Exhibit Review: 100 Years of Cartoons in El Universal: Mexico-United States As Seen By Mexican Cartoonists.

by Mike Rhode

100 Years of Cartoons in El Universal: Mexico-United States As Seen By Mexican Cartoonists. Augustin Sánchez González. Washington, DC: Mexican Cultural Institute, September 4 – October 30, 2019.  https://www.instituteofmexicodc.org/

El Universal was Mexico’s first modern newspaper, according to the exhibit, and on its first day of publication in October 1916, the first thing readers would see was group caricature of the men writing the new Mexican constitution. The exhibit commemorates both the 50^th anniversary of editor Juan Francisco Ealy Ortiz, and the 100^th anniversary of the newspaper.

Sánchez González organized the bilingual exhibit into five sections. The first deals with the establishment of the newspaper with its early cartoonists Andrés Audiffred and Hugo Thilgmann, as well as comic strips influenced by American strips. Two original strips by Audiffred and two caricatures by Thilgmann are highlights of this section, which also includes two sheets of the original comics section of the paper, as well as reproductions of front pages with cartoons. This section is supplemented with a video of the curator discussing the exhibit. 

The second section is on the influence of the American cartoon and comic strip. A reproduction of a newspaper page by Guillermo “Cas” Castillo of comic strip characters such as the Katzenjammer Kids and Mutt and Jeff with caricatures of Charlie Chaplin is displayed with large reproduction drawings by Juan Terrazas of Cas’ drawings of the characters. Terrazas is the director of the Museum of Caricature which was a major contributor of pieces to the exhibit. This room is by far the weakest part of the show. In spite of the curator’s comments about fame of the characters during the exhibit opening, the comic strips are too far removed from the current audience’s experience to be recognizable. Only students of the form recognize the 100-year old characters today. A local connection to the exhibit venue is seen in Rogelio Naranjo’s self-caricature of as a young dandy holding the Washington Post with a headline announcing his arrival in D.C., but the placement of the piece in this section is odd, and probably just is an artifact of the layout of the rooms.

The third part concentrates on caricature of American presidents, and the fourth on Uncle Sam and U.S. politics. These and the next section are by far the strongest part of the exhibit with original artwork by masters such as Antonio Arias Bernal, Ruis, Naranjo and Helioflores featured. It can be interesting and instructive to look at caricatures by artists who are not natives of the country, because they tend not to use the same tropes or exaggerated features as a local cartoonist might. Bernal’s drawing of Eisenhower is clearly recognizable, but Ruis’ cartoon of John F. Kennedy makes him look more like Superman’s Jimmy Olsen, and Efren’s caricature of Reagan does not seem accurate at all. Audiffred is still working for the newspaper at this time, and has a nice heavy ink line displayed in his drawing of Vice President Richard Nixon. Naranjo’s drawing of Jimmy Carter is firmly in the large-headed David Levine-influenced style, but with two men hanging on barbed wire behind Carter, is probably harsher than what would have appeared in an American publication. One of the pieces that resonates today is Helioflores drawing of Richard Nixon as a tree with multiple cuts in its trunk and titled, “¿Caerá? (Will it Fall?).” Although there are two good caricatures of Trump in this section, the Nixon drawing feels timely.

 

 The section on Uncle Sam’s best piece is “Cáscaras (Banana Peel Fall)” by Bernal, showing Uncle Sam slipping on a United Fruit Company banana peel. This section however, reveals the problem of the lack of dates in the captions as the viewer will not necessarily be aware of the events that prompted the cartoon. An exception of course is Altamrino’s odd untitled drawing of Uncle Sam missing two front teeth after September 11, 2001. Kemchs’ “Alambrada (Barbed Wire), a color print of Trump’s name as barbed wire is a clever piece even if it does not feature Uncle Sam.

 

The exhibit closes with a section on masters of Mexican cartooning. Without needing to hew closely to a theme, this section is the strongest part of the exhibit. Excellent examples by all the previously named cartoonists are featured along with others by Omar, PIT, Carilla, and Dzib. 

