A cartoonist is a visual artist who specializes in both drawing and writing cartoons or comics. Cartoonists differ from comics writers or comics illustrators/artists in that they produce both the literary and graphic components of the work as part of their practice.
Cartoonist Jack Elrod at work on a Sunday page of the Mark Trail comic strip
Benjamin Franklin's Join, or Die (May 9, 1754), credited as the first cartoon published in an American newspaper
A cartoon is a type of visual art that is typically drawn, frequently animated, in an unrealistic or semi-realistic style. The specific meaning has evolved, but the modern usage usually refers to either: an image or series of images intended for satire, caricature, or humor; or a motion picture that relies on a sequence of illustrations for its animation. Someone who creates cartoons in the first sense is called a cartoonist, and in the second sense they are usually called an animator.
Christ's Charge to Peter, one of the Raphael Cartoons, c. 1516, a full-size cartoon design for a tapestry
John Leech, Substance and Shadow (1843), published as Cartoon, No. 1 in Punch, the first use of the word cartoon to refer to a satirical drawing
Nast depicts the Tweed Ring: "Who stole the people's money?" / "'Twas him."
