ART

Looking at contemporary art cartoon – an optician’s eye test chart

A contemporary artwork composed of an ophthalmologist’s eye test chart.

The cartoon shows visitors to an art gallery looking at a piece of contemporary artwork that takes the form of an optician’s eye test.
They are looking intensely at the artwork in order to try to ‘read’ it in an attempt to understand its meaning. The man is saying that he understands it up to a certain point, that point being where the letters on the eye chart become too small for him to read.
The cartoon is about how to look at art. The artwork could be titled Ways of Seeing.

This version: 2019

Cartoon reference number: art062

This cartoon features in my book of cartoons about art.
See the book here.
Surrealism cartoon

Modern art disrupting classical art – Man Ray’s Cadeau.

A cartoon illustrating the effect of modern art movements such as surrealism on traditional and classical art.
A man (possibly Man Ray) is slashing a traditional landscape oil painting using Man Ray’s surrealist sculpture Cadeau, a flat iron with a row of nails attached to it.

Original cartoon: 2007
This version: 2019

Cartoon reference number: art061

This cartoon features in my book of cartoons about art.
See the book here.
Rene Magritte cartoon

Magritte cartoon – pastiche of Golconde.

A cartoon based on the Rene Magritte surrealist painting Golconde in which Magritte is painting a surreal image of raining men. The image seems to be imaginary, however in the cartoon Magritte can be seen to be painting the reality that is in front of him.
A cartoon about surrealism, realism, reality, imagination.

Concept: 2007
Drawn: 2019

Cartoon reference number: art060

This cartoon features in my book of cartoons about art.
See the book here.
Vermeer cartoon

Vermeer cartoon.

The cartoon shows Vermeer painting The Wine Glass.
He is painstakingly painting the tiles on the floor, and is thinking “I must get some plain Lino.”

Original version drawn: 2005
This version: 2019

Cartoon reference number: art053

This cartoon features in my book of cartoons about art.
See the book here.
Art galleries for the Instagram generation – cartoon

An art gallery removing classical portraits to replace them with contemporary celebrity selfies.

This cartoon is about contemporary celebrity culture, and its possible impact on art galleries and museums.
In the cartoon the portraits of historically important figures are being removed in order to make way for selfies of social media celebrities of the Instagram generation.
Part of the concept behind the cartoon is the potential debasement of culture due to commercial pressures in order to attract a new audience, on the basis that larger audiences attract more funding or income for art establishments.

Drawn: 2019

Cartoon reference number: art059

This cartoon features in my book of cartoons about art.
See the book here.
Contemporary art – the primacy of the concept

Contemporary art cartoon – the primacy of concept over aesthetics and execution.

This cartoon is about the way that the contemporary art world sometimes regards the intellectual concept behind a work of art as being in some ways more important than the physical quality and aesthetics of the artwork. The work can sometimes only be appreciated if the concepts behind the work are understood.

Drawn: 2019

Cartoon reference number: art058

This cartoon features in my book of cartoons about art.
See the book here.
Jeff Koons cartoon – Balloon Dog

Jeff Koons cartoon.

The cartoon shows a Jeff Koons’ Balloon Dog artwork.
The balloon dog has defecated on the art gallery floor, in the form of a balloon.
I first used this idea in a cartoon set in a surreal world of balloon people and balloon animals in 2009, later transferring the concept to the Jeff Koons sculpture.

Drawn: 2019

Cartoon reference number: art057

This cartoon features in my book of cartoons about art.
See the book here.
Contemporary art cartoon – market value

Accessing the market value of contemporary art.

The cartoon shows a contemporary art dealer assessing the value of an artwork.
He is saying that if it is priced too low it may reflect badly on the work, while a high price would make the work seem like a more desirable purchase for an art collector.

Drawn: 2019

Cartoon reference number: art054

This cartoon features in my book of cartoons about art.
See the book here.
Medieval religious art cartoon

Medieval art in an art gallery.

The cartoon shows a visitor to an art gallery looking at an example of medieval religious art.
In the medieval era very few people were literate, resulting in images being very important for communicating religious doctrine.
The gallery visitor is feeling uneasy about the idea of appreciating art that was aimed at an audience of illiterates.
It is a cartoon about intellectual snobbery in the art world.

Cartoon drawn: 2019

Cartoon reference number: art052

This cartoon features in my book of cartoons about art.
See the book here.
Humor in contemporary art – a cartoon about pretension in the art world

Humor in contemporary art.

