Facing the ClimateSwedish and international cartoonists take an amusing and alarming look at the climate

© The Swedish Institute and participating artists

ISBN 978-91-86995-73-7

Cover illustration “World Sea” by Love Antell

English translation by Stephen Croall

Graphic Design by Igor Isaksson/Mu AB

Paper: 150 g Arctic Volume

Printed by Exakta Print AB, Malmö, Sweden, 2016

Facing the ClimateSwedish and international cartoonists take an amusing and alarming look at the climate

5

We all recognise the images: a polar bear

pacing anxiously on its shrinking ice floe in

the Arctic; a Haitian child standing alone in

the remains of the family home after the

earthquake; neighbours fleeing over each

other’s rooftops to escape rapidly rising

floodwaters in the Balkans. The threats to

our c limate come in many shapes and forms.

Without doubt, ending climate change is one

of the greatest challenges of our time. “We are

the first generation that can end poverty – and

the last generation to tackle climate change

before it is too late.” The words of UN Secre-

tary-General Ban Ki-moon may sound ominous,

but to me they also speak of optimism – of

belief in a future that is sustainable in the

long term, for both people and planet.

The year 2015 was one of hope. It was the

year that world leaders gathered for a

UN summit in New York to lay down new

Global Development Goals. The summit was

successful, and the plan they adopted is

Agenda 2030. Heads of state and government

from across the globe have now agreed to join

together in leading the world towards a fairer

and more sustainable future. Last year also

brought the UN climate summit in Paris, which

sought to establish a just and wide-ranging

international climate agreement. Again, under

the influence of great expectations from the

citizens of the world, the parties managed to

agree. There is now a plan in place for reducing

climate emissions in all corners of the world.

Sweden has long pressed for ambitious

development goals and bold action on the

climate and we are of course inspired by both

Agenda 2030 and the new climate agreement.

The Swedish Institute (SI) focuses its activ-

ities on areas where Sweden and Swedish

skills, experiences and values are relevant

and sought-after. In 2010, to help illustrate

Sweden’s deep commitment to our environ -

ment and the climate, SI launched the ex-

hibition Facing the Climate, in cooperation

with Swedish embassies and local partners.

Since then, the exhibition has been seen by

more than 280,000 visitors across the world.

In it, five Swedish cartoonists and a range

of international colleagues provide their

interpretations of the climate crisis, with the

aid of humour and satire. The result makes us

smile, but also reflect on the many worrying

trends of today.

This project has shown the advantage of

using culture – and humour – as a means of

approaching difficult and contentious issues.

Through the exhibition and the workshops,

and the talks that have accompanied it, we

are proud to have contributed to important

discussions about sustainable development

and the survival of our planet.

With this publication, SI wishes to share

the rich array of images that the exhibition

has generated and make them more widely

accessible. At the same time we hope that

the book – like the exhibition – will provoke

further thoughts and reflection about one of

the truly crucial issues of our time.

Annika Rembe

Director-General, Swedish Institute

Foreword

“Everybody complains about

the weather, but nobody does

anything about it.”

“Every cloud has a silver lining”, as the say-

ing goes. The United Nations climate sum-

mit in Copenhagen in 2009 (COP 15) ended

in disappointment. Hopes of achieving an

international agreement that would follow

on from the Kyoto Agreement were dashed.

But an exhibition staged in connection with

the meeting proved a success.

An exhibition featuring cartoonists from

Denmark, Norway and Sweden, organised by

the Museum of Danish Cartoon Art – ‘The Black

Diamond’ – spawned a project that has since

gone on tour and steadily grown, like a grain

of sand in a clam. By now, 115 cartoonists

from five continents have taken part in Facing

the Climate and the exhibition has been seen

by an estimated 280,000 people. Everywhere it

goes it has been accompanied by talks, debates

and workshops that have attracted both

established and aspiring cartoonists. Facing

the Climate has thereby acted as a catalyst

for discussions about the climate issue and

freedom of expression.

The five illustrators who represented Sweden

in Copenhagen were a motley crew, different

in age, in artistic style and in their political

thinking. Some had several decades’ ex pe rience,

while others were new to the scene. I’m con-

vinced that the success of the venture is partly

due to the group’s composition. This randomly

created team has proved both strong and

persevering. Another reason for the success of

Facing the Climate is the impressive settings

in which it has been shown, whether in

prestigious libraries or the reception rooms

of Swedish embassies – another legacy from

Copenhagen.

The whole thing started when the grand

old man of Swedish political cartoons, Riber

H ansson, was invited by the curator of the

C openhagen exhibition to suggest suitable

Swedish exhibitors. He proposed Love Antell,

freshly graduated from the University College

of Arts, Crafts and Design (Konstfack) in

Stockholm, and Karin Sunvisson, a student

at École des Arts Décoratifs in Paris, and also

Helena Lindholm and Magnus Bard.

