expresso144

Winning Observations

Rodrigo de Matos, the winner of Press Cartoon Europe 2013, says that difficult topics are his favourite because they awaken “the bug to fight against evil”.
by
Rodrigo de Matos, a cartoonist based in Macau and collaborator with Macau CLOSER’s sister publication Portuguese newspaper Ponto Final, recently won the Press Cartoon Europe 2013 Grand Prize.  His winning work reflects, albeit with humour, a harsh reality resulting from the economic crisis in Portugal. As a cartoonist, the most sensitive topics are his favourites: “Getting a smile from something sad is such a difficult thing, so it is a very stimulating challenge”.
 
 
MC: Your winning work at Press Cartoon Europe 2013 was published in the Portuguese weekly newspaper, Expresso.  How did you come up with the idea for this cartoon?
 
Rodrigo de Matos – The cartoon shows a beggar in a soup kitchen who is being served soup in the form of a football. The idea came after Portugal qualified for the World Cup, in the context of the current economic situation in Portugal – austerity, rising unemployment, young people emigrating en masse, increased poverty, cuts in pensions and in salaries. I used the image of an extreme situation, a beggar, the lowest level of society. I tried to imagine the beggar in an everyday situation, such as at a soup kitchen. I began to think of the image I wanted to convey and it occurred to me that it was a situation of joy – the FIFA World Cup qualifier that momentarily overcame all that negativity arising from the economic situation. I thought of the idea that football could fill bellies, fill the gap left by the absence of joy. I mixed these ingredients and put the football in the place of the soup, as if people could feed themselves from the euphoria surrounding football.
 
Was it meant as a criticism in any way? 
 
These images can always be read critically. It’s a cartoon that is susceptible to such an interpretation, such as a critique on the excessive media coverage of football at the expense of other more important things. That is a valid reading.
 
Did winning the award come as a surprise to you?
 
It was a surprise, although I was aware that I had good ideas. I had two cartoons in the selected 50, and I think they both had good chances of winning. But it is always difficult because the choice is subjective and there were other very, very good cartoons. Never in my life have I won first prize in a competition of this size. I was super proud to be among the 50 selected and to come out ahead of the greats of Europe is indescribable. 
 
Do you think the theme portrayed in the cartoon was a factor in your win?
 
I think so, because the jury of this competition was made up of journalists. The story behind my cartoon is very relevant at a European level. The world had its eyes on the situation in Portugal that could have triggered the fall of the house of cards in Europe. And, on the other hand, the qualifying process for the World Cup was being very closely followed too, because we have the world’s best player, Cristiano Ronaldo. Everyone wanted to know if he would be in the World Cup, because a World Cup without the world’s best player is kind of lame.
 
Are you going to take part in the World Press Cartoon again this year?
 
Yes, this year I have submitted two pieces I made in Macau. They are issues relating to Macau, but I tried to look for things that are understood by everyone, such as the concern over heritage protection. One is a cartoon where you see a wave of buildings and construction swallowing a small temple.
 
Which of your cartoons has generated the most public reaction in Macau? 
 
There was one that was widely spoken about, that I did for Macau Daily Times. It was about the preference for hiring resident workers. It featured an employer and a job seeker with a resume that just said “Local resident” and below was written, “That’s it”. The employer responded with something like “your resume is impressive”.
 
Are there greater challenges making cartoons in Macau, compared with Portugal? 
 
Yes. The more time passes, the more familiar I become with the types of problems that there are in Macau. I notice that the same situations are repeatedly denounced and that there are no major evolutions – it is not easy to see a problem that is solved only because it has been in the media. Perhaps in the West it would be more immediate: something is reported, everyone talks about it, there’s a political scandal and things are resolved. I’m not saying it’s always the case and that it happens to the same degree in all European countries, but I note here that many of the cartoons I did for Ponto Final in the first year still seem to make sense. As these themes are recurring, I end up facing the challenge of ‘How can I talk about this again without repeating myself?’ It’s a funny challenge, so let’s see how far my creativity stretches.
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