Caricature
by
The term caricature emerged in Italy in the sixteenth century and was a form of exaggerated portrait drawing. The distortion or exaggerated representation of people’s features had a long history before that and can be seen in visual work produced by ancient Egyptians, Greeks, and Romans (Robinson 1917). It has often been used for comic effect. Part of what can make caricature comic is the way in which phenotypic excess can suggest the grotesque—a liminality between humanness and something else. Many caricatures of people are anthropomorphic, sometimes producing a feeling of the uncanny. The fusion of excess, comedy, and the grotesque has made caricatures an aesthetic practice valuable for political commentary and indicting the characters of public figures. It has thus been foundational to the art of editorial cartooning and satirical humor in cartoon art. Political cartooning came of age in the nineteenth century, with artists such as Honoré Daumier producing work for La Caricature (1830–1943), George de Maurier for Punch (1841–2002), and Thomas Nast for Harper’s Weekly (1857–1916). It was considered such a powerful tool in attacking political figures that in 1903, a Pennsylvania state legislator introduced a bill to make editorial cartoons illegal if someone is portrayed, described,...
This essay may be found on page 31 of the printed volume.