Some years earlier, in 2007, Riber Hansson

and the latter two had experienced an in-

spiring but disconcerting encounter with

Russian-speaking colleagues in the Russian

Baltic Sea city of Kaliningrad. Five well-known

Russian cartoonists had taken part, and five

Swedes.

Helena Lindholm later wrote an account of

that episode in the art and design journal

Tecknaren (No. 6/2007), describing amongst

other topics a round-table discussion. “Round

the table we all agreed that it’s what the

reader sees and not what the artist draws that

is the important thing. An illustration can be

interpreted in as many different ways as there

are readers, and what each person possesses

in the way of feelings and experience, opinions

and convictions determines how they react to

the picture they’re looking at.”

Her article makes clear that the participants

were hoping for a continuation of the project

embracing further countries around the

Baltic Sea, and possibly dealing with the

environment. It never transpired, however.

One reason could be that such an event

would be difficult to manage. That, at least,

is my own conclusion, given the number of

people and institutions involved. Helena Lind-

holm suggests another possible explanation

that has its roots in Russian policy. People who

shaped public opinion in Russia had just begun

using the Internet and the country’s official

censors were jumpy. Elections were round the

corner and it was not a time to take risks. Since

then, the political climate has hardened – and

not only in Russia. Facing the Climate began

touring before Europe had acknowledged the

global refugee crisis, before civil war broke out

in Syria and before the conflict in Ukraine.

The theme in Kaliningrad was how Swedes

view Russians and vice versa – a more

conventional subject for cartoons than the

climate and the environment. Prejudices,

‘mental shortcuts’, have always been a basic

ingredient in humorous drawings. To me,

political illustration represents a subcategory

7

Introduction

of the cartoon genre. The message may be

serious but it must always be put across

humorously. Many ‘apolitical cartoons’ can

in fact be interpreted politically.

Opinions differ as to when and where

cartoons first appeared. Western historians

frequently invoke a Roman wall inscription

from the 4th century AD showing a crucified

donkey. The caption below the drawing reads:

“Alexamenos worships (his) God”. There were

no mass media in those days, the artist couldn’t

expect his drawing to go viral, but I like this

example since it suggests a bottom-up form

of expression. The inscription was found in

a building that had been used as a school.

One suspects that the target may have been

a teacher.

Caricature is an important element in

p olitical cartoons, and so common that the

two terms are sometimes used synonymously.

In The Art of Controversy – Political Cartoons

and their Enduring Power, published in 2013

after the Danish Muhammad cartoons but

before the attack on Charlie Hebdo, editor

and journalist Victor Navasky compares the

genre to parody. This is a relevant comparison.

A parody may indeed be good-natured or cruel,

sophisticated or unrefined, banal or intelligent.

The same applies to political cartoons.

In both cases it’s the perspective that is

crucial.

The political cartoon genre, as we know it,

largely dates back to the emergence of the

liberal press in Western Europe. As a rule,

newspapers had an illustration on the front

cover. In those days, the early 19th century,

the publishers’ intention was to give them-

selves greater room for manoeuvre. It was

in this space that democracy took its first,

faltering steps. The cartoonists’ self-image as

frontline champions of freedom of expression

stems from this period. Their unique skills gave

them a special position in the various editorial

offices. Their role could be compared to the

one that court jesters are claimed to have had

in the Middle Ages – to say that which may not

be said.

It would be wrong to assume that the

political cartoons of the early 19th century

were published as a means of communicat-

ing with illiterates and the ignorant. In the

European cities where there was advancement,

literacy was widespread and the newspapers’

target group was informed and interested in

social development (perhaps more so than

today!).

The cartoons lent each newspaper its

special profile and the cartoonists were feared

by those in power. The competitive advantage

of such pictures is to be found at the abstract

level. We interpret images spontaneously

and intuitively, more or less involuntarily, as

abstractions of non-verbal communication.

The newspapers of the day were concerned

more with shaping opinion than with reporting

news. The texts and their authors dominated

but the cartoons and the cartoonists were at

the forefront. The authorities feared them.

Napoleon is said to have commented that the

British graphic satirist James Gillray caused

him more damage than any army.

Power hunger and vanity are interrelated.

(All caricaturists know that power-holders

tend to collect pictures of themselves.)

Charles Philipon, who drew the French king’s

face as a pear, was prosecuted by the French

state on six occasions, jailed for a year and

fined very heavily. But he was allowed to

live. Paradoxically, it has almost always been

the case that in order to say that which is

forbidden you must enjoy sanction – and

protection – from the highest echelons of

power.

In recent times, it has become increasingly

difficult to determine where supreme power

lies. Religious and ideological leaders don’t

care about national borders. A Swedish artist

has had a fatwa called down on his head

because of a cartoon. His life is threatened

and he is guarded by Swedish police round the

clock. It is hard to explain how a single drawing

can prompt a death sentence. To do so, we

must go way back in time.

