Dennis The Menace by Hank Ketcham (No. 93)

Dennis The Menace (1951-1994)

by Hank Ketcham

REVIEW BY GARY GROTH:

(from The 100 Best Comics of the Century! in The Comics Journal #210, 1999)

Hank Ketcham was born and raised in Seattle, Washington, and developed an interest in drawing and cartooning at an early age: on his 10th birthday, his dad made a studio for young Hank by installing "a slanted drawing board, a shelf, an overhead light and a kitchen chair." Ketcham studied Tack Knight's Cartoon Tips and signed up to the mail order drawing course W.L. Evans School of Cartooning, and was on his way. (The artists who he most admired, he wrote later, were, among others, Walt Kelly, Percy Crosby, Milton Caniff, Cliff Sterret, William Steig, Ronald Searle, Jules Feiffer, George McManus and Winsor McCay.)

Ketcham's professional cartooning career parallels that of his peer Charles Schulz: Ketcham enlisted in the Navy during WWII, after which he sold cartoons to a variety of popular magazines. He then created Dennis The Menace, which was first syndicated in 1951 (a year after Peanuts began).

Dennis began as a fairly conventional gag panel but in a short time both the humour and drawing attained a remarkable level of sophistication. (Surely the early widespread popularity of the winsome five-year-old rapscallion and his exasperated but infinity patient nuclear family had much to do with its timing at the height of the post-War baby boom.)

At their best, the Dennis gags were so visually inspired that they couldn't have existed in any other medium. The ideas behind even the best gags would not have been as pleasing if it weren't for the expressiveness of Ketcham's line, and his attention to facial nuance and body gesture, which provided exactly the degree of subtle and understated contrast to Dennis' notorious breaches of decorum.

PATRICK McDONNELL:

Each meticulously designed panel was a masterpiece of composition.

FURTHER READING:

The Guardian: Obituary by Paul Gravett (2001)

Go Visit A Comics Exhibition in October!

UNITED KINGDOM:

Quentin Blake and John Yeoman: 50 Years of Children’s Books
A celebration of over 40 books created by Quentin Blake with writer John Yeoman. More details...
Where: Derby Museum & Art Gallery, Derby
When: Now until 3 October 2021

Ralph Steadman: Hidden Treasures
The first ever public display of three never-before-seen artworks by British satirist, artist, cartoonist, illustrator and writer Ralph Steadman. More details...
Where: The Cartoon Museum, London
When: Now until 10 October 2021

Black Panther & The Power of Stories
Three iconic costumes from Marvel Black Panther film - T’Challa, Shuri and Okoye - sit alongside Marvel comics, historic museum objects and local stories. More details...
Where: Christchurch Mansion, Ipswich
When: Now until 24 October 2021

V For Vendetta: Behind The Mask
This major new exhibition invites you to step inside the story and characters of one of the world’s most iconic graphic novels: V for Vendetta. Featuring original artwork by David Lloyd. More details...
Where: The Cartoon Museum, London
When: Now until 31 October 2021

Drawing Life
A new display showcasing the very best of the Cartoon Museum collection of cartoon art, curated by Guardian cartoonist and Cartoon Museum Trustee, Steve Bell. More details...
Where: The Cartoon Museum, London
When: Now until 31 December 2021

The Political Comics & Cartoons of Martin Rowson
Featuring Rowson’s most powerful political cartoons, caricatures and comics from the past forty years. More details...
Where: Kendel, Cumbria
When: 15 October to 5 November 2021

Beano: The Art of Breaking The Rules
Come face-to-face with the Beano gang through original comic artwork and amazing artefacts, plundered from the Beano’s archive. More details...
Where: Somerset House, London
When: 21 October 2021 to 6 March 2022

NORTH AMERICA:

George Bess: Tale of Unrealism
Featuring the stunning artwork of French artist, George Bess, best known for his collaborations with Alejandro Jodorowsky. More details...
Where: Phillippe Labaune Gallery, New York
When: 9 September to 5 October 2021

