The Economist’s KAL gives his take on satire and the future of the political cartoon
IF YOU READ THE ECONOMIST, you know the satire of political cartoonist KAL, although you’ve never seen a credit or his signature. “It’s not that they’re ashamed of me,” says KAL, real name Kevin Kallaugher, 53. “It’s just a tradition – that nothing in the Economist is attributed.”
Far from being ashamed, the magazine has run KAL cartoons inside – and on at least 100 covers – since 1978. You probably know his Margaret Thatcher, his Reagan and all of his Bushes, from cartoons that can be silly, poignant or stinging. “I try to vary it up,” he says. “Every time you open the magazine, you wonder, ‘Will it be serious? Will it be funny?’ After all, we’ve had this relationship for 30 years. I don’t want people getting bored.”
KAL talked to power editor Anthony Spaeth in Hong Kong about satire, the future of cartooning, the US election and how John McCain has gotten really old really fast.
What is a political cartoonist?
I look on myself as a journalist first, a satirist second and an artist third. In many ways, my career has been the pursuit of caricature. I believe that caricature is the most potent form of satire to the visual artist.
What about cartoons that can be considered vicious?
Viciousness is a necessity of satire. Satire is all about observing a situation and criticizing with humor – to an end. There’s soft satire, there’s hard satire. I’m not against viciousness in satire.
To me, the most important thing is your putting across a point of view. There’s a big difference between topical humor and satire. Topical humor is all about making a laugh for a laugh’s sake. Satire is about making a point – and using humor as a vehicle for that point.
Like myself, you graduated from an American university in 1977. I think you’ll recognize this lyric from David Bowie’s “Young Americans”: “Do you remember your President Nixon?”
Nixon was the golden era of modern political cartoons. As Woodward and Bernstein fostered a generation of journalists, cartoonists in the Nixon era fostered a generation of political cartoonists.
In the last US presidential election, satirists were criticized for having become too powerful, especially those on television.
There was academic research a while ago, which got a lot of ink, on the theme that satire was ruining democracy. Young people were getting their news from satirists. The research turned out to be not that good. I think some of this is rubbish. The Daily Show and The Colbert Report don’t aspire to replace the news. They’re filtering the news. There’s so much news out there. People need such filters.
The great thing about being a cartoonist is that we help formulate in the public’s mind the perception of the candidate. This election has been a special one: we had 200 candidates running for president. The cartoonists became part of the discussion of all these candidates.
I always say you can judge the maturity of a democracy by the amount of satire it can endure. After 9/11, satire was feeling the heat: there wasn’t an appetite. These days, partly because of the election, there is an appetite.
Let’s talk about this campaign. How have the portrayals of Barack Obama changed through the months?
He is smiling less and less in the cartoons. In fact, when he is not smiling it is harder to capture a strong likeness, as he looks less animated and less striking.
And what about McCain? He’s gotten a rougher ride, correct?
Rougher ride? I don’t know … he had it easy for years because he was deemed to be an honest and straightforward politician who didn’t indulge in the silly pandering games of Washington. Now that he has become the panderer-in-chief, he’s getting more abuse from the pundits, and rightfully so. He’s getting older by the minute in cartoons. Earlier he was in the Jurassic period. Now he’s in the Triassic period.
What about Sarah Palin? Was she a gift to cartoonists or what?
The only problem about Sarah Palin from a cartoonist’s perspective is that we cannot capture her brassy “Wilderness Gal” voice. Win or lose, be prepared for her hockey mom shtick to be ringing in our collective ears for many years to come.
Lastly, Hilary. I’ve noticed in both your cartoons and your animations you draw her as an almost unearthly creature, with kind of scary, bulging eyes.
Yes … I guess kind of alien. But in some way she is alien to most Americans. There are many that respect her intelligence, drive, perseverance and compassion. But I don’t think most people can identify with her. She is unlike anybody around. That is why Sarah Palin has such an appeal to some Americans (not me!) because people know women like her. She seems of this world. Hillary is otherworldly!
And how do you think the cartoonists have done, by and large, in portraying George W Bush?
The satirists have been pretty brutal on him. It has just taken time for the public to catch up. We were way ahead.
Which was the best election for you as a satirist?
Without a doubt 2000. Over my career, I’ve had lots of readers send in ideas. In the four weeks of the 2000 recount, I got more letters and faxes than I received in the rest of my 30 years combined. People felt impatient, frustrated, and the idiocy was absolutely naked to all of us as to how democracy had let us down.
For many people, the cartoonist projects the voice of the common people to the powers that be. He’s the class clown.
The newspaper industry in the US is going through an existential crisis thanks to the Internet and jobs are disappearing. How is this affecting the political cartoonists?
In many ways, the political cartoonists have been the canaries in the coalmine – and the coalmines are out of oxygen. With all the cutbacks in the newspaper industry, the cartoonists have been the first to go, which surprised a lot of people. In the US, we’ve probably gone from 200 cartoonists 20 years ago to 110 now – we’ve been cut in half in that time. I’ve been a daily cartoonist for the Baltimore Sun since 1989, and in 2006 they gave me a buy-out offer and terminated my position. Just that year I was given the cartoonist of the year award, the Thomas Nast prize.
So what to do now?
Political cartoons for centuries have evolved in the print media. In the past, they were bound to newspapers, but that’s all over now. The problem is that when you move to the Internet, the static image doesn’t bode well. Animation is the way to go, but animation is labor intensive and time consuming, while politics turn on a dime. Luckily, we have software now, and full-body motion capture, and I’m now making 3D animated cartoons. I’m sort of leading the pack on how to handle this. If Thomas Nast or Daumier were practicing today, what would they be doing? They’d be doing 3D.
Full-body motion capture? The same technology as in The Lord of the Rings?
That’s right.
And you’re doing your own Gollum?
More like Obama and McCain and Hillary. With this technology, you are a virtual puppeteer.
What about the voices?
I hire actors, except for George W Bush. That voice I do myself.
Give us your best sound bite.
Sure: “75 percent of Americans disapprove of my presidency … but the other 60 percent think I’m doin’ just fine!”
KAL’s 2D and animated 3D cartoons can be seen at
www.kaltoons.com
