The devil's summer camp

Thanks to the ever-nouvelle and culturally rich labyrinth that is Le Monde Diplomatique, among the most readable journals in the world. They have talked of the work of a variety of artists and visual commentators, who have at some point or other had a connection with the Diplo. I’ve selected just three to show how varied and interesting a visual contemporary account of our world can be.

“The source of inspiration for the comic was our interest in folklore and mythology, and our ongoing research in this area. The experiences of a winter holiday we went on to an organic farm on Salt Spring Iceland, influenced the comic as well: the moonlit nights, a flock of crows in the nearby woods and a herd of wild goats nearby gave rise to the kind of picture-book fantasy, the central point of our art and animations. During our walks in the lush rain forest, we discovered frequently huts that were built from branches and were sometimes enormous proportions. We imagined that this would be the devil’s summer camp, whom he visited when he was down in hell too hot and humid.”

Pat Shewchuk and Marek Colek working collectively under the name Tin Can Forest live in Toronto, temporarily elsewhere (wherever it suits them over time). They mainly work as animation film makers, but also as combined graphic designer, cartoonist and painter.

The graphic artist Henning Wagenbreth has found a good solution to handle the daily flood of words from messages. He cuts it simple – as in the comic book for Le Monde Diplomatique:

“The illustration was created with the automated system ‘Tobot’.  ” ‘Tobot’ cuts through the world of images and texts into tiny components and uses the fragments according to different rules together. The results are often absurd, paradoxical and strange, but so are the various forms of politics in anything after.”

Henning Wagenbreth attended the art academy in East Berlin Weissensee. Before the fall of the Berlin wall, he supported various citizens’ movements in the GDR with its posters. Since 1994 he is professor of illustration in the Visual Communication course at the Berlin University of the Arts. For his posters and book illustrations, he was awarded numerous prizes.

For Le Monde Diplomatique, the American artist Mark Marek has drawn a history of his favorite character ‘Father Dirty Harry’. “I was raised Catholic, so is the inspiration for Father Dirty Harry.” I wrote it originally for a Rolling Stones album ‘Dirty Work’, back in the 1980s. However, the legal department of CBS Records got cold feet. I have something else then devised. But I liked the character very much. Some comic strips appeared later in the satirical magazine National Lampoon, until its legal department got nervous.”

Mark Marek has worked many years as a cartoonist and illustrator. Meanwhile, he made animation and even ‘Dirty Harry Father’ has been animated.

Meanwhile, the latest Le Monde Diplomatique’s annual Atlas (2009) takes a thoroughly different world in mind. I’ve taken this from the Deutsch edition and this map is called ‘Die Welt von Morgen’ or The World of Tomorrow. Using as its backdrop the events of the deepest crisis in the world economy since 1945 (the end of World War Two), the BRIC countries (Brazil, Russia, India and China; actually the BASIC bloc since South Africa is included), are depicted as having shifted the geopolitical balance of power.

Le Monde Diplomatique, Atlas 2009 — Un monde à l’envers

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