The cartoon shows a visitor to an art gallery giving the reasons why he likes a particular piece of contemporary artwork.
The main reason he likes it is because liking it makes him feel superior to people who don’t like it.
The artwork in the cartoon is a typical trope of a challenging piece of contemporary sculpture, in that the artwork appears to be craftless, ugly and a bit revolting.
The humour in this cartoon is about pretension, snobbery and elitism in the art world.

Cartoon drawn: 2019

Cartoon reference number: art051

This cartoon features in my book of cartoons about art.
See the book here.
Contemporary sculpture cartoon

Flat pack art.

The cartoon shows a person constructing a piece of sculptural artwork from a flat-pack kit.
The sculpture is in the flatpack form of furniture and fittings available in stores such as Ikea.
The sculpture is labelled as an Ikea Skulptr, in homage to the unusual spelling (to English speakers at least) of Ikea products.

Part of the joke in the cartoon is the contrast between what is often seen as the elitist and high-brow (and expensive) world of contemporary art and the mass market (and cheap) consumerism of shops such as Ikea.
Cartoon drawn: 2019

Cartoon reference number: art050

This cartoon features in my book of cartoons about art.
See the book here.
Banksy cartoon – Monet waterlilies

Banksy cartoon – Show me the Monet.

A cartoon about the sale of a Banksy parody of Monet’s waterlily pond and bridge at Givency with rubbish dumped in the pond.

The work was sold at Sotherby’s for £7.5million.

Drawn: 22nd October 2020

Cartoon reference number: a858
High art and low art cartoon

The difference between high art and low art.

Art is often categorised as being high art or low art. Different art forms move in and out of the two categories, and it’s sometimes difficult to tell which is which, or why.
Contemporary art is particularly difficult to categorise, some art forms are described as craft, which is usually a low form but not always. Cartoons are usually thought of as a relatively low artwork, if they’re thought of as art at all (which of course they are!).
The cartoon features the Mona Lisa by Leonardo da Vinci (high art) and the Green Lady by Vladimir Tretchikoff (low art).
There’s a lot of elitism and snobbery in the art world.

Cartoon drawn: 2019

Cartoon reference number: art049

This cartoon features in my book of cartoons about art.
See the book here.
Taking photos in art galleries

Cartoon about taking photos in art galleries

A cartoon showing the visitors to an art gallery all taking photographs of the art with their phones.

Original version drawn: 2018
This version drawn: 2019

Cartoon reference number: art003

This cartoon features in my book of cartoons about art.
See the book here.
Bridget Riley

A cartoon showing two chess pieces admiring a Bridget Riley painting.

The Bridget Riley painting resembles a chess board, hence the chess pieces identify with it.

The painting is in the black and white op art style that Riley employed in the 1960s when pop art was a major genre in the contemporary art world. I believe that Riley didn’t like being labelled a pop artist, so she probably didn’t like being labelled an op artist either.

Original cartoon drawn: 2012
This version: 2019

Cartoon reference number: art028

This cartoon features in my book of cartoons about art.
See the book here.
Contemporary sculpture cartoon

A cartoon showing a contemporary sculpture.

The sculpture is titled Bogey Man.
It is composed of plaster, glue and bogeys.

The cartoon is about the way that some contemporary art is deliberately disgusting or repulsive.

Cartoon drawn: 2019

Cartoon reference number: art027

This cartoon features in my book of cartoons about art.
See the book here.
A cartoon about creativity in art

A cartoon showing an artist painting out of doors.

A passer-by is saying ” But you’re just copying what’s right in front of you – isn’t that cheating?”

The idea behind the cartoon is that painting ‘what’s in front of you’ may be seen as not being very artistically creative, especially when artistic forms such as abstract art or conceptualism are dominant.

Cartoon drawn: 2019

Cartoon reference number: art026

This cartoon features in my book of cartoons about art.
See the book here.
Regulations about the depiction of children in art

A cartoon about regulations about the depiction of images of children in art.

The cartoon shows an old oil painting of a child in an art gallery.
The painting has been restored and modified to comply with regulations concerning the depiction of minors.

The child’s face has been pixelated to comply with the rules.
In real life rules on the depiction of children apply to certain media (in which the faces may be blurred), but not to old oil paintings.

Cartoon drawn: 2019

Cartoon reference number: art024

This cartoon features in my book of cartoons about art.
See the book here.
The art market – art as a financial investment cartoon

A cartoon about the investment in art.

The cartoon shows an investor studying the art market and buying and selling works of art on the basis of their financial value rather than their artistic value.

