Today is the 100th anniversary of the opening International Exhibition of Modern Art (February 17th to March 15th, 1913) in New York City, better known as the 1913 Armory Show. Presenting Cubist & Futurist Art to the American public, its influence is regarded as a major turning point for American Art. Naturally, as seen in this posting using pages from issues of Cartoons Magazine from that year, it also elicited reactions from American cartoonists, who saw it as a great target for parody (plus, a way for them to have fun experimenting themselves, if they chose to attempt to imitate these new art movements).

The American 1913 Armory Show, was preceded by similar shows in London and Paris a year prior — which also elecited cartoon parody (click here to find the 1912 Cartoons Magazine page devoted to that). Even prior to the show, Futurist Art cartoon parodies were showing up in American newspapers soon after the European shows — click here to see cartoonist Bushnell’s Futurist depiction of the state of Presidential candidate Teddy Roosevelt’s mind (bottom right of the second page).

Click on the above & below pages, to view larger versions, and better read the captions.

Above, Nelson Harding takes aim with the top two cartoons, using the style to parody the ongoing Mexican Revolution and passengers of the New York City Subway. Harding’s subway take may have been more inspired from artist J.F. Griswold’s cartoon parody of Duchamp’s Nude Descending a Staircase, then by anything actually at the show. Maurice Ketten gives his impression of Cubism (and, “Curvism”), in the bottom half of the above page, perhaps accidentally giving us the only element in all of these cartoons even remotely resembling any work in the show — his head of New York City mayor William Jay Gaynor, versus the Picasso sculpture, “Head of a Woman”. Beneath, W.A. Rogers’ “New York Street as Futurists See It”. Both are from the May 1913 edition of Cartoons Magazine (remember: Cartoons Magazine collected cartoons from other publications, one to three months after their initial appearance)

From the April 1913 issue of Cartoons Magazine: above, Ketten again, this time taking aim at the painters themselevs; below, Clare Briggs depicts his idea of quilt makers as “The Original Cubist”.

In addition to the examples found in Cartoons Magazine, numerous other cartoon parodies appeared. Click here, for some posted several years back, by Jeet Heer. Plus, click here for a collection of cartoons parodying the show, posted by the SUNY Oneonta university.

Doug Wheeler

Cubist Art Futurist Art