Tuesday, February 12, 2019
Morre cartoonista e ilustrador francês Tomi Ungerer a 9 de Fevereiro de 2019
Aritista ficou famoso
em todo mundo com obras infantis, desenhos de temas eróticos, ou satíricos, e
cartazes políticos.
O cartunista e ilustrador francês Tomi Ungerer faleceu na madrugada deste sábado (9), aos
87 anos, na Irlanda, onde mora sua filha - informou seu ex-assessor Robert
Walter.
"Ele faleceu à
noite. Foi sua mulher que me ligou nesta manhã (de sábado)", disse Walter
à AFP, amigo "há 35 anos" e seu antigo consultor.
Tomi Ungerer em 2010, na França Foto: PATRICK HERTZOG
/ AFP
"Era um gênio universal, um homem que tinha talento para
tudo, amava a literatura. Dizia 'escrevo o que desenho e desenho o que
escrevo'", lembrou.
Nascido na cidade francesa de Estrasburgo, o artista viveu nos
Estados Unidos e no Canadá antes de se instalar na Irlanda nos anos 1970. Ficou
famoso em todo mundo com obras infantis, desenhos de temas eróticos, ou
satíricos, e cartazes políticos.
Engajado politicamente - contra a segregação racial, a Guerra do
Vietnã, a corrida nuclear, a eleição de Donald Trump, entre outros -, trabalhou
alternadamente em francês, inglês e alemão.
Ungerer doou mais de 11.000 desenhos originais, esculturas,
brinquedos e livros para o museu dedicado a ele em Estrasburgo.
Sua obra consiste em entre 30.000 e 40.000 desenhos.
Em 2018, recebeu a insígnia de Comandante da Legião de Honra por
sua contribuição para "a projeção da França por meio da cultura".
Anos antes, o artista - que se definia como um "pessimista
feliz" - disse à AFP que, para ele, "se tivesse que haver um paraíso,
seria uma biblioteca".
Jean-Thomas
"Tomi" Ungerer foi um artista francês e escritor em três idiomas.
Publicou mais de 140 livros que vão desde livros infantis muito amados a
trabalhoss adultos controversos e do fantástico ao autobiográfico. Ele era
conhecido pelas sátiras sociais e aforismos espirituosos.
It is with deep regret that we announce the passing of
Tomi Ungerer.
He died
peacefully in his sleep with a book beside him.
He
recently began working on a new collection of short stories and he has two
major exhibitions opening in Paris this Spring.
A polymath and a provocateur, Tomi Ungerer is perhaps
best described by his motto: ‘Expect the Unexpected’.
His life and work defied easy
categorization. Although best known as an author and illustrator of children’s
books, Tomi Ungerer’s oeuvre encompassed diverse practices including
illustration, advertising, writing, collage, sculpture and architectural
design. From the beginning of his career in the 1950s to the present day,
Ungerer’s work challenged social norms and conventions with breath-taking
originality.
Born in Strasbourg in 1931,
Ungerer worked in New York, Canada and Ireland as well as his place of birth.
He has published over 140 books which have been translated into 28 different
languages, ranging from his acclaimed children’s stories to autobiographical
accounts to controversial volumes of social satire and adult themes.
Ungerer’s illustrative style
is celebrated for its minimal dexterity, darkly comic wit and dazzling
inventiveness. Renowned for his iconic advertising campaigns and his
contentious political posters that railed against the Vietnam War and racial
injustice in the 1960s, Ungerer’s frequently subversive work provides
invaluable commentary on the divisive socio-political events of the second half
of the twentieth century. Ungerer’s work continues to be politically-charged
and he has been involved in numerous humanitarian campaigns for nuclear
disarmament, Amnesty International, Reporters without Borders and more
recently, European integration.
Don’t Hope, Cope: The Many Lives of Tomi Ungerer 1931 -2019
Tomi Ungerer was a children’s
book creator, an illustrator, a writer, a graphic designer, an architect, a
satirist, a sculptor and the maker of the most idiosyncratic collages. He was a
father and a farmer, a joker and a teacher, a fighter for sexual freedom and a
realist. And, with his unstoppable and most demanding self-drive, he was all of
these things simultaneously.
Ungerer published over 140
books, which have been translated into 30 languages. They range from his
globally acclaimed children’s stories to illustrated memoirs to controversial
volumes of biting social satire and adult themes.
Central to the success of his
children’s writing was the fact that Ungerer did not write down to children, he
wanted to challenge them, to frighten them, to delight them. And children all
over the world continue to adore these darkly brilliant tales. He was awarded
the Hans Christian Andersen Prize in 1998 and, in 2003, Ungerer was appointed
as the first Ambassador for Childhood and Education by the Council of
Europe.
Ungerer was born in
Strasbourg, in Alsace, in November 1931, the youngest of four children. His
father died when he was three years old, but it was his mother who contributed
most to his deep-seated resolve and determination. She raised Ungerer and his
siblings never to look away, always to stand strong and to know the importance
of experiencing fear and not letting it destroy you.
The Strasbourg of Ungerer’s
childhood was a city uprooted by war and Ungerer recognised the part of him
that bridged this French-German divide, describing himself as being without
borders.