The caption reads: Sell Abstract Expressionism. Buy Concrete Conceptualism.
I made up the genre of concrete conceptualism, it being an oxymoron.

Cartoon drawn: 2019

Cartoon reference number: art022

This cartoon features in my book of cartoons about art.
See the book here.
Art in the environment cartoon

A modern art sculpture set in a natural setting.

The cartoon shows a modern art sculpture, similar to the work of Barbara Hepworth or Henry Moore, set in the environment. A bird is nesting in the hole in the sculpture.

The sculpture is titled Art in Nature.
.
Cartoon drawn: 2019

Cartoon reference number: art021

This cartoon features in my book of cartoons about art.
See the book here.
Art that children like – cartoon

A cartoon about art that children like – such as paintings of ponies.

The cartoon shows a young girl visiting an art gallery and asking if there are any paintings of ponies.
The art gallery is a gallery of contemporary art, and thus contains little or no work that would appeal to children.

The cartoon is partly about the different purposes of art and the different audiences for art.

Cartoon drawn: 2019

Cartoon reference number: art019

This cartoon features in my book of cartoons about art.
See the book here.
The emperor’s new clothes – contemporary art cartoon

The emperor’s new clothes – contemporary art cartoon.

The cartoon shows visitors to an art gallery admiring a contemporary work of ark that features a blank canvas.
The artwork is called the Emperor’s new clothes.
The visitors are admiring the detail in the work (even though there’s nothing there).

The cartoon is a comment on the way that people sometimes put on a front to appear to understand concepts and ideas in order to avoid being thought of as stupid or out of touch.

Original version drawn: 2006
This version drawn: 2019

Cartoon reference number: art018

This cartoon features in my book of cartoons about art.
See the book here.
Seeking artistic inspiration cartoon – the blank canvas

The blank canvas.

This cartoon uses the contemporary art trope of a blank canvas as a finished work of art.

Original cartoon drawn: 2006
This version: 2019

Cartoon reference number: art031

This cartoon features in my book of cartoons about art.
See the book here.
Understanding contemporary art – cartoon

A cartoon about contemporary art that’s difficult to understand.

The cartoon features someone who pretends to understand a piece of contemporary art that has a deliberately obscure meaning, when in fact he doesn’t.

Cartoon drawn: 2019

Cartoon reference number: art029

This cartoon features in my book of cartoons about art.
See the book here.
Salvador Dali surreal lobster telephone cartoon

Surrealism cartoon – Salvador Dali lobster telephone and shrimp cell phone

Cartoon showing Salvador Dali’s surrealist telephone, along with a mobile phone that he may have imagined if they had existed then.

Original cartoon drawn: 2010
This version drawn: 2019

Cartoon reference number: art013

This cartoon features in my book of cartoons about art.
See the book here.
Entertainment in art galleries cartoon

A cartoon about the rise in entertainment-related installations in art galleries.

Over recent years I’ve visited various art galleries where some of the exhibits have resembled fun fair or playground structures.
Examples are the helter-skelter slides and swings that have been installed in Tate Modern at various times.
This cartoon features fun fair dodgems.

Cartoon drawn: 2019

Cartoon reference number: art039

This cartoon features in my book of cartoons about art.
See the book here.
Historical portrait painting cartoon – cut down in size

Portrait oil painting cartoon – cut out the head.

The cartoon shows a classical portrait oil painting in a historic house, possibly a stately home.
The owner of the house (and oil painting) has cut the head out of the painting so that it fits neatly above the mantlepiece.

Cartoon drawn: 2019

Cartoon reference number: art038

This cartoon features in my book of cartoons about art.
See the book here.
Profound art and banal art – cartoon

Profound art and banal art – cartoon

Cartoon showing a painting of a vase of flowers (banal art) and a painting of a vase of dead flowers (profound art).

The painting of the dead flowers is judged as being profound because it alludes to death.
Original cartoon drawn: 2010
This version drawn: 2019

Cartoon reference number: art012

This cartoon features in my book of cartoons about art.
See the book here.
Value of artworks cartoon – phone app for market value

Art price cartoon – a phone app that displays an artworks market value.

The caption reads “I’ve got this fantastic new app – I point my phone at a painting and it tells me its current market value.”

Cartoon drawn: 2019

Cartoon reference number: art037

This cartoon features in my book of cartoons about art.
See the book here.
Artist’s self-portrait about mortality cartoon

Artist’s self-portrait cartoon

Cartoon showing an artist’s final self-portrait.

The self-portrait is the artist’s cremated ashes.
It’s an artwork about mortality.

