajo commenting on Sweden and Finland joining NATO perfectly visualizes how we imagine Putin has often felt since he launched his invasion.

Dinner party

With corona in the past, 2022 was also the year that saw the return of climate and environmental summit, like COP27 about the climate crisis and COP25 about biodiversity, jetting in world leaders from across the globe to meet in a luxurious setting and discuss the demise of the planet. Cartoon by Luc Vernimmen.

Gun culture

2022 saw it's fair share of mass shootings in the US. Awantha Artigala drew a line between foreign policy and domestic violence.

Abortion rights aborted

A rather visceral cartoon by Vasco Gargalo (who often manages to make our selection of best cartoons), commenting on the U.S. Supreme Court ruling overturning Roe v. Wade.

Washing machine 

Obviously we couldn't have a top 10 without at least one cartoon about the World Cup in Qatar. This one by Daniel Garcia was the most popular.

Under new management

And what will become of Twitter in 2023? Cartoon by Bahram Arjmandnia.

Iran protests

Another topic that had to be included is the uprising in Iran following the death of Mahsa Amini. Cartoon by Jawad Morad.

With that striking visual we come to an end of our top 10 for this year. Want to seee more? Take a look at the cartoons we selected in 2021 and 2020. Our just go to our main website.

We are proud to give a platform to Belarus Comics, an underground collective of comic artists from Belarus, forced to work in deep secrecy because of the oppressive regime of dictator Alexander Lukashenko.

Barro Abdoul Kader is a cartoonist from Burkina Faso in West Africa. He shares his perspectives on the news through cartoons published on social networks and in the press.

Behrang Jeddi is a cartoonist, illustrator and animation artist from Iran. He has been working as a political cartoonist since 2010, for various publications in Iran. Follow him on Instagram to see more of his work.

Cartoon by Gatis Sluka

A sad announcement from the World Press Cartoon this week, as their main funder has pulled out, making the 2023 edition of the award highly uncertain. This is the second time in recent history that the WPC has had to scurry to find new funding to continue its operations.

In 2021, I wrote an editorial about why awards for editorial cartoons matter. But in these time we live in, it seems not many other people see the need to celebrate the value of political satire. Earlier this year, the Pulitzer did away the 'Editorial Cartoon' category, renaming it 'Illustrated Reporting and Commentary'. The Association of American Editorial Cartoonists complained, but I am not sure they ever received a response, nor do I believe the Pulitzer Board will reverse its decision any time soon. The UN Political Cartoon Award died in its sleep a few years ago. One glimmer of light is the launch of European Cartoon Award by the European Press Prize a couple of years ago, but its future is far from secure (which I will get back to a little later on in this editorial).

Should we just accept that (international) awards for editorial cartoons are more and more rare? Or is there a way to increase this number, or at least safeguard the existing ones? Those who've read some of my editorials know I consider political cartooning to be a form of journalism. In my opinion, cartoonists should always be part of the journalistic association or union in their country. They should have a press card. First of all for their safety, but also for how their work is seen and valued. And maybe we should extend this to the way cartoons are awarded.

A simple Google search shows that there's a multitude of awards for journalism. I would argue that we need to integrate political cartoon awards with journalistic awards as much as possible. Although the Pulitzers present a problematic example right now (for the reason given above), the basic idea of having  or political cartoons be a category in a journalistic award is a sound one, for two reasons. One, it would give more value to the political cartoon, as a vital part of journalism. Second, it would present a far more secure situation in terms of funding and continuity. It's easier to defund an award just for cartoons than it is to defund a broad journalistic award.

If we, as cartoonists and organizers of cartooning awards, were to decide this is the right direction, there is still a long way to go. Journalists and journalistic award organizers often do not consider cartoonists to be true journalists. This is probably the reason the European Cartoon Award is separate from the general European Press Prizes. It also makes it a lot easier to discontinue or defund the ECA, as this will not impact the other EPP in any way. On the other side of the spectrum, there are also some cartoon awards have a reputation and legacy that they're not willing to give up by joining a more general journalistic award.

This is, for instance, the case for the Dutch cartoon award (the Inktspotprijs); the Dutch Association of Journalists would be more than happy to make this award part of their annual journalist awards, but the organizers of the Inktspotprijs and cartoonists fear this will mean losing the unique character of the Inktspotprijs. That might be true. But I still believe that, in the long run, editorial cartoonists will be better off joining journalists. Both in general and specifically when it comes to awards.

Tjeerd Royaards
Cartoon Movement editor