Here at home we know that Zapiro takes no prisoners, and despite threats of legal action he has never backed down from a fight.

For the best part of 60 years Gerald Scarfe has been doing the same over in the UK, his somewhat psychedelic cartoons portraying the world’s leaders in a generally unflattering light.

CNN have put together a great piece on Scarfe, focusing on how he captures the ugly side of politics, so let’s find out more about the man:

Scarfe is an artist who has always worked within the establishment that he satirizes [sic], starting out at satirical current affairs magazines Private Eye and the now-defunct Punch in the ’60s, before working for the Sunday Times, the New Yorker, the English National Opera, Disney, and rock giants like Pink Floyd as a caricaturist, cartoonist and concept artist.

But his work has remained provocative and political in a way that sits slightly at odds with his image as the debonair grandfather of modern illustration.

It’s about time we looked at some of his more iconic cartoons:

We’re all thinking it – how many drugs does this man imbibe?

He credits both his interest in drawing and his vivid take on the world to a sickly childhood, much of which he spent indoors, in the years before people knew how to treat his chronic asthma.

“Someone asked me the other day if I thought all the drugs I had to take as a child had an effect on me,” he adds. “As an asthmatic, the drugs in those days were not as sophisticated as they are now … I remember there was one drug called ephedrine (a drug that can be used to make methamphetamine), which I used to take a lot of, which used to induce this dreamy state on me.”

Well that explains that, then.

Some more of his Trump efforts:

Can someone let Scarfe know about our dear president? I would love to see what kind of havoc he could wreak.

[source:cnn]