“There is no precise date. It is known that what awaits us will occur in the last quarter, it will be held at the Palácio Anjos, and it will feature an awards ceremony hosted at the Ruy de Carvalho auditorium,” stated António Antunes, who signs his graphic work with just his first name.
The cartoonist, in remarks to Lusa, emphasized that “the World Press Cartoon is undeniably annual,” but due to the absence of sponsorship after several editions in Caldas da Rainha, he had to “search until another municipality was found to sponsor the event.”
“Since we were inactive for two years and are uncertain about the current state of ‘cartoon’ on an international level, we know that many newspapers have stopped publishing ‘cartoons,’ so we have become slightly more flexible, meaning we accept drawings from this period that have not been published,” António explained.
The event organizer added that the unpublished ‘cartoons’ “compete outside the contest” and “are not eligible for prizes,” with the exhibition of selected works in each category.
“The exhibition continues with an enticing structure of 10 prizes, including a ‘Grand Prix’ of 10,000 euros,” the WPC site states, noting that due to the hiatus, “as an exception, drawings published in an extended period” from January 1, 2024, to May 15, 2025, will be admitted to the competition.
According to the regulations, the WPC categories include editorial ‘cartoon,’ with works on specific current events and topics; caricature, with strictly humorous portraits; and humorous drawing, covering subjects not directly related to current affairs.
Works eligible for the competition must have been published “in newspapers or magazines with regular circulation and public sale, or in recognized journalistic ‘online’ publications,” and works “created using Artificial Intelligence tools” will not be accepted.
In addition to the grand prize, prizes of 3,000, 2,000, and 1,000 euros will be awarded for first, second, and third place, respectively, in each category.
“At a particularly challenging time for journalism worldwide, amidst multiple crises in the press, economy, and international politics, the World Press Cartoon remains a hymn to freedom of expression,” the site highlights.
Regarding the hiatus in organizing the event, António admitted that “reality is moving at an astonishing pace,” but the WPC will “try to mitigate that as much as possible.”
“The cartoonist is a profession, I don’t know if it can already be said that it is a profession in extinction, but it is clearly a profession in crisis, which is part of the broader crisis that is the crisis of the printed press,” he pointed out, lamenting that they are “a kind of weakest link in this chain,” where cuts begin “with the ‘cartoon,'” both in national and international media.
In terms of threats to the profession, the Portuguese cartoonist acknowledged that the profession’s fragility becomes more complex when alleged opinion crimes arise, as in the case he experienced when The New York Times withdrew his ‘cartoon’ depicting Donald Trump as blind, led by a dog with the face of Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu.
“It doesn’t seem to me that The New York Times is in such a bad state to end ‘cartoons.’ The New York Times doesn’t want to have this voice that slips away somewhat” and that “sometimes is uncomfortable for the newspaper itself,” he said.
More recently, the Washington Post also led to the resignation of cartoonist Ann Telnaes, when she was rejected for a drawing featuring “a series of oligarchs” from technology and ‘media,’ including Zuckerberg, Altman, the Walt Disney Company, and Bezos, owner of the American newspaper, “depositing bags of money at the feet of the new American president.”
“In that group of oligarchs handing over bags of money was also Bezos, and she decided to leave,” upon seeing her work rejected, not due to comprehension doubts, but because of the ‘cartoon’s’ content, António summarized.
Over the 17 editions of the WPC, held in Sintra, Cascais, and Caldas da Rainha, since 2005, the exhibition has also traveled to various continents in about fifteen countries, and contacts are underway for exhibitions in South Africa, Argentina, Cape Verde, the United States, Greece, and Switzerland.
An official source from the office of the Mayor of Oeiras, Isaltino Morais, confirmed to Lusa the WPC’s occurrence in the municipality, but “locations and dates of the event have not yet been fully defined.”
