Interview with Ed Frascino

above: Ed Frascino, "WMD"

Q: Please tell us what issues are important to you.
Animal Rights. I am appalled by the inhumane treatment of animals whether it be in the wild, in laboratories, in animal farms, in circuses, in zoos, or in domestic settings.
Endangered Species
Environment/Global Warming
Anti-war
Gun Control

Q: How is the idea of activism apparent in your art?
I can't be objective enough to analyze my own work. If I tried to define it I'd be hampered when it came time to produce it. The idea of activism seems apparent in my work simply by looking at it. One picture is worth a thousand words.

left: Ed Frascino, "Global Warming Note Card"

Q: Do you think political and environmental issues can be effectively addressed in art?
Images can very powerfully address political issues. Goya and Daumier did it and Picasso most prominently did it with his famous Guernica. Photo journalists make an impact with one photograph. The United States is now fighting in two wars. If each day every newspaper printed on their front pages images of battlefields and the sufferings of civilians living in war zones perhaps Americans would understand what war is really like. It ain't like a John Wayne movie.

Q: Which artists do you admire who have an activist agenda?
Pat Oliphant, Tony Auth, Ben Sargent are three of many excellent editorial cartoonists who with a single drawing can cut to the core of complicated political and social issues. One of the greatest was the late Herblock whose caricatures succinctly satirized any subject he chose to skewer. In the past there was Heinrich Kley. His masterful pen line drawings blend fantasy, satire, and humor. The magnificent Saul Steinberg elevated the art of cartooning to the realm of the great masters. Beginning in 1922 a Pulitzer Prize has been awarded for Editorial Cartooning. This year Mark Fiore whose animated editorial cartoons appear exclusively on the web won the first Pulitzer for this genre of editorial cartooning.

I especially admire my cousin Elena Mary for starting Making Change.

Q: Tell us something about your process of creating.
The creative process always has been and remains a total mystery to me. I don't know where it comes from or how it gets here but I'm grateful that it does. Making pictures may be my greatest pleasure. Be it drawing, painting, or now, with computer technology, having fun with Photoshop.

Q: What is the name of your etsy shop?
http://www.etsy.com/shop/EdFrascino


right: Ed Frascino, "Nuke'em"