The Artists: The Way To Be Uncivilized

Jim Morrissey, editorial cartoonist and a creative director in advertising, remembers how crudely drawn the character designs of The Simpsons were when it was a short on “The Tracey Ullman Show.” We talked about the evolution of his own work, the need for political cartoons, and how they function as a means to speak truth to power.

Modern iconoclasts

Around the 8th or 9th century, a group of dissidents formed a movement led by people known as the iconoclasts, which translates to “break likeness” or “image breaking.” History doesn’t note an inciting incident. Rather it reveals an incoming tide that was swelling for years as many iconoclasts would find the imagery of Mary, saints, and anything not pertaining to Jesus himself to be in contradiction with the second commandment — do not worship God through an idol.

Satire does not possess the heft and consequence of this movement, but at their roots, they have nearly the same philosophies: They both see a lofted image, something put on a pedestal for the sake of celebration or reverence and aim to challenge that placement, which is to say, they’re not better than the rest of us.  The original iconoclasts railed against images of the church while the modern iconoclasts challenge celebrity, the icons of today, through parody and satire.

Satirists mean to check power, an idea Morrissey would often come back to when he reflected on why he became a political cartoonist in the first place:

My local newspaper [printed] something dumb like, “We’re going to start arresting people who let their cats out at night!” I’m like, “This is the stupidest waste of paper.” I remember just drawing something and laughing and calling the newspaper saying, “Hey, can you guys run this?” And they said, “Sure. Hey, would you like to do this every week for us?” It was a good way of feeling like, as a citizen, you can have an opinion on something, and there was a way to get it out there.

The article “Satire: Comedy for Democracy” offers a similar sentiment when addressing the value of satire in the modern world:

“Satire also acts as a societal pressure valve. It provides a means for the public to cope with the often disheartening realities of political life. Through humor, we find a way to confront our frustrations and fears about governance and policies.

By mocking the powerful, satirists remind them (and ourselves) that they are not above scrutiny. In regimes where freedom of speech is stifled, satire often bubbles up as subversive art, challenging authority and sparking debate. Even in democracies, it keeps leaders from becoming too detached, puncturing their egos with wit.”

Morrissey echoed the sentiments of a previous artist in our series, Steve Skelton, in his love for the sardonic parody and satire of Mad Magazine and Gary Larson’s “The Far Side.” He would go on to say:

[Mad] was kind of like the holy grail for me growing up. Whatever movie was big or whatever thing was going on in culture, they were right there to parody it and make fun of it. They just had amazing writing, amazing artists. Mort Drucker, Sergio Garcia —  they just had this cast of people on staff that would just capture stuff. Couldn’t wait to get the new one. My friends and I would swap ’em or share ’em. To me, those were just rich with stories, content, art I could just copy, pre-internet.

He would go on to laud the works of Larson’s “The Far Side”:

“The Far Side” is another great example. That was science, biology, sci-fi, anthropology making fun of the whole human condition with animals and space. And, he would boil it down to what I would even consider to be like an Instagram post today. It was short and sweet for a little kid to open the panel and go, “Got it! Yep!” Gary Larson could just create magic in such a short space to make it come to life.

In a lecture given by Professor Kerry Soper, who himself worked with the Larson syndicate to publish his comics online, he talked about Larson’s approach to satire and how why it became so pervasive within the world of satirists:

For example, at one point he spoke on Larson’s tendency to “deflate or parody?genre entertainment myths, fairy tales” saying he was “kind of like the anti-Disney — like all the sweet platitudes you might get in a movie like Bambi are brought right down to?earth with his?naturalistic view of things.” To illustrate this point, he displayed a comic with the caption, “That evening, with her blinds pulled,?Mary had three helpings of corn,?two baked potatoes,?extra bread, and a little?lamb.”

The final point made by Soper about Larson’s work is what makes this kind of commentary important. Within this example of Bambi, even though we see deer grow up, the hunters are still out there. He hasn’t escaped the menu. A harrowing thought, yes, but the most likely outcome for his story.

The political turn

Considering all the influences that Morrissey has taken from Mad and “The Far Side,” one of the more interesting reveals was that those weren’t the influences that led him to political commentary. It was a library book he couldn’t remember the name of:

With political stuff I remember a book. I was at the library. I think it was 741, Dewey Decimal System. I don’t even remember who the politicians were. It was just something that I couldn’t let go of because of the art behind it, how simple it was, how stripped down it was. And, it wasn’t Mad Magazine, and it was “The Far Side,” but there was something intriguing about this world where you can kind of speak truth to power.

