EDITOR’S LETTER(^10) | APRIL 2016
ISSUE N
O
183
IT’S 2016 AND WE ARE IN THE THROES OF PURE PRIMARY
madness. While Juxtapoz is not The Atlantic or New Yorker,
or even Politico, you’d have to be living under a rock to not
feel a disconnect between verbosity and action. We all know
people will say anything, as hurtful as can be, to get votes,
portray a show of strength, and profess how they would
act in hypothetical situations if they were president. It’s no
longer hope and change, but fear and retread.
Maybe that is why Jean Jullien’s simple, and now globally
iconic Paris peace symbol, created on the night of the
November 13th attacks, reverberated with so many people.
It didn’t reimagine fear-mongering or hate, or take sides.
What it did was plainly convey a perfect message of unity
to people who really do, in fact, believe reconciliation is
far mightier than violence. This peace message became
the emblem of the world’s connection to not only Paris,
but all the violent conflicts scorching the world. And it took
guts to create this image. Jullien, in the great tradition of
cartoonists and satirical artists, makes creative work that is
both clever and quietly complicated in its ability to speak to
multiple cultures without the use of words. It’s playful and
smart. Yet his stance on one of the biggest news events
that has happened over the past decade, in a simple stroke
of genius, touched us all. It didn’t have to be controversial,
positioning one side against the other. This act of an artist
using special gifts to speak his mind, strengthened by the
fortitude to react with his heart, has made him one of the
most recognized artists in the world.
We were excited to work with Jullien on this issue, and
after his residency day at the Juxtapoz x Victory Journal
Times Square Newsstand in October 2015, we knew
that the artist had begun to resonate with audiences in
a way that is rare. His work is friendly and sophisticated,
approachable with an amusing edge. With fellow satirical
artist Kimou “Grotesk” Meyer interviewing Jullien this
month, we get to share the tradition of smart cartooning
and clever messaging, where like-minded people unite to
speak in a common creative voice.
Enjoy #183.
Jean Jullien
London, England
Photo by Ian Cox