J. Carlos (Rio de Janeiro RJ 1884 - idem 1950)
J. Carlos was a cartoonist, caricaturist, draftsman, painter and illustrator. He began his career in 1902 at the magazine O Tagarela, edited by Raul Pederneiras (1874–1953) and K. Lixto (1877–1957). The following year, he began contributing to various publications for adult and child readers, until he was hired in 1908 by the newly founded magazine A Careta, where he worked until 1921. At the same time, he contributed to other magazines, such as Fon-Fon, A Cigarra and O Malho, becoming editor of the latter from 1918.
Throughout his career, J. Carlos recorded in his cartoons the urbanization of the city of Rio de Janeiro and its social impact. Between 1922 and 1930, he served as art director of the O Malho companies, starting an extensive series of political cartoons in which he satirized both Brazilian and foreign events and personalities.
Political criticism was present in his work from the beginning of his career. Particularly notable are the antiwar cartoons produced during the period of the two world wars and, especially, during the two governments of Getúlio Vargas (1883–1954), published mostly in the magazine A Careta. Taking advantage of the relative leniency of Vargas-era censorship regarding international politics, the artist produced illustrations criticizing American imperialism, especially after the end of the Second World War (1939–1945). He worked tirelessly until his death, in 1950, in the newsroom of A Careta.
Critical Commentary
J. Carlos is one of the most original Brazilian caricaturists of the first half of the 20th century. The humor, speed and clarity of his line record the changes in customs and behavior that took place in Rio de Janeiro at the turn of the 19th century. His artistic life begins in 1902 at the magazine Tagarela. However, it is as the exclusive artist of the illustrated magazine Careta between 1908 and 1921 - where he presents a cover cartoon and six inside drawings every week - that his characters become known and popular. During his career, J. Carlos contributes to almost all the important magazines of the time, such as O Malho, Para Todos, A Cigarra and Vida Moderna (both from São Paulo), Revista Nacional, Cinearte, Fon-Fon, A Avenida, Tico-Tico (a children's weekly), O Papagaio, O Cruzeiro and A Noite. In over 40 years, J. Carlos has an estimated output of 100,000 drawings, and he also works in advertising between 1931 and 1936 (his clients include Caixa Econômica Federal, Casa Baby and the film company Cinédia), as well as book illustration, decoration, theater sets, sculpture and graphic design.
At first his line still seems hesitant and somewhat heavy, but over time, especially after the 1930s, he refines his drawing, which, influenced by Art Déco, becomes stylized, elegant and above all increasingly crisp. His originals are made in pencil and finished with pen and India ink, sometimes with gouache to thicken the line. For color he prefers watercolor, often using two alternating tones on a white background, almost always in large flat areas.
The quintessential subject of J. Carlos's cartoons is the carioca, his habits and surroundings. His drawings bear witness to the arrival of the telephone, photography, draft beer, samba, the electric streetcar, the automobile, cinema, radio, the airplane, and the culture of football, the beach and carnival, and, in the political sphere, the Old Republic, the Revolution of 1930, the Estado Novo and the two World Wars. His visual chronicle does not miss the segregating modernization of Pereira Passos's urban plan, and in this sense it portrays both the Frenchified habits of the wealthier classes - with their promenades and afternoon teas at the Confeitaria Colombo - and the birth of hillside culture, the spread of favelas and the survival of the carioca culture of old Rio in the Lapa neighborhood.
One of his most famous types is the figure of the Melindrosa [flapper], created in 1920. He immortalized her with her slender silhouette, round eyes, hair cut à la garçonne with the characteristic kiss curl on the forehead and beside the face, and heart-shaped mouth painted with bold lipstick. This woman, a mixture of naive child and refined, sensual girl, is present throughout J. Carlos's output, almost always being courted or pursued by one or more men.
The politicians of the time did not escape J. Carlos's biting line either. Rodrigues Alves, Affonso Penna, Nilo Peçanha, Washington Luiz and Dutra, among others, provided the artist with abundant material. But with the establishment of the Estado Novo and censorship, at the end of the 1930s the artist turns to the harsh reality of the war in openly anti-Nazi cartoons.
