Twenty years of Lanzarote told in cartoons: Miguel Cabrera's show at the Chamber of Commerce

There is a way of doing politics that does not go through press releases: drawing. Cartoonist Miguel Cabrera has practised it for twenty years for the Chamber of Commerce of Lanzarote and La Graciosa, and now those drawings are gathered in one exhibition: 20 años de reivindicaciones ilustradas, in the courtyard of the Vivero de Empresas.

Where it comes from

The artist explained the origin of the idea at the opening on Thursday 24 September: the cartoon began as a tool of impact, to stop official files sinking into bureaucratic oblivion. Lanzarote's demands needed to be seen by the administrations, and a drawing gets where a forty-page report does not. Intelligent satire has the advantage of being read even by people who did not want to read.

What is on show

A graphic retrospective that is, in effect, a chronicle of two decades of island economy and island life: the requests, the delays, the battles won and the ones that were not. In the latest commemorative drawing the artist placed a large, strong tree, and a basket in the foreground: the fruits secured for La Graciosa.

The Chamber's president, José Valle, opened the event thanking the artist for his generosity: behind the graphic humour, he said, lies a deep dedication to this land.