Drawn to Combat: Bill Mauldin & The Art of War
A retrospective of the provocative work by two-time Pulitzer Prize winning cartoonist Bill Mauldin about a nation’s time of war, civil rights, and social justice. More details...
Where: Pritzker Military Museum, Chicago
When: Now until Spring 2022

Chicago: Where Comics Came to Life  - 1880 To 1960
Curated by Chris Ware, and Chicago Cultural Historian, Tim Samuelson, this exhibition is a historical companion to the concurrently appearing survey of contemporary Chicago comics at the MCA. More details...
Where: Chicago Cultural Center, Chicago
When: Now until 3 October 2021

Chicago Comics: 1960s To Now
Telling the story of the art form in the influential city through the work of Chicago’s many cartoonists: known, under-recognized and up-and-coming. Featuring Chris Ware, Lynda Barry, Chester Gould and more! More details...
Where: Museum of Contemporary Art, Chicago
When: Now until 3 October 2021

Society of Illustraors: Comic Art Exhibition & Sale
Over 180 pieces of original comic book art from EC, Marvel & DC, from 1935 up to the modern era. More details...
Where: Society of Illustrators, New York
When: Now until 23 October, 2021

Marvel Universe of Superheroes
Celebrating Marvel history with more than 300 artefacts - original comic book pages, sculptures, interactive displays and costumes and props from the Marvel blockbuster films. More details...
Where: Museum of Science & Industry, Chicago
When: Now until 24 October 2021

Walt Kelly: Into The Swamp
Celebrating Walt Kelly and his social commentary through the joyous, poignant, and occasionally profound insights and beauty of the alternative universe that is Pogo. More details...
Where: Billy Ireland Cartoon Library & Museum, Columbus, Ohio
When: Now until 31 October 2021

The Legend of Wonder Woman
An exhibition celebrating 80 years of DC Comics’ iconic Amazon. More details...
Where: Cartoon Art Museum, San Francisco
When: Now until 31 December 2021

Romanticism To Ruin: Reconstructing the Garrick
Focused on the lost buildings of Louis Sullivan. Co-curated by John Vinci, Tim Samuelson, Chris Ware and Eric Nordstrom. More details...
Where: WrightWood659, Chicago
When: 24 September to 27 November 2021

Hapless Children Drawings From Mr Gorey's Neighbourhood
Featuring a menagerie of youngsters who come to bad ends, and for that reason it’s suggested that you avoid establishing any emotional attachment to them. More details...
Where: The Edward Gorey House, Cape Cod, MA
When: Now until 31 December 2021

Marvelocity: The Art of Alex Ross
Featuring original art from his most recent book, Marvelocity, visitors will also learn about how Alex Ross developed into a great illustrator through his childhood drawings, preliminary sketches and paintings. More details...
Where: Canton, Ohio
When: 23 November 2021 to 6 March 2022

COMIC ART MUSEUMS & GALLERIES

UNITED KINGDOM:

British Cartoon Archive
By appointment access to over 200,000 cartoons and comics. More details...
Where: University of Kent, Canterbury

Heath Robinson Museum
A permanent exhibition dedicated to Heath Robinson’s eccentric artistic career. More details...
Where: Pinner, London

Orbital Art Gallery
The gallery space of an awesome comics shop. More details...
Where: Central London

Quentin Blake Center for Illustration
Soon to be home to Quentin Blake's archive of 40,000 works. More details...
Where: Clerkenwell, London

The Cartoon Museum
Celebrating Britain’s cartoon and comic art heritage. More details...
Where: Central London

V&A National Art Library Comic Art Collection
By appointment access to the Krazy Kat Arkive & Rakoff Collection. More details...
Where: South Kensington, London

EUROPE:

Basel Cartoon Museum
Devoted to the art of narrative drawing. More details...
Where: Basel, Switzerland

Belgian Comics Art Museum
Honouring the creators and heroes of the 9th Art for over 30 years. More details...
Where: Brussels

Hergé Museum
Explore the life and work of the creator of Tintin. More details...
Where: Belgium

Le Musee de la Bande Dessinee
A celebration of European comics culture. More details...
Where, Angouleme, France

NORTH AMERICA:

Billy Ireland Cartoon Library & Museum
The world’s largest collection of materials related to cartoons and comics. More details...
Where: Columbus, Ohio