In the early 1920s, J. Carlos also creates the children's characters Jujuba, Lamparina, Goiabada and Carrapicho, at a time when almost no one was concerned with young audiences. Not surprisingly, when Walt Disney visits Brazil for the launch of his film Fantasia, he tries, unsuccessfully, to take the Brazilian artist to Hollywood. Some say that the American creator's character Zé Carioca is based on J. Carlos's character Papagaio [Parrot], which Disney may have seen during his visit to the country. Ironically, when he stopped drawing his children's characters in 1941, J. Carlos said: "I made them for more than twenty years, but today, such an effort for what?... Why?... The pay is so insignificant. Who can compete with these stereotyped foreign originals?".
Critiques
"No one practiced his art with greater professional dignity than this incomparable draftsman, whose creations, of the most beautiful and polished execution and the finest taste, combined with the charm of the motif and the elegance of the line, filled the pages of our best illustrated magazines for almost half a century. (...) And yet there may be no other example among us, a country of self-taught people par excellence, of such self-teaching in an artist whose work was distinguished precisely by the perfection of the drawing, the balance of the composition, the harmony of the color, and the marvelous science of line that made his originals masterpieces of neatness, almost entirely free of any correction or erasure, as was publicly shown at his great retrospective exhibition at the Salão Assírio at the end of 1950".
Herman Lima
LIMA, Herman. Os precursores (conclusão). In: ______. História da caricatura no Brasil. Rio de Janeiro: J. Olympio, 1963. v. 3, p. 1072. Cap. 12.
"José Lins do Rego wrote that J. Carlos is to Brazilian caricature what Villa-Lobos is to music and Machado de Assis to literature. (...) Almost 50 years after his death, this is still the judgment of posterity, which has recognized in the flawless line of José Carlos de Brito e Cunha the most accomplished expression of Brazilian humorous drawing. (...) As a graphic artist, J. Carlos is simply prodigious. His output was gigantic, for the regularity of his work routine over 49 years in the press ensured an uninterrupted flow of drawings to supply the country's largest illustrated magazines. If the estimated number of drawings J. Carlos produced is impressive (more than 100,000!), it is above all the constant quality that seems almost unbelievable, given the speed at which editorial deadlines forced the artist to work. Not a single bad drawing by J. Carlos is known, especially from the 1920s on, when his style reaches full maturity and an innate sense seems invariably to guide his line toward the best graphic solution or the most tasteful effect. (...) J. Carlos was indeed a keen observer of the life and types of Rio de Janeiro, some of which he helped create, fixing their image, like the flapper of the 1920s, or making them recurring, like the Portuguese grocer or baker".
Pedro Corrêa do Lago
LAGO, Pedro Corrêa do. Caricaturistas brasileiros: 1836-1999. Prefácio Zuenir. Rio de Janeiro: Sextante Artes, 1999. 215 p., il. Color. p. 74-76
Solo Exhibitions
1911 - Rio de Janeiro RJ - Solo, at Galeria Brasil
1914 - São Paulo SP - Solo, at the offices of the magazine A Cigarra
Posthumous Exhibitions
1950 - Rio de Janeiro RJ - Retrospective, at Salão Assírio do Teatro Municipal
1981 - Rio de Janeiro RJ - Universe of Carnival: Images and Reflections, at Acervo Galeria de Arte
1982 - Rio de Janeiro RJ - Universe of Football, at MAM/RJ
1997 - São Paulo SP - Graphic Humor in the 1930s, 40s and 50s, at Itaú Cultural
1997 - Belo Horizonte MG - Graphic Humor in the 1930s, 40s and 50s, at Itaú Cultural
1998 - Brasília DF - Graphic Humor in the 1930s, 40s and 50s, at Galeria Itaú Cultural
1998 - Penápolis SP - Graphic Humor in the 1930s, 40s and 50s, at Galeria Itaú Cultural
2000 - Rio de Janeiro RJ - When Brazil Was Modern: Visual Arts in Rio de Janeiro from 1905 to 1960, at Paço Imperial
2001 - São Paulo SP - Brazilian Caricaturists, at Instituto Cine Cultural
2004 - São Paulo SP - The Price of Seduction: From Corset to Silicone, at Itaú Cultural
2004 - São Paulo SP - The Humor of J. Carlos, at CCSP
2005 - São Paulo SP - Solo, at Arte Pedrosa
Source: Itaú Cultural
