400 cult drawings by Cabu exhibited to “make people laugh and think”
With his round glasses and his timeless bowl cut, he remains for some the designer who rocked their childhood in Recess A2before growing up and learning to appreciate his cartoons in Duck we Charlie Hebdo. These two facets of Cabu, we find them throughout the exhibition dedicated to him at the Hôtel de Région of Toulouse from this Tuesday, May 3. But also many others, that of his fights in particular for the environment or pacifism.
Or freedom of expression. And it is symbolically on this world press freedom day that it opens to the general public to discover the universe of the man who fell under the bullets of terrorists on January 7, 2015. Baptized “The laughter of Cabu”, this exhibition of 400 cult drawings, and sometimes unpublished, had already been presented in Paris in 2020, but cut short due to confinement.
Education to citizenship
On the initiative of the president of the region, Carole Delga, and the widow of the designer, Véronique Cabut, she is packing her bags for the first time in the provinces in Toulouse. Visitors could find the Grand Duduche there, but also the successive Presidents of the Republic sketched with humor. A way to discover the history of the Fifth Republic from a different angle. “We strive to reach all audiences. It’s a moment to go deeper into the knowledge of history”, explains Jean-François Pitet, the curator of the exhibition who is delighted to introduce high school students in particular to this work of a “free man”.
“We want to show diversity, we want to make people laugh and think,” adds Véronique Cabut, who recalls that her husband was attached to the region, he was a big fan of Narbonnais Charles Trenet and a loyal fan of the Marciac Jazz Festival.
If the spirit of this exhibition is guided by humour, the message also remains that of activism. “It’s a tribute to freedom of expression. I wanted it to be free because there is a cultural issue there but also an education in citizenship for the youngest, ”assures the socialist president of the Occitanie region, Carole Delga.