Cartoon drawn: 2018

Cartoon reference number: art011

This cartoon features in my book of cartoons about art.
See the book here.

ART

A contemporary artwork composed of an ophthalmologist’s eye test chart.

This version: 2019

Cartoon reference number: art062

This cartoon features in my book of cartoons about art. See the book here.

Modern art disrupting classical art – Man Ray’s Cadeau.

A cartoon illustrating the effect of modern art movements such as surrealism on traditional and classical art. A man (possibly Man Ray) is slashing a traditional landscape oil painting using Man Ray’s surrealist sculpture Cadeau, a flat iron with a row of nails attached to it.

Original cartoon: 2007 This version: 2019

Cartoon reference number: art061

This cartoon features in my book of cartoons about art. See the book here.

Magritte cartoon – pastiche of Golconde.

Concept: 2007 Drawn: 2019

Cartoon reference number: art060

This cartoon features in my book of cartoons about art. See the book here.

Vermeer cartoon.

The cartoon shows Vermeer painting The Wine Glass. He is painstakingly painting the tiles on the floor, and is thinking “I must get some plain Lino.”

Original version drawn: 2005 This version: 2019

Cartoon reference number: art053

This cartoon features in my book of cartoons about art. See the book here.

An art gallery removing classical portraits to replace them with contemporary celebrity selfies.

Drawn: 2019

Cartoon reference number: art059

This cartoon features in my book of cartoons about art. See the book here.

Contemporary art cartoon – the primacy of concept over aesthetics and execution.

Drawn: 2019

Cartoon reference number: art058

This cartoon features in my book of cartoons about art. See the book here.

Jeff Koons cartoon.

Drawn: 2019

Cartoon reference number: art057

This cartoon features in my book of cartoons about art. See the book here.

Accessing the market value of contemporary art.

The cartoon shows a contemporary art dealer assessing the value of an artwork. He is saying that if it is priced too low it may reflect badly on the work, while a high price would make the work seem like a more desirable purchase for an art collector.

Drawn: 2019

Cartoon reference number: art054

This cartoon features in my book of cartoons about art. See the book here.

Medieval art in an art gallery.

Cartoon drawn: 2019

Cartoon reference number: art052

This cartoon features in my book of cartoons about art. See the book here.

Humor in contemporary art.

Cartoon drawn: 2019

Cartoon reference number: art051

This cartoon features in my book of cartoons about art. See the book here.

Flat pack art.

Part of the joke in the cartoon is the contrast between what is often seen as the elitist and high-brow (and expensive) world of contemporary art and the mass market (and cheap) consumerism of shops such as Ikea. Cartoon drawn: 2019

Cartoon reference number: art050

This cartoon features in my book of cartoons about art. See the book here.

Banksy cartoon – Show me the Monet.

A cartoon about the sale of a Banksy parody of Monet’s waterlily pond and bridge at Givency with rubbish dumped in the pond.

The work was sold at Sotherby’s for £7.5million.

Drawn: 22nd October 2020

Cartoon reference number: a858

The difference between high art and low art.

Cartoon drawn: 2019

Cartoon reference number: art049

This cartoon features in my book of cartoons about art. See the book here.

Cartoon about taking photos in art galleries

A cartoon showing the visitors to an art gallery all taking photographs of the art with their phones.

Original version drawn: 2018 This version drawn: 2019

Cartoon reference number: art003

This cartoon features in my book of cartoons about art. See the book here.

A cartoon showing two chess pieces admiring a Bridget Riley painting.

The Bridget Riley painting resembles a chess board, hence the chess pieces identify with it.

Cartoon reference number: art028

This cartoon features in my book of cartoons about art. See the book here.

A cartoon showing a contemporary sculpture.

The sculpture is titled Bogey Man. It is composed of plaster, glue and bogeys.

The cartoon is about the way that some contemporary art is deliberately disgusting or repulsive. Cartoon drawn: 2019

Cartoon reference number: art027

This cartoon features in my book of cartoons about art. See the book here.

A cartoon showing an artist painting out of doors.

A passer-by is saying ” But you’re just copying what’s right in front of you – isn’t that cheating?”

The idea behind the cartoon is that painting ‘what’s in front of you’ may be seen as not being very artistically creative, especially when artistic forms such as abstract art or conceptualism are dominant. Cartoon drawn: 2019

Cartoon reference number: art026

This cartoon features in my book of cartoons about art. See the book here.

A cartoon about regulations about the depiction of images of children in art.