When the Nazis annexed
Strasbourg, he witnessed firsthand his mother standing up to the German
soldiers, refusing to relent. And this deeply affected Ungerer. When he was
nine, he started drawing cartoons mocking Hitler — drawings which might have
put his family in danger had they been found. But Ungerer never shied away from
danger when he felt he had a purpose and a duty.
Ungerer also possessed an
unshakeable belief in loyalty. His friendships stretched decades and spanned
generations (and countries). He was also loyal to places, his bond with
Strasbourg never faltering no matter where he lived. And the city loved him
back, proudly erecting a museum in honour of their great artist in 2007, the
first living artist to have a public museum dedicated to their life and work in
France. For his 85th birthday
in 2016, 85 artists from all over the world created works in his honour that
were exhibited in the museum.
A young Ungerer did not start
out wanting to be an illustrator or to write books. He instead harboured early
dreams of becoming a mineralogist or geologist, he was connected to the land.
But once he started drawing, he never stopped and his future was unavoidable.
Ungerer moved to America in
1955, lured by jazz music and the creative freedom that suggested. He arrived
in New York as a gauche 20-something with no plans and just $60 in his pockets.
He described the world he found as “a land of specialists and savages”.
But Ungerer’s New York life
quickly took off. He was embraced into the avant garde creative circles and
soon started publishing illustrations in high profile magazines. A turning
point came when he connected with the publisher Ursula Nordstrom. Nordstrom had
vision and she crucially believed in Ungerer, she nurtured Ungerer’s obvious
talent.
The callow youth was soon
replaced by a literary success. Ungerer produced key children’s books that
quickly garnered international acclaim including The Mellops’ series and The
Three Robbers. He was mixing with the artistic elite such as Tom Wolfe, Stanley
Kubrick, Philip Glass and collaborating with the likes of Gunther Grass. He was
even made the food editor for Playboy and driving around Manhattan in a cream
Bentley. But behind the social whirlwind was an impossibly disciplined
creative, Ungerer lived to work.
Everything changed in 1967.
Ungerer was so incensed by the American participation in the Vietnam War that
he produced a series of incendiary posters. They were initially a commission
for Columbia University, but the university rejected a number of them due to
the uncensored provocation of their content. These posters soon became cult
classics. But American society and, more importantly, American politicians were
outraged.
Ungerer reacted to this turning
tide against him in a typical manner and, in 1971, took himself and his
young wife Yvonne to a very remote farm in Nova Scotia. He disappeared into the
wilderness at the peak of his fame. But his mark was already made. And Ungerer
never stopped writing and creating, he could not have, the work drove him. It
was of course part of his subversive spirit that he left after the publication
of Fornicon, his most famous work of erotic satire and one that is still
legally banned in England, a fact that Ungerer was always proud of.
In 1973, he published No Kiss
for Mother, a very different children’s book about the naughty kitten Piper
Paw, and a response to his friend Maurice Sendak’s Kiss for Mother. Tender and
provocative at the same time, it was his most autobiographical book, exposing
his relationship with his own mother – but in a uniquely Ungerer fashion.
Nova Scotia was never fully
home for the Ungerers, so they took another surprising move and upped roots to
go to the very south west of Ireland, buying a farm perched high on the cliffs
of West Cork. Their new land contained the ruins of three castles and Ungerer
somehow found his true home, where the dramatic waves deafeningly crashing
against the rocks provided the perfect soundtrack for his furious creativity.
Against the odds, this
eccentric Alsatian and his exotic American wife carved an indelible place for
themselves in this remote Irish landscape. Local farmers even found themselves
collecting discarded dolls to give to the artist living on the cliffs. For
Ungerer could always see the interesting in the rejected. He collected
obsessively and his studio was a cluttered cabinet of curiosities.
This home at the end of the
world, or at least Ireland, also nurtured not only Ungerer’s work but also his
family and it was here that his three children, Aria, Pascal and Lukas, were
raised, amidst sheep, horses and endless hares.
In October 2018, Ungerer’s
contribution to French culture was recognised when he was promoted to
Commandeur de la Légion d’honneur by the president of France and on behalf of
its people. This rare honour places Ungerer in the cohort of such other
luminaries as Balzac, Charles Aznavour and Charlie Chaplin.
Ungerer refused to conform and
fought many battles, most of them were political ones. He created political
posters and satirical cartoons that viciously attacked the violent and depraved
parts of modern life. In the 1990s, he campaigned hugely for AIDS, giving
away thousands of free condoms featuring his drawings. More recently, he worked
with the French ministry for education, and campaigned hugely for AIDS, giving
away thousands of free condoms featuring his drawings.
What linked all of his work,
from children’s books to political posters to his cartoons and his mechanised
sexual satire, was his interest in representing the “underside of things, the
repressed, the overlooked, the sidelined”.
Ungerer died peacefully in his
sleep with a book (of Nabokov letters) beside him. He was working on a new
collection of short stories and he has two major exhibitions opening in Paris
in March (and April). Ungerer’s
imagination never slept.
By Sophie Gorman.