Morrissey would then mention the current political climate as we approach what has been an election cycle for the ages:

I was having dinner with some folks, and we were talking politics while keeping it friendly over dinner. But, I look back to July of this year, and July of this year was just one of those watershed moments in American history where I don’t think we all realize,  Wow, here you have one of the worst debates ever. Like Nixon/Kennedy back in the 60s, where Biden just shriveled under the — you know, we just saw what we’d all been thinking. And, then the assassination attempt, then “Biden step down — I’m not stepping down — Biden step down — Grandpa, take your medicine.” And, just to see all that transpire within a 30-day window was pretty remarkable.

And, even though this period has been extremely content rich, Morrissey shed some light on the trappings of such a time period:

This time is one of the richest times in the sense of there’s so much to dissect. But, the other, I guess I’ll call it a trap with it is: It’s easy to fall into the easy gag with it all. ‘Oh I can do this,’ then you look online after you’re done and see five other cartoonists have done it. So, what’s good about it is there’s a lot of ripe things for the pickings that are there for your interpretation. How do you go beyond the easy punchline? … Even when Trump was in office from 2016 to 2020, I felt myself becoming numb to parody shows like “The Daily Show.” All they’re doing is putting actors in a room to reenact what happened this week. And, I don’t blame the writers, but as a creative person you have to figure out what’s a new way to interpret what’s going on with this. How do we as creative [people] raise our level to do something completely different?

It’s inherently human

Artificial intelligence, the ever-divisive subject among the artistic community, is something that Morrissey sees as one more tool to master. As he works in both the world of political art and advertising, the inevitable future where AI is in all facets of work life is fast approaching and many have a great degree of trepidation:

I’m part of a symposium of folks in the creative world, and they were like, ‘Hey, we’re having an emergency meeting. We’re just going to talk about what AI is going to do to our business. I just remember getting on, and there were so many glum faces. Everyone just looked like it’s the end of the world. The end of the world!’ Then one guy goes, “I don’t know if anyone remembers the show on FOX called, “How did you do that?”” It was how magicians share their tricks. And, one magician was going to share all the tricks: coin behind the ear, saw a woman in half.

He would recount how many of the magicians within the community responded with deep-rooted anger. They were worried that a magician revealing the secrets was ruining magic. However, Morrissey would go on to talk about the response from the magician who was revealing the secrets, who stated so to the effect of “No. We need to up our game.”

He would further state, “’Collectively, magic will get better!’ We need to stop being threatened by something that is only innately human. We call it artificial, but all the information is from humans. For me I just want to know the tools. At the end of the day, it’s just another tool in the chest.”

A recent announcement in The Art Newspaper brings Morrissey’s views on AI to the forefront. Morrissey plays around with tools like Midjourney to get a sense of how AI works in the artistic fields. He assesses that we call it AI, but all the data used is inherently human, which is why this announcement of Dataland is so interesting. Per The Art Newspaper, “Refik Anadol Studio today announced plans for the world’s first museum of artificial intelligence (AI) arts. The museum, Dataland, is due to be launched in 2025, with a flagship location at the Frank Gehry-designed development The Grand LA in downtown Los Angeles.”

What’s even more interesting is that the artist’s studio, Refik Anadol Studio, has a  “trademark data style” which is something, as of writing this piece, has little to no precedent, but as use of AI rises, will probably be something we hear more of in the future. In any case, much like Morrissey surmised, it’s a tool we need to learn how to use. And, if artists want to produce work that will lure people away from museums like Dataland, they’ll need to “up their game.”

The worst thing to happen to an artist

Morrissey ended the interview by referencing Rocky, which is less surprising the more it’s given thought. Rocky’s story is that of a fighter, a habitual line-stepper who refused to accept that living in the box he was placed in was enough and always fought for more. Seeing the similarities between the fight within a boxer and the fight within an artist is fitting, even more so when said artist sees the world as iconoclasts did — with a want to combat by questioning those in power. When referencing Mickey’s advice to Balboa in the third film, Morrissey phrased it this way:

‘The worst thing that can happen, happened to you, you got civilized.’ I think that as creators, we can’t ever get civilized in what we do. We just always make sure to keep our backs against the wall. Not in a bad way. Not in a ‘We got to martyrs for the art.’ But, in a sense with everything becoming more AI, and things look very AI sometimes, we can’t ever be civilized in a sense of ‘It’s easy.’ We still need to try hard at what we do.