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Ann Telnaes is one of the most important political cartoonists of this era. In 2001, she became only the second woman to win the Pulitzer Prize for Editorial Cartooning. Relying on sharp, elegant lines, noted use of positive and negative spaces, strong metaphor, evocative symbolism, biting satire, and pointed editorial commentary, Telnaes' editorial cartoons are distinctive both artistically and in the message they convey.
Never one to shy away from controversy, Telnaes' cartoons tackle some of the most important issues of the past decade and a half: gun violence, environmental destruction, family planning, racism, the separation of church and state, civil liberties. In 2001, she submitted a portfolio primarily consisting of cartoons concerning the 2000 presidential election to the selection committee for the Pulitzer Prize for Editorial Cartooning. Telnaes' selection as winner of that prize-the second woman, and one of very few freelance editorial cartoonists to win-is testimony to the quality and relevance of her work. In 2004, her editorial cartoons were shown in a solo exhibit in the Great Hall of the Library of Congress's Thomas Jefferson Building. That same year, Pomegranate Press published Humor's Edge: Cartoons by Ann Telnaes, a collection of her editorial cartoons and an interview with Telnaes conducted by Harry Katz, the head curator of the Prints and Photographs Division and curator of Popular and Applied Graphic Art at the Library of Congress.
Telnaes has been a thorn in the side of both the Bill Clinton and George W. Bush presidential administrations. In particular, her opposition to the Bush administration's foreign policy has been scathing. She has entitled an entire portfolio of her cartoons "The Bush Administration's Iraq Fantasyland." Her cartoons challenging the veracity of the administration's claims, the wisdom of their foreign policy strategy, and their public evasiveness (see, for example, Figure 1) have evoked her editorial page ire. Her cartoons, in turn, have spawned strong reactions by both her politician-subjects and by her readers.
Telnaes is a naturalized U.S. citizen, born in 1960 in Stockholm, Sweden, to Norwegian and German parents. Telnaes' father was an IBM executive; his work meant that the family would move often throughout Telnaes' childhood. By age 10, the family had settled in the United States. Telnaes graduated with a B.F.A. from the California...