In the exhibition catalogue, comic historian Paul Gravett writes that they were “a visual outlet for her staunch opposition to war, fascism and communism, even if it meant her courting controversy and censorship.She was a remarkable rarity for being such an outspoken and highly visible female political commentator.” These covers were also the birthplace for a small creature called Snork, a clear early version of Moomintroll, her now legendary plump, white cartoon hero. In 1929, she started to create covers for the satirical magazine Garm when she was just 15. Her cartoon work, though, helped to mark her as a political force and a philosophical soul. From her confident, bracing self-portraits to her atmospheric landscape paintings of her native Finland, her paintings are a tribute to her skills as both an artist and a storyteller. A major new exhibition at the Dulwich Picture Gallery, opening this week, will put these paintings on display, alongside drawings and cartoons from her extensive Moomin oeuvre. The Moomins remain Jansson’s biggest creative legacy, but she was a remarkable painter - if not as prolific as she would have liked to have been. (Photo: Finnish National Gallery / Jenni Nurminen) Tove Jansson, Comic strip Moomin on the Riviera, 1955, British Cartoon Archive, University of Kent.
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