Up until the present age, a hallmark of

power was the ownership of – and the means

to reproduce – images. Images are accorded

magical qualities in all cultures. To draw or

reproduce is to appropriate or acquire. It is

immodest, self-asserting. The scriptures of

the western monotheistic religions, the

Tanakh (Old Testament, Torah) expressly

forbade the use of images. This prohibition

was first lifted in Christian Europe. It may

seem strange that the magical significance

attributed to images has not been eliminated

in today’s globalised and digitised society, but

such is indeed the case.

8

After an initial run in Iceland, the Facing the

Climate concept was tested in full in the

autumn of 2010, with Swedish and local

contributors, in the Serbian capital of Belgrade.

There, the GRAD culture centre selected the

local cartoonists and curated the exhibition. The

concept is simple but if it is to work well there

has to be a conscious effort at the local level.

Swedish embassies that are interested

in the exhibition undertake to find local

cartoonists who can take part and prepare

a programme activity. The Swedish Institute

provides a digital toolkit with pictures, rules

and templates – a design manual, perhaps –

and offers guidance on the process. In many

countries, cartoonists are not organised.

Where this is the case, other networks need to

be used. In Vietnam, where Facing the Climate

was exhibited in the autumn of 2015, there is

no tradition of political illustration. There, the

embassy worked with a small private gallery.

This is how Camilla Bjelkås from the Hanoi

embassy describes events: “We made clear in

our discussions with the Manzi Art Space that

we wanted both men and women, both from

Hanoi and Ho Chi Minh City, illustrators with

different styles. The fact that they’re all young

is due to the curators’ network. But also to

the fact that satirical cartoons are not usually

found here. There are a couple of people who

do strips for a few newspapers but they’re

older and we wanted to find cartoonists who

aren’t published as frequently.”

Globalisation has many benefits. People are

brought closer together and it becomes clear

what we as human beings have in common.

Our fundamental needs have nothing to do

with national borders. Nor do nature or the

climate respect boundaries drawn by people.

Unfortunately, the same applies to radioactive

emissions. And viruses. And ethnic or religious

conflict. When problems spread, national

borders simply resemble invocations. The

climate crisis may be deemed of secondary

importance when the world is on fire. Not since

the Second World War have so many people

been in flight around the globe.

The climate issue is sometimes considered

a luxury problem, but the Swedish exhibitors

reject this. Karin Sunvisson: “I’ve been forced

to realise that the climate issue in particular

brings people together”. Camilla Bjelkås: “An

exhibition like this makes it abundantly clear

both to us as organisers and to visitors that

the image you have of climate change varies

enormously depending on where you live.

For us Scandinavians it’s often about snow,

ice and warmer winters, whereas for the

Vietnamese it’s almost exclusively about air

pollution and rising sea levels.”

Expressing oneself graphically means being

over-explicit. Political cartoonists are of

course responsible for what they publish,

but as a rule they share this responsibility

with a publisher who has a specific political

agenda. At least when their work is published

in a newspaper.

How, then, are we to interpret the cartoons

in this book? They haven’t been produced

for a newspaper. They were commissioned

by the Swedish Institute, which doesn’t

have a political agenda – unless one were to

argue that the Swedish form of government

represents a political stance.

And what is there to say about the climate?

In the presence of the weather gods we are all

equal and we have learnt that we are power-

less. I borrowed the heading for this article,

with its reference to our powerlessness, from

the American 19th-century humorist Charles

Dudley Warner. If the weather reflects the will

of God, how can you joke about it?

A net search for images associated with

‘climate change’ turns up any number of

illustrations sharing the same motif: the polar

bear on a melting ice floe. It’s a tiresome cliché

and I’m glad this book contains only one such

example. It is, on the other hand, empathic.

Generally, the image portrays helplessness,

but this particular bear doesn’t look like

a victim. The cartoon reminds me of an

observation by William Hazlitt in an essay

on British humour (1819): “Man is the only

animal that laughs and weeps, for he is the only

animal that is struck by the difference between

what things are and what they ought to be”.

There is hope. The climate summit in Paris in

2015, COP 21, ended more auspiciously than the

one in Copenhagen. Awareness of the climate

issue is spreading. And Facing the Climate is

continuing its highly successful tour.

