The art of oversubsulation - anatomy of a successful caricature

Like the press, satire is one of the corrective forces that serve in democracies to develop society. Satire is also closely related to the press - where the media make it too easy, prices the idle fields. Democratic societies need satire; Image satire is a form of satire that reaches a lot of people, but the "anatomy" of which is as complicated as the entire society is:

When did a cartoon succeed?

Like every satire, the caricature has succeeded when it draws the viewer aware of a social grievance, stimulates thinking about undesirable development, places survived conventions in the framework of reason and thus makes their whole absurdity visible.

Since such grievances, undesirable developments, (self-) harmful habits can only be changed by working many people, an image satire always wants to achieve as many people as possible-it can and should also pursue this purpose because serious caricature is serious about missing tones in human coexistence.

Caricaturists work in the core and core of society - a caricature is successful if it fulfills its purpose to touch the people in this society and to change “old certainties”.

A successful cartoon

• Contains a statement on a socially relevant topic,
• which emphasizes a widely unknown, collectively ignored/repressed side of this topic for a good reason,
• With an exaggerated, humorous drawing, attracting the attention of many viewers,
• which are stimulated by the statement of the image to think.

For most people, a picture satire always particularly successful if it not only reveals grievances, but also presents the viewer elimination of these grievances.

So simple, so difficult, here are a few stations of development as a cartoonist :

The basis: learn to draw

The first prerequisite for a satire picture is well received is the visual language .

Because the picture transports a statement with the satirical drawing, which is usually not about banalities.
If this statement is to reach as many people as possible and draw attention, the picture should be easy to understand.

The cartoonist should therefore master the visual language , know how he expresses what and what he expresses how.

can be recognized by the eyebrows and the position of the upper eyelid A broken person expresses his misery in his entire physical attitude; Only a nuance distinguishes the friendly radiant smile of the confident , self -conscientious grin of the egoist. An impending, ominous mood can arise from dark hatching or deep clouds; The happiness hovers and silly hits caprioles.

All very difficult sign work , if a cartoonist , you have to learn to draw. Since (image) satire always refers to the coexistence of people, learn at least anatomical and facial mimic drawing-if you to exceed , it must be able to portray very precisely.

No special character knowledge for the actual "overlooking" - the respective features are simply thicker, larger, stronger or otherwise emphasized. It is also essential for the satirical drawing, not this simple emphasis, but the decision as to which details are highlighted - and this is part of the content that is addressed in the next paragraph.

A good cartoonist continues to know how to conjure up feelings with hatching and accent moods; And he has explored all the forms of expression of drawing to develop his own style. If you do not want to learn the high art of drawing caricatures for a long time in order to make a humorous oversubscribed portrait of good friends, family members or colleagues, you can also have a cartoon drawing . Only the sending of a photo as a template is necessary.

A very good cartoonist continues to develop this style, up to new forms of expression, for which satirical drawings were not yet known ( see Banksy ) .

Face - cartoon - similarity | Learn to draw very simply

In subsequent video tutorial for beginners, Sebastian von Artistravel shows how to recognize the most striking features in a face and reflect in a cartoon. He explains how to make it particularly similar to the original.

The content: a statement that takes the position

Since (image) satire deals with the difficulties that the coexistence of people brings with it, the artist must comment on what difficulties he sees; And ideally also what to do about it.

The prerequisite for this is that he can notify these difficulties, describe aptly and can implement image composition

The head is much more in demand than the pen, and this head needs knowledge from which it can draw: human knowledge and knowledge of the known motives for human action (a study of psychology would certainly not be poor preparation for a caricaturist ), knowledge of biology and ecology and history and history, to recognize the wrong ways of society, and knowledge of future research to show ways out.

Therefore, young draftsmen, who naturally lack the overview for the "great caricatures of contemporary history", should rather focus on details. In this way you can practice closely observing, learn to draw caricatures and train your critical spirit because a critical detail always includes a critical detail:

Anyone who as a teen  consumer naive  influencer with the pointed pencil does not need big character skills because they all look very similar. According to the influencers , the mature, more voice -oriented  pen leader takes the advertising, a wide field of bullshit to idle to stupid.

More knowledge and a first idea for relationships leads to the environmental, society , health damage to the consumer craze . At some point, the now highly comic  caricaturist arrives among the large corporations, all the regions steal the groundwater, and the politicians who cover such basic and human rights violations .

The last sentences describe the practical "training" of a cartoonist quite well, until the royal discipline of "political caricature", a stinging means of social parasites, stupidity and ignorance.