posted on 27 Jul 2015

Drawing the Curtain: The Cold War in Cartoons   by Fontanka Publications

What can you do when the world is teetering on the brink of nuclear destruction? Buy a fall-out shelter? Subscribe to a survivalist cult? Maybe the best thing to do is to laugh at the basic absurdity of old men in the East and the West strutting around threatening each other. Winning the battle for hearts and minds was as important as building more missiles and both sides mobilised the propoganda possibilities of cartoonists to make their enemies look absurd in the eyes of their respective populations.

This fabulous book has been put together by experts from either side of the old Iron Curtain but focuses on previously unseen cartoons that were produced as propoganda in the Soviet media and they are accompanied by explanatory notes that put them into context.

I just love the way the book is put together and the production values that have been thought-through so carefully. Produced almost as a portfolio and with fold-out graphics on a really beautiful and tactile paper. The collection makes you want to linger over the excellent graphics and spend time with the informative essays.

Fontanka Publications   2012