Cartoon Art Museum
Exploring comic strips, comic books, political cartoons and underground comix. More details...
Where: San Francisco, California

Charles M. Schulz Museum
Dedicated to the life and works of the Peanuts creator. More details...
Where: Santa Rosa, California

Fantagraphics Bookstore & Gallery
Bookstore and gallery space of the publisher of the world's greatest cartoonists. More details...
Where: Seattle, Washington

Frazetta Art Museum
The largest collection of Frazetta art. More details...
Where: East Stroudburg, PA

Norman Rockwell Museum
Illuminating the power of American illustration art to reflect and shape society. More details...
Where: Stockbridge, MA

Philippe Labaune Gallery
Comic art and illustration by emerging and established artists from around the world. More details...
Where: New York, NY

The Edward Gorey House
A museum dedicated to Gorey’s life and work and his devotion to animal welfare. More details...
Where: Cape Cod, MA

The Society of Illustrators
Dedicated to the art of illustration in America. More details...
Where: New York, NY

The Book of Jim by Jim Woodring (No. 71)

The Book of Jim (1993)

by Jim Woodring

REVIEW BY GIL ROTH:

(from The 100 Best Comics of the Century! in The Comics Journal #210, 1999)

A distillation of Woodring's quixotic magazine series Jim (a self-described "autojournal" neglected at the time of its original four-issue run), The Book of Jim melds dream comics, automatic writing, and surreal illustrations into one unsettling package. The book is fascinating, both for its constituent parts and for the suggestiveness of their interrelationships. Indeed, The Book of Jim is one of those volumes which can be reread from a hundred different points of entry, in dizzying recursions - a real tail-swallowing experience. The comics, such as the harrowing What the Left Hand Did (with its unforgettable scene of torture as spiritual epiphany) and the cryptic Invisible Hinge (which hints at, yet defers, some profound revelation), join to form one hallucinatory dream-diary, punctuated by intervals of uncanny, lucid-dreamy prose, such as When the Lobster Whistles on the Hill. It all fits together like one of those blurred, unreconstructed dreams you try to grasp just after waking.

The Book of Jim lives up to its author's contention that true horror is "not only fun, but sacred". Woodring fearlessly plumbs his own unpredictable dream-life for material, without manicuring what he finds; the result weds beauty to terror. His drawings boast a hypnotically wavy-line and an unfailing graphic brilliance; dig those garden plots, those critters, those alarming, kaleidoscopic transformations. His line is matched by the fearlessness of his prose, eccentric, and precisely descriptive, which can transform an insect's dead shell into a "fuselage" or wring sheer terror out of an empty playground swing. Art and writing run together to give The Book of Jim the matter-of-factness and disarming spiritual heft of a really good nightmare. With this work, Woodring opened up new horizons in first-person cartooning, creating work at once frightening and profoundly affirmative.

ALAN MOORE:
Jim Woodring's stories manage, by some occult means, to be at once unsettlingly alien and intimately familiar. The effect is not unlike opening a new book to find the illustrated account of a dream you had when you were five and told no one about. Cryptic and haunting, Woodring's work evokes a sense of something important and forgotten. Easily the most hypnotic talent to enter the field in years.

FURTHER READING:

Jim Woodring Official Site

Jim Woodring at Fantagraphics Books

The Mishkin Saga by Kim Deitch & Simon Deitch (No. 28)

The Mishkin Saga (1992-1994)

by Kim Deitch & Simon Deitch

REVIEW BY TOM SPURGEON:

(from The 100 Best Comics of the Century! in The Comics Journal #210, 1999)

With The Mishkin Saga, Kim and Simon Deitch manage the near impossible: an affecting story about the creative process that neither drowns in nostalgia nor avoids showing how its characters participate in their own personal tragedies. The heart of the story is animator Ted Mishkin, his family and loved ones, and their interaction with Waldo, a cartoon cat who is both a character in their successful animated series and an actual spiritual presence in the lives of Ted and his nephew Nathan. Through an impressive shorthand, The Mishkin Saga spans the history of American animation, from Winsor McCay to modern Disney, making the Deitch brothers story in many ways a cutting commentary about the nature of creative enterprise in 20th Century America.