The cartoon shows an old oil painting of a child in an art gallery. The painting has been restored and modified to comply with regulations concerning the depiction of minors.

The child’s face has been pixelated to comply with the rules. In real life rules on the depiction of children apply to certain media (in which the faces may be blurred), but not to old oil paintings. Cartoon drawn: 2019

Cartoon reference number: art024

This cartoon features in my book of cartoons about art.
See the book here.

A cartoon illustrating the effect of modern art movements such as surrealism on traditional and classical art.
A man (possibly Man Ray) is slashing a traditional landscape oil painting using Man Ray’s surrealist sculpture Cadeau, a flat iron with a row of nails attached to it.

Original cartoon: 2007
This version: 2019

This cartoon features in my book of cartoons about art.
See the book here.

Concept: 2007
Drawn: 2019

This cartoon features in my book of cartoons about art.
See the book here.

The cartoon shows Vermeer painting The Wine Glass.
He is painstakingly painting the tiles on the floor, and is thinking “I must get some plain Lino.”

Original version drawn: 2005
This version: 2019

This cartoon features in my book of cartoons about art.
See the book here.

This cartoon features in my book of cartoons about art.
See the book here.

This cartoon features in my book of cartoons about art.
See the book here.

This cartoon features in my book of cartoons about art.
See the book here.

The cartoon shows a contemporary art dealer assessing the value of an artwork.
He is saying that if it is priced too low it may reflect badly on the work, while a high price would make the work seem like a more desirable purchase for an art collector.

This cartoon features in my book of cartoons about art.
See the book here.

This cartoon features in my book of cartoons about art.
See the book here.

This cartoon features in my book of cartoons about art.
See the book here.

Part of the joke in the cartoon is the contrast between what is often seen as the elitist and high-brow (and expensive) world of contemporary art and the mass market (and cheap) consumerism of shops such as Ikea.
Cartoon drawn: 2019

This cartoon features in my book of cartoons about art.
See the book here.

This cartoon features in my book of cartoons about art.
See the book here.

Original version drawn: 2018
This version drawn: 2019

This cartoon features in my book of cartoons about art.
See the book here.

This cartoon features in my book of cartoons about art.
See the book here.

The sculpture is titled Bogey Man.
It is composed of plaster, glue and bogeys.

The cartoon is about the way that some contemporary art is deliberately disgusting or repulsive.

Cartoon drawn: 2019

This cartoon features in my book of cartoons about art.
See the book here.

The idea behind the cartoon is that painting ‘what’s in front of you’ may be seen as not being very artistically creative, especially when artistic forms such as abstract art or conceptualism are dominant.

Cartoon drawn: 2019

This cartoon features in my book of cartoons about art.
See the book here.

The cartoon shows an old oil painting of a child in an art gallery.
The painting has been restored and modified to comply with regulations concerning the depiction of minors.

The child’s face has been pixelated to comply with the rules.
In real life rules on the depiction of children apply to certain media (in which the faces may be blurred), but not to old oil paintings.

Cartoon drawn: 2019

This cartoon features in my book of cartoons about art.
See the book here.

The caption reads: Sell Abstract Expressionism. Buy Concrete Conceptualism.
I made up the genre of concrete conceptualism, it being an oxymoron.

Cartoon drawn: 2019

This cartoon features in my book of cartoons about art.
See the book here.

The sculpture is titled Art in Nature.
.
Cartoon drawn: 2019

This cartoon features in my book of cartoons about art.
See the book here.

The cartoon shows a young girl visiting an art gallery and asking if there are any paintings of ponies.
The art gallery is a gallery of contemporary art, and thus contains little or no work that would appeal to children.

The cartoon is partly about the different purposes of art and the different audiences for art.

Cartoon drawn: 2019

This cartoon features in my book of cartoons about art.
See the book here.

The cartoon shows visitors to an art gallery admiring a contemporary work of ark that features a blank canvas.
The artwork is called the Emperor’s new clothes.
The visitors are admiring the detail in the work (even though there’s nothing there).

The cartoon is a comment on the way that people sometimes put on a front to appear to understand concepts and ideas in order to avoid being thought of as stupid or out of touch.

Original version drawn: 2006
This version drawn: 2019

This cartoon features in my book of cartoons about art.
See the book here.

Original cartoon drawn: 2006
This version: 2019

This cartoon features in my book of cartoons about art.
See the book here.

This cartoon features in my book of cartoons about art.
See the book here.

Original cartoon drawn: 2010
This version drawn: 2019

This cartoon features in my book of cartoons about art.
See the book here.