Thursday, Dec. 19, 2013 - 12:32 p.m.
Soup or Salad
**************
We have all seen the classic
" deeper social commentary"
cartoon
of an octopus
embracing the globe of the world
' and its tentacles
reaching out and grabbing
groups of people
and or nations
The octopus of Communism-
or of Capitalism
or of Tuberculosis
or of AIDs
or of Cancer
or of Dope
or of War
or of Sexism
or of whatever Religion
you get the idea
that riff was stolen by artist thieves
who stole it from yet others
who stole it from other message thieves
who stole it.. from yet even earlier thieves
from centuries ago
it is single panel deep illustration's
hands down, favourite image-
and when i see it
I recoil at any message
the artist was trying to get across
knowing full well that
even they artists and publishers don't believe it
and most of them
don't even draw
their own squid-
they steal someone else's
pose and layout
line for line
the good ones
will change the faces
the bad ones
just re-letter the rectangles
identifying the victims
in each tentacle
if the perceived oppression
is not real bad
they use fewer tentacles'
than nature does
ifs oppression is real bad,
they will add more than
one victim per tentacle
but usually its
four or five tentacles writhing ,
rarely all eight
this is the four bar rock riff of cartoonists
the soup and salad lunchtime choice
of the sacred graphic arts brotherhood
both soup and salad
are both made up of
old bits from yesterday-
soup is hot and wet
and you eat it with a spoon
salad is cold and dry
and you eat it with a fork
but its all the same
handful of leftovers in the bowl,
plus or minus hot water
