Here Comes The Poster

Coming soon to a bare patch of wall near you, the 2023 Galway Cartoon Festival poster!

This year’s poster image is by the marvellous Jim Cogan, whose style will be unmistakable to anyone in Ireland.

Send Us Your Cartoons!

Due to an issue with our email, any submissions sent in the last few days may have failed to reach us. If you emailed work and haven’t yet received acknowledgement, please try again using this address:

info@galwaycartoonfestival.ie

(If for any reason that doesn’t work you can also send them to: richard.chapman@gmail.com)

See here for all the submission details.

Cartoon of a man caricaturing a leader with his urine.
Alone – Keyvan Varesi

Submissions Are Now Open

For the 2023 Galway Cartoon Festival

This year we have three separate shows that are open to public submissions. Feel free to send stuff in to any or all of them:

Artificial Idiocy

Are You Ready To Be Replaced!?

This could be the last Galway Cartoon Festival, folks. Soon they won’t need us any more. Just tell a computer what makes you laugh and it will turn out side-splitting gag after gag, all beautifully drawn in its own inimitable style.

Well, someone’s inimitable style.

What do you think – is Artificial Intelligence a useful tool and amusing toy? Or will it murder us all and boil down our corpses for useful minerals? It could go either way. Give us your artistic reaction to the rise of the machine.

While you can.

General Mayhem

Wait, you’re not concerned about humanity’s harrowing future? You have something to say about humanity’s harrowing present instead? Good on you. Or perhaps there’s a simple but hilarious gag cartoon or a comic strip you’d like to show.

Cristina Sampaio, “Público” Portugal

No problem. We’ll also be doing a show about everything except AI. As is tradition, we call it General Mayhem.

Tarraing É I nGaeilge

Which is Irish for “Draw It In Irish“, and is our show specifically for cartoons in that language – the only one of its kind!

Works selected for Tarraing é i nGaeilge will be exhibited both in Galway City and on Inis Óirr in the Aran Islands.

Dean Patterson

The Terms and the Conditions

  • All our exhibitions are open to submissions from anyone, anywhere.
  • They should be sent, as 300dpi jpegs, to: info@galwaycartoonfestival.ie – Please include a little biographical information.
  • Selected cartoons will be printed and framed by the Galway Cartoon Festival and offered for sale. The Galway Cartoon Festival is a voluntary organisation promoting the art of cartoon and any sales will be put into meeting the costs of running this year’s festival.
  • Submitted cartoons may be used in publicity materials for the festival. They will be credited to the artist.
  • Submission deadline:

20 August ’23

Don’t Miss These Shows

The main exhibitions of the Galway Cartoon Festival 2022 are still open, but must close soon. Now is your last chance to see…

Marilena Nardi – The Drawings of Tomorrow

Town Hall Theatre Bar

12:00pm – 5pm

Marilena Nardi teaches illustration and artistic anatomy at the Accademia di Belle Arti di Venezia, and her mastery of these disciplines is clearly evidenced by her works. She is a cartoonist of extraordinary power, a voice crying silently for justice, the passion of her meaning manifest in every line. Having appeared in leading newspapers such as Le Monde and Corriere della Sera, she now regularly contributes to Italian progressive daily Domani.

Jim Cogan Retrospective

Town Hall Theatre Foyer

12:00pm – 5pm

A brief preview of Jim Cogan at the Town Hall Theatre

Each year, the Galway Cartoon Festival endeavours to choose one Irish professional to celebrate. Jim Cogan has been one of Ireland’s funniest and most famous cartoonists for decades, and deserves this honour more than most.

Tarraing É I nGaeilge

Galway City Library

10:00am – 5pm

“Draw It In Irish”, our annual showcase of cartoons and comics created in the first official language, is displayed both on Inis Oírr and – until this Thursday – at Galway City Library. It features both some of the best-known names in Irish cartooning and some completely new talent. This year we even feature contributions from Italy!

Drawing The Line

PorterShed Bowling Green

12:00pm – 5pm

And of course our main annual international exhibition, Drawing The Line, is still on show. Come and see cartoons from all around the world. Some by complete unknowns, others by the biggest names in the profession.

Included among the latter are some of the wonderful guests we had this year – Steve Bell, Hunt Emerson, Cristina Sampaio, Ivailo Tsvetkov, Brady Izquierdo Rodríguez, Graeme Keyes, Tom Mathews, Aongus Collins, Dean Patterson, Harry Burton and of course, Liza Donnelly. See their work, and much more, at the PorterShed Bowling Green.

SELECTED ARTISTS 2022

“Drawing The Line”

It is with huge thanks to everyone who sent work for consideration that we announce the artists who were chosen for our 2022 open international exhibition, “Drawing The Line”.

Alagon Italy
Andrey Selivanov Russia
Aongus Collins Ireland
Bahman Jalali Nokandeh Iran
Brandon Hicks Canada
Brady Izquierdo Rodríguez Cuba
Ciaraíoch Ireland
Cristina Sampaio Portugal
Dara McGee Ireland
David Carmody Ireland
David Hafez USA
Dean Patterson Northern Ireland
Dokhshid Ghodratipour Iran
Doru Axinte Romania
Evžen David Czechia
Fabrice Matray France
Fadi Toon Norway
Glenn Marshall UK
Graeme Keyes Ireland
Harry Burton Ireland
Hunt Emerson UK
Ivailo Tsvetkov Bulgaria
Jabar Saber Iraq
Joe Boske Ireland
Joey Mason USA
Jon Berkeley Ireland
Jonathon Bomser USA
Liza Donnelly USA
Mahboob Pakdel Iran
Mark Winter New Zealand
Martyn Turner Ireland
Milko Dalla Battista Italy
Nol France
Philip Witte USA
Raed Khalil Syria
Richard Chapman Ireland
Richie Brennan Ireland
Salar Eshratkhah Iran
Shen Hong Li China
Steve Bell UK
Teja Fischer Germany
Til Mette Germany
Tjeerd Royaards Netherlands
Tom Mathews Ireland
Viacheslav Kapreliants Ukraine

Having received something approaching 2,000 entries this year, our chief regret is that we only had space to hang 90 pieces. We have been able to display nothing more than a brief sample of the cartooning talent that exists in Ireland and around the world.

All the chosen works remain on exhibition at the PorterShed Galway until Sunday October 9th (and will be available as an online gallery after the festival). Please come and enjoy them.

Taibhdhearc Shows

Sunday October 2nd

Tickets online or on the door.

The Comics of Jack B Yeats

4pm Tickets

Ilustrated talk by Michael Connerty with Q & A session and mini comic strip art exhibition by Jack B Yeats in An Taibhdhearc.

The State of The Art

A panel discussion with top Irish and international cartoonists in An Taibhdhearc, as part of Galway Cartoon Festival 2022

  • Liza Donnelly (The New Yorker)
  • Steve Bell (The Guardian)
  • Cristina Sampio (SpamCartoons)
  • Hunt Emerson (The Beano)
  • Tom Mathews (Of Course)

Your host: James Harrold

7pm Tickets

Draw With Harry

Saturday October 1, The PorterShed

Would you like to learn some cartooning skills? You could hardly find a finer teacher than political cartoonist and storyboard artist Harry Burton, one of the finalists in this year’s European Cartoon Award!

Harry will give a class on how he goes about drawing cartoons. All abilities welcome!

American Gothic – Harry Burton