Drinking Liberally: the art of the political cartoon

This weekend is Art A Whirl in northeast Minneapolis. One of the patrons at the 331 Club asked me if we were doing an Art A Whirl edition of Drinking Liberally, and I thought that was a really good idea.

So this Thursday, May 19^th, we'll celebrate the art of the political cartoon with guests L.K. Hanson and Ken Avidor. We will be at the 331 Club from six to nine PM; the program with L.K. and Ken is going to crank up around seven. They will bring some examples of their work to show and talk a little about the process of taking an idea and making a memorable image.

Just to whet your appetite, here's a cartoon by each artist.

This is a recent work of Ken's – "commissioned" by the Cucking Stool – to describe what it is like to try to reason with the Republican leadership in the legislature. It's called The Valkyries. I haven't written the post that goes with it yet. Ken is a blogger (Dump Michele Bachmann); Ken has been recognized as one of the top 100 creative people in town by City Pages. He's also done some freelance courtroom sketching at the Tom Petters trial, and apparently will during the trial of Frank Vennes, too.

Here's a favorite of mine by L.K. Hanson. It appeared in the Star Tribune a year and a half ago. The Manager of the Department of Opinions at the Strib assured us this is not Katherine Kersten, our beloved Katie. L.K.'s work is featured in the Star Tribune regularly; I hope somebody will ask him about one of my favorite features from years gone by, Farley goes to the Fair.

A great show is on tap for Thursday with a great couple of guests. Oh! I almost forgot; there may be a third guest artist, depending on how the root canal goes.

I hope to see a lot of you Thursday night.