The emotional core of The Mishkin Saga is so realistically depicted it seems almost brutal, but is the rock-solid basis from which the rest of the story emanates. Central figure Ted Mishkin is a completely stunted character - a horrific alcoholic with a naive artistic soul, who faces debilitating frustrations in both his professional and personal lives. There is no hope for redemption - Mishkin's worst and best qualities flow from the same well - and little hope for solace, but when those moments do occur, in flashes of uncompromised artistic vision, they are among the most beautiful in comics history.

Ted Mishkin's tragic personality is mirrored in the surrounding characters: his eventual wife Lilian Greer, his brother Al, even relatively minor characters like studio head Fred Fontaine and psychiatrist Dr. Milton Reinman. Similarly, each independent series in the saga covers some of the same ground, but add weight and detail to the events. When the searing insight of such writing is added to the delightful two-dimensional quality of the art, amazingly successful in depicting the relationship between the artistic enterprise and madness, what one experiences is a rare combination of great truth and great beauty.

ART SPIEGELMAN:

(from the backcover blurb to The Boulevard of Broken Dreams, 2002)
At last the general public will be allowed to discover Kim Deitch, one of the best-kept secrets in comics for over thirty-five years. He's an American Original, as spinner of yarns, whose beautifully structured pages and intricate plots conjure up a haunting and haunted American past.

FURTHER READING:
Kim Deitch at Fantagraphics Books

TCJ Interview: Kim Deitch (2019)

TCJ Article: Filing Kim Deitch (2011)

The Death of Speedy Ortiz by Jaime Hernandez (No. 22)

The Death of Speedy Ortiz (1987)

by Jaime Hernandez

REVIEW BY ROBERT BOYD:

(from The 100 Best Comics of the Century! in The Comics Journal #210, 1999)

The Death of Speedy Ortiz is a great self-contained story. It's also the beginning of a long story cycle that ends with Chester Square. And ultimately, it marked a huge qualitative leap for Jaime Hernandez. Prior to this story, Jaime was perceived as the more frivolous of the Hernandez brothers. Gilbert Hernandez did the moving and meaningful stories, Jaime Hernandez did the light, entertaining, beautifully drawn stories. The Death of Speedy Ortiz changed that equation and forced a reevaluation of the artistic achievement of Jaime Hernandez.

The Death of Speedy Ortiz is in a sense the second chapter of a long narrative which begins with The Return of Ray D. This story introduces the soon-to-be major character Ray, as well as elevating a walk-on character, Danita, to major character status. This is also the point when Hopey, Maggie's girlfriend, leaves on an extended tour with her band - perhaps the critical event in the entire story cycle. These two events set up The Death of Speedy. Speedy is the younger brother of Izzy Ortiz. He begins an affair with Maggie's younger sister, Esther. Esther, however, is also romantically entangled with Rojo, leader of the Dairytown gang. Dairytown and Hoppers (where Speedy, Maggie and the rest live) are two barrios that have a long-running violent feud. There is, at this point, a certain West Side Story inevitability to The Death of Speedy Ortiz. But Hernandez undercuts this in his storytelling technique. Hernandez almost never shows us a major plot point as it occurs - even the actual death of Speedy takes place off-panel. This subtle approach keeps the reader interested in what is an admittedly a hoary plot. It also illuminates corners of the lives of characters who are not central to the narrative at hand, but who are important in the larger cycle that The Death of Speedy Ortiz is part of. Primarily this means Maggie, but also Izzy and Ray.

This is also Hernandez's first story that doesn't take place in the milieus he had mapped out for himself - weird science fiction foreign countries (as in Mechanics and Las Mujeres Perdidas) and the punk rock world. Hernandez introduces a new setting - the barrio - with its own rules and unforgettable characters. ('Litos, for example, is never more than a minor character, but is nonetheless completely compelling as an ageing street punk who can't escape his violent life.) Family issues become more important, as the relationship between Maggie, Esther and their Aunt Vicki is explored, as well as, to a lesser extent, the relationship between Speedy and Izzy Ortiz. (It's a family party in The Return of Ray D. that introduces Esther to Speedy.) In almost every way, this is a deeper and more complex work than anything Hernandez has done before. The Death of Speedy greatly rewards rereading.

It almost goes without saying that Hernandez's artwork in The Death of Speedy Ortiz is superb. But it is worth pointing out that the story marked another step along the road that was leading Hernandez away from the flashy, details "mainstream" artwork early in the series towards the more minimal approach he now favours. To draw so cleanly requires a great deal more confidence and virtuosity than drawing with lots of feathering and pointless details. The figures, their gestures and expressions, the panels and the storytelling - all these factors must stand on their own when not given the gloss of flashy detail. Again, the more one rereads The Death of Speedy Ortiz the more obvious this becomes.

FURTHER READING:

Jaime Hernandez at Fantagraphics Books

Ernie Pook's Comeek by Lynda Barry (No. 74)

Ernie Pook's Comeek (1979 to 2008)

by Lynda Barry

REVIEW BY MARSHALL PRYOR:

(from The 100 Best Comics of the Century! in The Comics Journal #210, 1999)

Lynda Barry belongs to the tradition of James Thurber and Jules Feiffer: talented humorists for whom comics is one of several media suited to their talents. Barry, along with close friend Matt Groening, stood at the forefront of the least talked-about aspect of the 1980s comics renaissance, the rise of the alternative newspaper strip. Appearing in a number of free weeklies across the United States, particularly the Readers in Los Angeles and Chicago, Barry in some ways has achieved the alternative comics dream. Her work reached adults who might not read any other comics, adults who because of work like Barry's don't question the fact that the art form can produce sophisticated reading matter.

Ernie Pook's Comeek is most remarkable because of its voice: lonely, unremarkable children struggling with everything that is awful and over-whelming about the world. In Ernie Pook's best years, in the late '80s, Barry's strip reads like actual diaries of children. While the writing has become less convincing as the characters have aged, they are such great characters that the reader is willing to forgive the occasional off-kilter week. In an act of developmental shorthand, Barry has created characters that have earned affection it takes most cartoonists decades to build.

The second great strength of Ernie Pook lies in the veracity of Barry's observations. In a time when recognition "humour" has spread across mainstream newspaper strips like a virus, Barry manages to convey common experiences of adolescent existence without ever once crossing over into generalities and cliche. She does this by being very, very specific - even if it's not your experience, it feel authentic - and by doggedly staying in character. Several elements may draw one into a comic strip, but one takes away the characters; there are none better than those in Ernie Pook's Comeek.

FURTHER READING:

Lynda Barry at Drawn & Quarterly

TCJ #132: The Lynda Barry Interview (1989) 

The Cartoons of James Thurber (No. 48)

The Cartoons of James Thurber (1927-1961)

REVIEW BY TOM SPURGEON:

(from The 100 Best Comics of the Century! in The Comics Journal #210, 1999)

James Thurber is a towering figure in American comedy, responsible for moving comic writing into common, everyday speech from the baroque rhythms and dialect humour that dominated the previous century. His comic persona of the put-upon everyman struggling to deal with a strange and often harsh world - perhaps best used in The Secret Life of Walter Mitty - has become a cornerstone of American comedy both written and spoken. On top of that, Thurber's influence came via wonderfully skilful writing, practically inventing the casual first-person essay as an avenue for sublime artistic expression. It is almost impossible to overestimate Thurber's importance.

Thurber was also a terrific, natural cartoonist, despite a frustrating eye affliction (resulting from a boyhood accident). Cartoon art could be found in nearly all of his works, and sometimes, in the case of the great comics short story The Last Flower, take it over entirely. Thurber once said of his own cartooning, "My drawings have been described as pre-intentionalist, meaning that they were finished before the ideas for them had occurred to me. I shall not argue the point."

Thurber's cartoons are particularly valuable for two reasons. The first is that they explicate his views in a different way than any of his work in other media. Seeing the "Thurber Man" is quite a different thing than reading about him; and the dynamic interaction between such a static figure says volumes about criticism Thurber has received about the way women are treated in his essays. In one great single-panel cartoon, a shocked visitor is introduced to a family that includes a deranged person on top of a bookcase with the words, "That's my first wife up there, and this is the present Mrs Harris." The cartoon is funny; even in the hands of a skilled prose stylist like Thurber, that could come across as incredibly cruel in print. 

Thurber was also one of the first great casual minimalists in comics, who understand how to simplify figures for the sake of characterisation. If style is the cartoonists voice, it could be said that Thurber helped change that into the vernacular as well.

FURTHER READING:

Thurber House

JamesThurber.org

Doonesbury by Garry Trudeau (No. 37)

Doonesbury (1970-1983, 1984 to present)

by Garry Trudeau

REVIEW BY BART BEATY:

(from The 100 Best Comics of the Century!, in The Comics Journal #210, 1999)

Not because it's been famously dropped by the papers that carry it time and time agin. Not because it's pushed more hot button issues than any daily strip before or since. Not because it's drawn the ire of so many of its targets, from presidents to captains of industry to entertainment figures and the news media. Not because it was the most topical comic strip of its day in the 1970s and remains so in the 1990s. But because it is still the most fully actualised collection of characters to hit the comics page in half a century, at least.

And still it manages to scandalous and subversive, agenda-setting and rhetoric-destroying, and above all else, laugh-out-load funny. 

It's a testimony to Garry Trudeau's vision that no matter what happens he seems to have a character ready to step into the situation. Want to take on Microsoft and the '90s go-go software culture? Not a problem: Trudeau already has an ad man and a science nerd in the cast. Want to talk about Nike abusing its overseas labourers? No problem: Trudeau already has not one but two recurring Vietnamese characters.

It's flexibility like that which has given Doonesbury the ability to remain constantly on the cutting edge of social change. Sure, sometimes hindsight shows us that he was a little too close for parodic comfort (a Reagan meets Max Headroom shtick? The '80s really were an inexplicable time), but for the most part the strip succeeds in finding the right mix of character driven comedy and sharp-witted mockery of the rich, powerful and out of control.

This past holiday season saw the release of the most essential Doonesbury collection yet: Bundled Doonesbury came complete with a CD-ROM collection of more than 9,000 of the daily strips, excerpts from the animated television special and other assorted new-gaws for the technologically inclined. If only it had included the Duke action figure we could have counted it the best strip collection of all time. Instead, we may have to settle with calling Doonesbury the best daily strip of the past quarter century.

FURTHER READING:

G.B. Trudeau's Doonesbury

Doonesbury at GoComics

NPR Interview: Garry Trudeau on 50 Years of Doonesbury (2021)

Terry & The Pirates by Milton Caniff (No. 23)

Terry & The Pirates (1934-1946)

by Milton Caniff

REVIEW BY R.C. HARVEY:

(from The 100 Best Comics of the Century! in The Comics Journal #210, 1999)

With the comic strip Terry & The Pirates, Milton Caniff (1907-1988) virtually redefined the adventure strip so thoroughly did he improve upon the genre's basic ingredients. Starting October 22, 1934, the strip focused on the China wanderings of a youth and his adult mentor, a vagabond journalist named Pat Ryan. 

In less than a year, Caniff, inspired by the work of his studio-mate, Noel Sickles, developed the most imitated of his refinements, an impressionistic style of drawing that suggested reality with shadow rather than with linear particulars. He added realism of detail, striving for absolute authenticity in depicting every aspect of the strip's locale, whether Oriental or, later, military. 

But Caniff's signal achievement was to enrich the simple adventure story formula by making character development integral to the action of his stories: readers wanted to know not just what would happen but how the characters would fare. To weave into his stories such an intriguing character as an alluring but ruthless pirate queen called the Dragon Lady (doubtless the most famous of Caniff's creations) was to add to the strip's exotic locale a powerful enhancement: her characterisation complemented the mysteriousness of the Orient with the inscrutability of her personality, which nonetheless seemed so true-to-life that it lent the authority of its authenticity to the strip's stories, making the most improbable adventures seem real.

