Award-winning artist and instructor David G. Brown will have his political cartoons on display at the Watts Towers Art Center.
“Politics, Race and Cartoons: Two Decades of Drawing my Own Conclusions” will debut with an opening reception on Sunday, May 4, and will continue until February 21, 2026. His editorial cartoons have been featured in the Sentinel for the last 20 years.
“I said, ‘well, why not have this exhibit be like a narrative of over two decades,’” said Brown. “Not only my experience, but also Black America.”
A gifted designer, photographer and illustrator, Brown grew up in West Atco, South Jersey outside of Atlantic City. He received his Bachelor’s Degree from Stockton University where he has received the Arts and Humanities Professional Achievement Award in 2011 and the Alumni Impact Award in 2023.
“I started doing political cartoons my freshman year in college,” said Brown.
“I’ve always loved art, drawing, comics and all that kind of stuff and so, they started a student newspaper, called The Argo Newspaper.”
It was the 70s and Brown shared he was very liberal at that point in time. He shared that in high school, he did paintings of Huey Newton, the Black Panther Party, Shaft, and was strongly influenced by Blaxploitation films.
“I remember going to see ‘Super Fly’ and for the first time seeing a Black character, who’s like the hero,” said Brown. “This was a great opportunity for me to speak for the students and especially from a more radical liberation point of view.
“I would do cartoons for the student newspaper about like, the dorms are too crowded, tuition is too high, we want more Black Studies. So, that’s where I started doing it, I started doing it for the college newspaper.”
Local businesses trying to get college students to patronize their establishments reached out to Brown having seen his cartoons. They wanted him to help advertise for their businesses.
“There was the pub, student night, St. Patrick’s Day or a fraternity night and so, they reached out to me to do cartoons that they could use in the advertisement,” said Brown.
“As I became more proficient at my cartoons, I went from being just the cartoonist to the associate editor.
“When I became the associate editor, I got involved with the advertising component of it and that’s actually where I learned how to do ads and that was the foundation of learning advertising.”
While in college, Brown worked for an advertising agency that did the Yellow Pages. This is where he said he refined his skills.
“I would contribute these cartoons that were relevant to what we did like somebody forgot to plug in the computer—just kind of workplace situations that was kind of humorous,” said Brown.
After college, Brown moved to Los Angeles in the mid 80s continuing to build his portfolio. In the 90s, after the L.A. Uprising, Brown created the comic book the “L.A. Phoenix”, a hero for the neighborhood of South L.A.
“I got some media attention from my L.A. Phoenix character that led to me doing an interview on CNN and a bunch of local programs and that led to my ‘Tales from the Kids,’” said Brown.
In the early 2000s, the Sentinel cartoonist at the time retired and the publication was looking for a cartoonist. An editor at the Sentinel was familiar with Brown’s comic book.
“They reached out to me and they asked me if I was interested and initially, I wasn’t really,” said Brown. “At the time, I was an art director/production manager for a marketing firm and I had been there like 15 years and that’s really where I honed my craft about design, catalogs and ads.”
Brown was receiving grants to do different projects. Some of those contracts included work on projects for the city of Los Angeles. However, in 2003, Brown’s contracts fell through, which led him to a crossroads of sorts.
“Sometimes in life, there are these turning points and serendipity,” said Brown. “I started doing the cartoons for the Sentinel.”
“Politics, Race and Cartoons: Two Decades of Drawing my Own Conclusions” will feature a number of galleries composed of two decades of political cartoons that have been featured in the Sentinel.
The galleries will feature editorial cartoons on subject matter such as slavery, phrases like, “I can’t breathe”, lynching, police injustice, gun violence, Black athletes, Barack Obama and more.
“I am grateful to the Sentinel and to have the platform and the opportunity to speak for so many of us that don’t really feel like they have a voice,” said Brown. “I just hope that I can make a difference in the community and America through what I do.”
Brown continued, “I think what happens with a cartoon, especially a powerful cartoon, that image resonates with you and you get a picture in your head. I think especially now, we’re at a time in our culture where so much is reels and images.”
For more information, visit www.wattstowers.org.