Overall the exhibit is an interesting and educational introduction to one particular niche in Mexican cartooning. Additional photographs can be seen at https://flic.kr/s/aHsmGJtK1B. The exhibition is open Monday – Saturday on 16^th St NW, and includes a free booklet. The historic mansion that holds the exhibit is available for a guided tour as well, and features striking murals by Roberto Cueva del Río of Mexican history up the three levels of the main staircase. I believe there is an accompanying book and will provide additional details if I can confirm that.

(This review was written for the International Journal of Comic Art 21:2, but this version appears on both the IJOCA and ComicsDC websites on September 6, 2019, while the exhibit is still open for viewing.)

100 Years of Cartoons in El Universal exhibit opened last night (corrected)

100 Years of Cartoons in El Universal, an exhibit of political cartoons opened at the Mexican Cultural Institute in Washington, DC last night, featuring remarks by Ambassador Martha Bárcena, El Universal newspaper editorial director David Aponte, and curator Augustin Sanchez Gonzalez.

(correction: we had earlier mis-identified Mr. Aponte and apologize for the error)




My pictures are at https://www.flickr.com/photos/42072348@N00/albums/72157710704426503

Regarding the photos of the remarks, the podium was flanked by the Mexican and American flags. Due to the angle I was standing at, I was only able to get the American flag in my shots.

The website description is

 EXHIBIT: 100 YEARS OF CARTOON IN EL UNIVERSAL

September 4 - October 30, 2019 at the Mexican Cultural Institute 

El Universal newspaper editorial director David Aponte

The Mexican Cultural Institute is proud to announce its newest exhibit, 100 Years of Cartoons in El Universal: Mexico - United States as Seen by Mexican Cartoonists, taking place from September 4 through October 30, 2019. The exhibit collects a brief sample of the thousands of cartoons published in 100 years in the widely known newspaper, El Universal, where almost all Mexican cartoonists of the 20th century have traveled through. This exhibit reads as a nodal part of the history of the cartoon in Mexico and includes a brief representation of the artists who traced and portrayed the history of the country. The pages of El Universal have shown the critical work, with aesthetic greatness, by artists such as Andrés Audiffred, Eduardo del Río Rius, Helioflores and Rogelio Naranjo, who have all shaped Mexican national events with art and humor.

The exhibition consists of seventy pieces; sixty-two of them orginal and of great value. Most came from the Museum of the Cartoon of Mexico City, from the authors themselves, and from private collectors. The works follow three themes: the American cartoon, the vision of the cartoonists around Uncle Sam and their vision around the American presidents. 100 Years of Cartoons in El Universal is complemented with the first cartoonists of El Universal and concludes with the great masters of the Mexican cartoon.

Ambassador Martha Bárcena

Right to left: Ambassador Martha Bárcena, El Universal newspaper editorial director David Aponte, and curator Augustin Sanchez Gonzalez.

curator Augustin Sanchez Gonzalez.

Mexican cartoonist obit in today's Post

Gabriel Vargas' obituary ran online a few days ago, but today it is in the hard copy - Mexico's 'Familia Burron' cartoonist dies at 95
The Associated Press
Wednesday, May 26, 2010; 6:20 AM

Mexican editorial cartoonist on one of those Post blogs you've never heard of

Amar C. Bakshi on February 19th interviewed Francisco "Paco" Calderon for "Mexico Wages Cartoon Wars Over U.S." There's video on the site as well.

Miguel Covarrubias portraits on display this fall.

The great Mexican caricaturist has material - "portraits of and by" - borrowed from the National Portrait Gallery in the exhibit "Mexican Treasures of the Smithsonian" in the underground Ripley Center from September 4 - November 11.


Last year's exhibit of his work was well worth seeing. Here's the review I wrote for the International Journal of Comic Art 8:2:

Miguel Covarrubias: Mexican Genius in the United States. Washington, DC: Cultural Institute of Mexico, May 3-July 7, 2006.

