Cartoonist
Jose Arles Herrera – Calarcá – Born in Armenia, Quindío, Colombia (1934), he assumed his pseudonym as a tribute to the brave chieftain Pijao who fought the Spanish occupation in the lands of Quindío. He is convinced of the social commitment of caricature, so his work, rather than claiming, demands at the cry of a pencil, a decent and fair space for the human being, without worrying, for this reason, that his work in political caricatography acquires times the banner tone. A militant communist, Calarcá has worked in the political cartoon genre since 1962, the date on which he joined the weekly magazine Voz de la Democracia, today Voz; watchtower of his principles from where he has denounced the paradox of a country that is falling apart in the hands of the corrupt, that disappears in the dark meanders of democracy, who dies massacred and gagged by the violent of all extremes. Between 1987 and 1990 he promoted and organized four versions of the Latin American Festival of Graphic Humor in Bogotá. Calarcá studied at the Moscow Institute of Political Science and Communication. There, the quality of his work deserved publication inCrocodile, the humor magazine with the largest circulation in the former USSR. He stands out in the genre of caricatographic physiognomy not only for his constant search for new ways of designing the human face, and therefore his permanent evolution in the genre, but also for the contribution he has made to different groups of caricatographers, through of the National School of Caricature, in Bogotá, Taller Dos in Calarcá and the multiple workshops that he has carried out, by special invitation, in different regions of the Colombian geography. His work in caricatographic physiognomy was recognized by the Mexico Cartoon Festival and by the X Biennial of Graphic Humor in Cuba, where he was a special guest and awarded for the bronze physiognomy of the poet Nicolás Guillén. Likewise, the Government of Quindío,At the tip of a pencil: the Quindío in the Colombian caricature . In September 2016 he receives in Pereira, Risaralda, Colombia, the Comic sin Fronteras award in the category: “Life and Work”.
Reference: tebeosfera.com, 2016
