Asylum seekers in today’s cartoons
Each year the national Museum of Australia holds an exhibition displaying some of the best political cartoons published over the year. I believe that more cartoons addressing Asylum Seekers should be in this year’s exhibit, this is not only because of the entertaining arguments that have been sparked between the parties while debating the matter, but the importance of how and where we process our refugees. I have chosen 3 cartoons that address this political issue and I feel should be included this year.
But before I do, what is a political cartoon? A political cartoon is an illustration which is designed to convey a social or political message. The goal of a political cartoon is to send a clear message, using images which will be familiar to all of the people in a society. Political cartooning relies heavily upon the use of caricature and simple visual images which are instantly recognizable to readers, with various visual symbols standing in for complex political concepts.
My first Cartoon is illustrated by Inkclinct on an online article in Sydney, June 2012.There are many effective elements used in this cartoon, first the use of Caricature,By enhancing the size of Julia Gillard’s ass, and the length of her nose it is clearly indicating that this is taking a stab at Julia Gillard and the labour party. Then there is her shadow, or in fact the shadow of John Howards, we can tell it is John Howard again because of the use of caricature, such as the glasses, big ears and patruding lips clearly outlining the ex-Liberal leader. The cartoon depicts labour re opening Nauru detention centre which was closed under the previous Rudd government. Nauru however was established as a detention centre under the Howard liberal government. The cartoon is purely emphasising the fact that Gillard is adopting liberal policies on Asylum seeker processing. This cartoon uses basic illustrations, with basic colour and only basic figure drawing, however that is all it needs to draw attention to the matter, as the whole message takes place with the shadow and the text.
My second cartoon is illustrated by an artist that goes by the name Leaky, on another online article, on September 2011 in Melbourne.In this cartoon we have Gillard again with her fat ass and red hair, who was PM at the time of the Cartoon, and we have abbot with his monkey like ears and his budgee smugglers who was the Liberal opposition leader.In this cartoon we have both leaders standing on Australia scratching their heads trying to work out a solution as to wear to process asylum seekers offshore. The problem was that Australia needed a nearby island nation to help assist in processing Asylum. However our leaders could not come to an agreement as to where so they ended up, scratching their heads while the rest of Australia watched.The cartoonist used a more detailed drawing, really bringing out the features on the leaders, like Abbots chest hair. The colours were more basic using mostly blue to represent the ocean and red for the budgee smugglers and Gillard’s hair. Other elements used are the