Palestine in Black and White

About the Book

Palestine in Black and White is an intimate and powerful portrayal of life under occupation from one of the most talented cartoonists working today.

Mohammad Sabaaneh has gained worldwide renown for his black and white sketches. His stark geometric figures and landscapes are rich with Palestinian visual traditions and symbols, while his haunting figures depict a vivid perspective of the occupation.

This first collection brings together one hundred of Sabaaneh’s most striking works, including cartoons that portray the experience of Palestinian prisoners, drawn while Sabaaneh himself was detained in an Israeli prison. The drawings do not flinch from revealing the reality that confronts Palestinians, from Israel’s injustices in the West Bank to their military operations on Gaza.

About the Author

Born in 1979, Mohammad Sabaaneh is a Palestinian painter and caricaturist. He has a daily cartoon in the Palestinian newspaper al-Hayat al-Jadida and his work is published in publications across the Arab world. Through the art of caricature, Sabaaneh has worked with deaf students to help them express themselves, and with children who have witnessed Israeli assaults to enable them to process their trauma. He lectures regularly about the art of caricature, including at An-Najah University (West Bank), the New School and School of Visual Arts (New York), and institutions in Spain and Great Britain. Sabaaneh is the Middle East representative for Cartoonist Rights Network International and the Palestinian ambassador for United Sketches, an international association for freedom of expression and cartoonists in exile. His work has been exhibited in solo and group shows around the world. Sabaaneh is the recipient of numerous awards, including the 2017 Marseille International Cartoon Festival Prix d’Or. He lives in Ramallah, Palestine.

Reviews

‘Palestine in Black and White is an intense communication of Palestinian life; bludgeoned, displaced, yet still resisting.’
Middle East Monitor

‘Narrates real stories of Palestinians’
The Daily Star Lebanon

‘The cartoons themselves cry out for a different future where both occupied and occupier can break out of their current patterns and frames, past walls and ribbons, into a freer life.’
Qantara

‘Each of Mohammad Sabaaneh’s powerful drawings is like a gut punch that gets straight to the essence of the stark reality of Palestinian life under Israeli occupation. This is how an artist resists.’
Joe Sacco

‘Despite working at a very complicated crossroads of ideology and political pressures, Mohammad Sabaaneh continues to produce sharp, incisive cartoons. His tenacity and courage is an inspiration for cartoonists around the world.’
Matt Wuerker, Pulitzer Prize-winning editorial cartoonist at Politico

‘If you want to get a smart Palestinan’s view of what’s happening in the Middle East, you can’t do better than look at Mohammad Sabaaneh’s cartoons—they tell you more than words can say.’
Victor Navasky, The Nation

‘Incisive artwork … multi-layered.’
Mint Press News