Andreas Berg

Professor of Illustration, Oslo National

Academy of the Arts

9

Getting along

10

Sergey Tunin, Russia | Aquarium

11

Stathis (Stavropoulos), Greece

12

Zapiro (Jonathan Shapiro), South Africa

13

Meton Joffily, Brazil | Empty

14

Mai Thảo Ngân (Bít Tất Biết Tất), Vietnam | Moving out

15

Hameed Karout, Syria

16

Zapiro (Jonathan Shapiro), South Africa | Trojan Horse

17

Claudius Ceccon, Brazil | Climatic Justice

18

Karin Sunvisson, Sweden | Bad Times Ahead

19

Neama Zedan, Egypt

20

Ilja Bereznickas, Lithuania | Contemporary Park

21

Paulo Caruso, Brazil | Tractor (left), Reforest (right)

22

Victor Bogorad, Russia

23

Today’s menu

24

Claudius Ceccon, Brasilia | Ethanol or Food

25

Jiří Bosák, Czech Republic | Banana Bear

26

Agim Sulaj, Albania | Water

27

Karin Sunvisson, Sweden | Still Life

28

Ngô ĐứcTrí, Vietnam | Food Army

29

Marek Oravski, Czech Republic | Looking for air?

30

Xiao Longhua, China

31

Helena Lindholm, Sweden | Ronald Mc Do Bad

32

Youssouf Cissé, Mali

33

Volha Sazykina, Belarus | Buffet. Sandwiches, natural bread, glossy photo

34

Sifiso Yalo, South Africa | Tree of Life

35

Kazo Kanala, Slovakia | I feel myself a kind of empty

36

Bobo Pernecký, Slovakia | Ice floe

37

Karin Sunvisson, Sweden | Guilty Pleasure

38

Aleg Karpovich, Belarus | In October

39

Payoff

40

Magnus Bard, Sweden | Rethink

41

Igor Paschenko, Russia

42

Janina Wegscheiderin, Austria

43

Sergey Tunin, Russia | Autumn

44

Ricardo Sasaki, Brazil | Greed Street

45

Nicolas Mahler, Austria | Industry

46

Helena Lindholm, Sweden | China most polluted?

47

Roman Sustau, Belarus | Chernobyl

48

Helena Lindholm, Sweden | Reactor Vases

49

The bigger picture

50

Love Antell, Sweden | The Plant

51

Serhiy Ryabokon, Ukraine | Dead-end offshoot

52

Gatis Sluka, Latvia

53

Riber Hansson, Sweden | Ship Earth

54

Mykola Kapusta, Ukraine | Bogus birches

55

Linda Spåman, China

56

Vladimir Stepanov, Russia

57

Petros Zervos, Greece

58

Magnus Bard, Sweden | Global Chemist

59

Serhiy Ryabokon, Ukraine | Scape Donkey

60

Yasser Ahmad, Syria

61

Magnus Bard, Sweden | Fashion Colour

62

Katsyaryna Martsinovich, Belarus | Landfill

63

Bruno Haberzettl, Austria | Common Values

64

Saša Rakezic alias Aleksandar Zograf, Serbia

65

Nini Sum, China | A Masterpiece

66

TheMico (Mihajlo Dimitrievski), Macedonia | Play

67

Karol Cizmazia, Slovakia | Obdurate

68

Riber Hansson, Sweden | Global Warming

69

Issam Hassan, Syria

70

Nina Hadžic, Bosnia and Herzegovina | Bad Time for Heroes

71

Love Antell, Sweden | Mirror #1

72

Agim Sulaj, Albania

73

Ramunas Vaitkus, Lithuania | A Bike’s Seminar

74

Ree Treweek, South Africa | Migration

75

It’s time

76

Syargey Volkau, Belarus | FINITA III

77

Tan Faezal, Malaysia | Stuck

78

Fadi Fadel, Syria

79

Antanina Slabodchykava, Belarus | Life is short

80

Varlam Jmukhadze, Georgia

81

Igor Hofbauer, Croatia | Eco 2

82

Riber Hansson, Sweden | The Ark

83

Hana Al Hejizy, Libya

84

Levan Kvaratskhelia, Georgia

85

Jeffrey Guan, Austria | The Climate in Your Face

86

Mohamed Salah, Egypt | 8 Minutes

87

Facing the Climate is a touring exhibition that has grown in size over the

past five years. By 2016, a total of 115 cartoonists from five continents had

taken part and the exhibition had been seen by an estimated 280,000 people.

Wherever it has travelled, talks, debates and workshops involving established

and aspiring cartoonists have been an accompanying feature.

AlbaniaAngola

Australia Austria

Belarus Bosnia and Herzegovina

Brazil Czech Republic

China Egypt

Croatia Georgia

Greece Island Israel Kosovo Latvia Libya Lithuania

Macedonia Malaysia

Mali Montenegro

Russia Serbia

Slovakia South Africa

Sweden Syria

Ukraine USA

Vietnam

The Swedish Institute (SI) is a pub lic agency that promotes

interest and confidence in Sweden around the world. SI

seeks to establish co op eration and lasting relations

with other countries through stra tegic commu nication

and ex change in the fields of culture, edu cation, science

and business.

www.si.se www.sharingsweden.se

Facing the Climate

Participating Countries: