Pandemic Cartoons for the #Draw Challenge: Sisyphus as Key Worker and The Toad and the Scorpion

Abstract

The political cartoon, by its nature, provides comment as events unfold and part of its power can be understood by ‘the satisfaction the successful cartoon gives us simply by its neat summing up, “a momentary focus”’ (Gombrich 1994: 131). This submission contains two cartoon series produced in response to a call on Twitter as part of the #Draw Twitter challenge by political cartoonist Martin Rowson. They were both constructed at the time of the 2020 lockdowns, imposed in the UK as a result of the developing events around the global spread of the then little-understood COVID-19 virus. This graphic submission includes my own work that was created in response to the #DrawTheCoronaVirus in collaboration with The Cartoon Museum, London, UK. In late@font-face{font-family:Cambria;panose-1:2 4 5 3 5 4 6 3 2 4;mso-font-charset:0;mso-generic-font-family:auto;mso-font-pitch:variable;mso-font-signature:3 0 0 0 1 0;}@font-face{font-family:font491;panose-1:0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0;mso-font-alt:Cambria;mso-font-charset:0;mso-generic-font-family:auto;mso-font-format:other;mso-font-pitch:auto;mso-font-signature:99592203 597701894 0 0 524289 0;}p.MsoNormal, li.MsoNormal, div.MsoNormal{mso-style-parent:"";margin:0cm;margin-bottom:.0001pt;mso-pagination:widow-orphan;font-size:12.0pt;font-family:"Times New Roman";mso-ascii-font-family:Cambria;mso-ascii-theme-font:minor-latin;mso-fareast-font-family:Cambria;mso-fareast-theme-font:minor-latin;mso-hansi-font-family:Cambria;mso-hansi-theme-font:minor-latin;mso-bidi-font-family:"Times New Roman";mso-bidi-theme-font:minor-bidi;}p.MsoFootnoteText, li.MsoFootnoteText, div.MsoFootnoteText{mso-style-noshow:yes;mso-style-link:"Footnote Text Char";margin:0cm;margin-bottom:.0001pt;mso-pagination:widow-orphan;font-size:12.0pt;font-family:"Times New Roman";mso-ascii-font-family:Cambria;mso-ascii-theme-font:minor-latin;mso-fareast-font-family:Cambria;mso-fareast-theme-font:minor-latin;mso-hansi-font-family:Cambria;mso-hansi-theme-font:minor-latin;mso-bidi-font-family:"Times New Roman";mso-bidi-theme-font:minor-bidi;}span.MsoFootnoteReference{mso-style-noshow:yes;vertical-align:super;}a:link, span.MsoHyperlink{mso-style-noshow:yes;color:blue;text-decoration:underline;text-underline:single;}a:visited, span.MsoHyperlinkFollowed{mso-style-noshow:yes;color:purple;text-decoration:underline;text-underline:single;}span.FootnoteTextChar{mso-style-name:"Footnote Text Char";mso-style-noshow:yes;mso-style-locked:yes;mso-style-link:"Footnote Text";mso-ansi-language:EN-GB;}div.Section1{page:Section1;}