Within a few years of its debut, Terry was setting the pace for cartoonists who did adventure strips. During World War II, Caniff sent his strip to war, infusing the action with a trenchant patriotism that inspired both soldiers at the front and their families at home and brought Caniff unprecedented fame. After the war, he gave up Terry and on January 13, 1947, started Steve Canyon in order to own and control his creation. Terry was continued by George Wunder, who did his best to follow in the master's footsteps until the strip ceased in 1973.

FURTHER READING:

Milton Caniff at The Library of American Comics

Meanwhile... A Biography of Milton Caniff by R.C. Harvey

The New Yorker Cartoons of Peter Arno (No. 21)

The New Yorker Cartoons of Peter Arno (1925-1968)

REVIEW BY R. C. HARVEY:

(from The 100 Best Comics of the Century! in The Comics Journal #210, 1999)

New Yorker cartoonist Peter Arno may not have invented the single-speaker captioned cartoon, but he surely perfected it. A prototype of the Jazz Age's young man about town, Arno was rich, debonair, tall, urbane, impeccably dressed and multi-talented, and he had the jutting-jaw good looks of a model in the popular Arrow shirt ads of the day. 

He was about to abandon his ambition to be an artist for a musical career when he received a check for a drawing that he had submitted to a new humour magazine that had debuted February 21, 1925. With the publication of this spot illustration in the June 20, 1925 issue of The New Yorker, Arno began a 43-year association with Harold Ross' weekly. 

Arno's single-panel cartoons helped significantly to shape the magazine's sophisticated but irreverent personality with a Manhattan menagerie that included: the aristocratically moustached old gent in white tie and tails, whose eyes, as Somerset Maugham observed, "gleamed with concupiscence when they fell upon the grapefruit breasts of the blonde and blue-eyed cuties" whom he avidly pursued; a thin, bald, albeit youngish man with a wispy walrus moustache, a razor sharp nose, and an ethereally placid expression who was often seen simply lying in bed beside an empty-headed ingenue with an overflowing nightgown; and a ponderous dowager, stern of visage and impressive of chest, whose imposing presence proclaimed her right to rule. This trio was joined by an assortment of rich predatory satyrs in top hats, crones, precocious moppets, tycoons, curmudgeonly clubmen, ruddy-duddies and bar-flies of all description - in short, the probable population of all of New York's cafe society which Arno subjected to merciless scrutiny from his favoured position well within the pale, and he found something ridiculous and therefore valuable in everyone from roue to cab driver.

Arno's cartoons juxtaposed the seeming urbanity of his cast against their underlying earthiness, thereby stripping all pretension away. He proved again and again that humankind is just a little larcenous and lecherous and trivial in its passions and pursuits, social decorum to the contrary notwithstanding.

An admirer of Georges Rouault, Arno employed a broad brush stroke to delineate his subject with the fewest lines possible, holding the compositions together with a wash of varying gray tones. Arno denied that he had invented the single-speaker, or one-line, caption cartoon that by the end of the 1920s had replaced its historic predecessor, the illustrated comic dialogue. In truth, the one-line caption had been used occasionally for years, but Arno deployed it more consistently than others (thereby doing much to establish the form) because he valued the astonishing and therefore risible economy of its interdependent elements: neither words nor picture made any sense alone, but together they blended unexpectedly to create comedy.

One of his classic efforts shows a mousy little man emerging from a knot of military experts who have just witnessed an airplane crash, the flames visible on the horizon in the distance. The picture makes no sense until we read below it what the mousy little man is saying: "Well, back to the drawing board." And his utterance makes no comedic sense without the picture. But when we read the caption after viewing the picture, the comedy surfaces suddenly as a kind of "surprise": the picture explains the words and vice versa, and we are startled, joyously, by the discovery that it all makes sense. Presto: in this perfect blending of word and picture, in this "surprise explanation" the modern magazine cartoon is born.

FURTHER READING:
Peter Arno at The New Yorker

The New Yorker: The Peter Arno Cartoons That Helped Rescue The New Yorker (2016)

TCJ Review: The Mad, Mad World of The New Yorker's Greatest Cartoonist (2016)

Vanity Fair: The Double Life of Peter Arno, The New Yorker’s Most Influential Cartoonist (2016)