22.10.2008 | david levine out of work

Ο David Levine, o σπουδαιότερος αμερικανός καρικατουρίστας (μαζί με τον Al Hirschfeld) αποσύρεται στα 81 του χρόνια λόγω μειωμένης όρασης. Ο David Margolick του κάνει το πoρτραίτο για το Vanity Fair, χώνωντας και λίγο σ' εκείνους που ίσως να τον ανάγκασαν σε παραίτηση με τον τρόπο τους...



However pejorative his caricatures of politicians were, he maintains that they were always designed to be constructive: by making the powerful funny-looking, he theorized, he might encourage some humility or self-awareness. (I asked him whether that had ever actually happened. He said it had not.) But Levine also knew when to stop. As he often cautions young illustrators, caricature fails when people are distorted beyond recognition. He allowed himself an exception with J. Edgar Hoover (he did him four times), whom he depicted once as an amoeba-like, cobwebbed blob. Then again, Hoover was the man who seized Levine’s passport.