Covarrubias, while little remembered today, was a giant in magazine illustration and caricature from the 1920s though the 1940s. According to the promotional material for the exhibit, he illustrated for Vanity Fair, Vogue, The New Yorker, Fortune, Life and Time while also illustrating over twenty books. Surprisingly, he also did pioneering cultural anthropology research when he visited Bali with his wife in the 1930s.

This exhibit also consists of two smaller shows. On the ground level of the building, an aging mansion, sketches and studies from the Universidad de las Américas were displayed in a set of unadorned side galleries off the lobby. The fifty-two sketches appeared to be studies for more complete work. They were mostly on cheap newsprint paper, and the identity of the subject was frequently lost except for the famous like Marlene Dietrich, D.H. Lawrence, Joe Louis, Walt Disney, and Benny Goodman. The sketches showed Covarrubias working with a quick, forceful stroke, and "Unknown Character" in the first room demonstrated that Edward Sorel must have been familiar with his work. In the final room of the galleries, two or three films were supposed to be showing, but none were. The press release listed two films by José G. Benítez Wall, A Mexican in New York (1997) and Miguel Covarrubias 1904-1957 (1996) and the wall text listed a third, A Master Artist's Trade (1997).

Returning to the lobby, the visitor (of which I was the only one) could examine exhibit cases with published versions of some of his book and magazine work. Books he illustrated included non-fiction and non-cartoon works such as The Aztecs: People of the Sun. He wrote and illustrated Mexico South: The Isthmus of Tehuantepec (Knopf 1967) and drew striking maps and Olmec heads for it. In Fine Art Color Prints (Chicago: Peoples Book Club, 1945), Covarrubias contributed a very well done and very complex "Map of America" showing the distribution of natural resources. The exhibit cases also included Vanity Fair from June 1933 showing one of his series of Impossible Interviews -- "#18 Herr Adolf Hitler and Huey S. 'Hooey' Long versus Josef Stalin and Benito Mussolini." These Impossible Interviews were a major component of the second part of the exhibit, which was up four flights of red, fraying but thickly carpeted stairs, lined by mural scenes painted by Cueva del Rio from 1934-1941.

The fourth floor held the exhibit Miguel Covarrubias: Caricaturista, curated in 2004 by Kathryne B. Tovo for Humanities Texas with the University of Texas' Ransom Humanities Research Center. It was not readily apparent if the original show consisted of all reproductions, but the traveling version did. Given the quality of Covarrubias' artwork, the use of reproductions was a considerable disappointment, especially since the Ransom Center appears to have had access to the original works. In spite of that, this exhibit was a good representation of the breadth of his career, and was very well-labeled with biographical information on his subjects including scientists and explorers like William Beebe and Richard E. Byrd.

The label for the Impossible Interview in Vanity Fair of December 1931 succinctly explained the series rationale:

This regular feature paired two people who could not meet in real life in an imaginary conversation. Featuring such ill-matched celebrity pairs as a birth control advocate with the mother of quintuplets, a speakeasy hostess with the president of the Women's Christian Temperance Union, or a sultry Marlene Dietrich with moralist Senator Smith Brookhart, each interview offered rich potential for comic conversation and visual contrasts -- with the less respectable figure often achieving a slight edge.

Sorel's debt to Covarrubias can again be seen in his recent similar series for the Atlantic Monthly collected as First Encounters: A Book of Memorable Meetings (Knopf, 1994). The time is overdue for a collection of these original Interviews.

These rooms were filled interesting illustrations. Two especially worth noting were a skillful parody of Rockwell Kent that Covarrubias did in Kent's style in 1932, and an illustration of Walt Disney in Noah's Ark with all of his characters, done for Vogue in 1937. The Disney caricature was the finished version of the sketch seen on the first floor, and the failure to display the two side-by-side highlighted a disappointment of this exhibit. Overall, the show should have been better, but for those with little knowledge of Covarrubias' long and varied career, it was an adequate introduction to his work.