MEDIA-PERU: Comic Strips, Human Rights and Humour

By IPS Correspondents Reprint | | Print |

Abraham Lama

LIMA, Jan 4 2000 (IPS) - Peru’s comic strip artists Juan Acevedo, Alfredo Marcos and Eduardo Rodriguez have been recognised for their decades of work defending civil rights through caricatures charged with acidic political humour.

“The three are iconoclasts, irreverent, rebellious and anti- authority, with a big enough dose of wickedness to satirically chastise their targets and the honourability to always put themselves on the side of society’s weakest,” commented writer and publicist Jose Hidalgo.

Marcos and Rodriguez won the 1999 Journalism and Human Rights Prize awarded by the Human Rights Association, which brings together Peru’s non-governmental civil rights organisations.

Acevedo, winner of the same award in 1997, was honoured at the Catholic University of Lima’s Cultural Centre, where he presented his most recent comic book, “Pobre Diablo y otros cuentos” (Poor Devil and Other Stories). He served in the past as an advisor to the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organisation (UNESCO) in a programme that set up grassroots comic strip workshops in several countries.

“Acevedo is the best comic strip artist in Peru because of his ability to elevate this genre – born in North American newspapers at the beginning of the 20 th century – to become the drumbeat for the problems of our times, but without abandoning the freshness of humour,” stated journalist Luis Freire.

With “Juan Cuy,” a character named after a rodent (the ‘cuy,’ or guinea pig, is one of the only major protein sources for Peru’s Andean indigenous peoples), Acevedo was at the forefront of an extended phase of social criticism at a time when the nation was bristling with political violence.

The comic was about a “decent fellow” disconcerted by the social evils of the social and political systems, by unemployment and poverty, and beaten down by the discrimination against indigenous and Andean values, but tirelessly defended peace and justice.

“Neither the terrorists nor the right-wing paramilitaries liked my Juan Cuy, and both sides threatened to kill me more than once,” pointed out Acevedo.

‘Pobre Diablo’ is his newest character, conceived of as a tribute to humility. He is a Mr. Nobody, a gullible reader of yellow journalism, and an unconscious plagiarist of others’ words (of well-known politicians, bombastic academics or foreign ideologues), which contrast with the sharp edges of his own reality.

“A character that recites, with a great deal of hope, the advertising slogans of consumer society, the liberal recipes of the market economy, while looking for non-existent employment, and the minimal water and sewage services to which he has a right as a human being,” stated Alberto Panessi, a sociologist at the Catholic University.

The book “Pobre Diablo” was turned down by many publishers, and one editor told Acevedo, “It would be bad business, it would be like publishing poetry” – backhanded praise for the artist despite the rejection.

“The editor was right, the book ‘Pobre Diablo’ not only contains humour and social commentary, it is also testimony to the fact that comics can be transformed into visual poetry,” said Freire.

Marcos, who signs his work “Alfredo,” is the creator of the strip “Calatitos,” a word coming from the indigenous Quechua language meaning “naked.” The left-leaning ‘La Republica’ newspaper has published the comic strip for 18 years, highlighting the dire poverty in which most Peruvians live.

He also has other characters, such as snobby wealthy women, street criminals and, of course, the politicians of the day, who are the victims of his ironic attacks because they have forgotten about the ‘calatitos.’

In “El hombre que no podia irse” (The Man Who Could Not Leave), Marcos unravels the story of a couple trapped in their neurotic relationship, who want to separate but can never seem to do it because they need each other as a hostile counterpart to their own selves.

“When I created them, 18 years ago, I drew the ‘calatitos’ with tattered clothing, but since poverty has grown worse and total nakedness better describes the people’s extreme poverty, now they don’t have any clothes at all,” he explained.

Despite the habitual harshness of his comic strip, Marcos occasionally attempts to give the ‘calatitos’ a dash of hope, “like now, they wait as they take in the sad landscape of their neighbourhood, the one that will take them into the new millenium,” he said.

Eduardo Rodriguez, known as “Heduardo,” is a serious and taciturn man. Upon first meeting him, one would never imagine that he is the creator of side-splittingly humourous cartoons.

“Sometimes people ask me, ‘What do you do? Draw? Journalism?’ At first I did not know how to answer. But the truth is that I feel I am more of a journalist, in the sense that I describe the political and social reality,” Rodriguez explained.

He began publishing his comics three decades ago, in a political magazine for which he created “Burguesini y sus mayordomos” (Bourgeoisini and His Butlers), his satirical take on the upper class.

“Burguesini made the bourgeoisie laugh, but they only saw the ridiculousness of the exaggerated formalities of an old man and his demands of his domestic employees. Butlers also laughed, of course, because they recognised the social satire,” commented sociologist Panessi.

“But when the magazine asked me to venture into direct political criticism, and I drew some sarcastic cartoons about then- president Fernando Belaunde, they couldn’t handle it and I had to leave,” recounted Rodriguez.

“The same thing happened over and over, in several newspapers and magazines. When they began telling me to tone down the sarcasm against whoever was in the government at the moment, I realised it was time to look for a new job, because I wasn’t willing to give in,” he concluded.