Cartoonists around the world are responding to the horrific attack on the offices of the French satirical magazine Charlie Hebdo on January 7 that killed 12 people, including four cartoonists, six staffers at the magazine and two police officers. After an intense manhunt, on January 9 French police killed two suspects in the attack as well as an ally of the alleged killers at a second hostage situation in Paris.
The slain Charlie Hebdo cartoonists included the magazine’s editor, cartoonist Stephane Charbonnier (aka Charb), Jean Cabut (aka Cabu), Tignous and Georges Wolinski. Over a million people, including leaders from around the world, marched in Paris to memorialize those slain in the attack, to support free expression and to express solidarity against terrorism.
As authors and publishers around the world respond to the attack, cartoonists are creating images to memorialize their cartooning comrades as well as all the victims. But cartoonists are also marking their commitment to free expression by posting photographs of themselves on Facebook and elsewhere holding pencils, pens and brushes, their “weapons of choice.” Among them, Denys Cowans, Dean Haspiel, Bill Sienkiewicz and many others.
The attack happened as the French and global cartooning community was preparing for the opening of the Angouleme Festival International de la Bande Desinée, the annual festival of comics artists, publishers, and fans that opens at the end of the month. In the wake of the tragedy, the festival is collecting cartoons and illustrations in response to the events at Charlie Hebdo to create a “Je Suis Charlie” album—the phrase, I Am Charlie, evokes solidarity with the magazine as well as with free expression—for their Facebook page.
Drawings should be sent to jesuischarlie@bdangouleme.com. There will be a memorial held at the festival, which draws more than 200,000 people each year to the small town of Angouleme.
French publisher Glénat Editions also issued a statement.
“Among the 12 people murdered Wednesday morning at Charlie Hebdo, four authors close to Glénat Editions died because they were defending their ideas, their vision of the world and the joy to always draw our lives. Cowardly executed in Charlie Hebdo’s Parisian office by heavily armed men, they died for liberty and freedom of speech. Everyone at Editions Glénat, shocked by the disappearance of their friends expresses their solidarity with all the journalists, cartoonists and authors with whom they work every day and who feel threatened today. Glénat sends its condolences to the families and relatives of the many victims; cartoonists, workers and policemen. Jacques Glénat, who started his career as a courier at Charlie Hebdo, mourns his masters Wolinski, Cabu, Honoré and their young followers Tignous, Charb.”
