On plagiarism, Boligán and the contests that reward the recurrent idea
Hello! I bring a hot topic. Plagiarism, coincidences, profit with ideas of others. Nothing we do not know, in the world of illustration we also have a few cases. But I think that like this, few… or none.
The networks are starting to get hot, and I want to share with my friends and followers what is happening.
A few years ago, I wrote to Boligán (for those who don’t know him, a very recognized and award-winning cartoonist), in a private email, asking for explanations as a result of a drawing “his” award-winning in Istanbul. It was a version (little worked) of a drawing of mine that, curiously enough, had also been awarded in that same competition the previous year (which also does not leave very well the professionalism of the jury or the organization of the event). I gave him a touch of warning, because it wasn’t the first time I had done it, but it stayed there, between him and me.
Not much happened, I mean, my touch did not stop Boligán from plagiarizing, with more or less dissimulation.
But more than a year ago, I found out that a very offended Boligán had publicly denounced that he had been plagiarized, and curiously, just because of the drawing that 8 years ago had given him the touch. And I searched the Internet and found other denunciations of a Boligan, arrogant giving lessons in ethics and charging young cartoonists, many of them unknown beginners. (At the end of the post, I attach 2 of his writings to those who “plagiarized” him)
And I felt indignation.
I investigated further and found the page created by the cartoonist Julian Pena-pai ( https://bestcartoons.smugmug.com/search#q=boligan1&i=0 ) who has generously devoted much of his time to compiling all the coincidences, variants and blatant plagiarisms of graphic humour. With authors and dates. He has dedicated a good section to Boligán. To date we have counted 197 drawings, among coincidences, variants and plagiarisms more than evident. We only have to imagine what would happen if Boligan’s case were given, for example, in the music industry. It would be a worldwide scandal.
Fortunately, my livelihood many years ago ceased to depend on competition fees and this has allowed me the freedom to say what I think. So I decided to make this complaint public.
Neither I nor anyone else is exempt from coinciding punctually with the ideas of others, I have said it from the beginning and I repeat it again: it is almost impossible not to coincide in a world where the same codes and messages have been reduced to black and white. But in this case we are not talking about specific coincidences, but about bad practices. It is unethical for a cartoonist to grow up and benefit from the work of other colleagues.
