Hamid Soufinejad was born in 1980, he is a cartoonist, caricaturist, painter and illustrator, he has MA in illustration, but mostly known for his cartoons. He is one the Iranian famous cartoonists who has collaborated with papers; Hamshahri, Jam-e-Jam, Javan, he has won awards from different national and international contests and has held several solo exhibitions and participated in group exhibitions too.

He has created many cartoons on the subject of Corona virus too.

Soufinejad has received 5 prizes from different international contest during the current year, and has won the first prize of Kartoenale contest for the second time.

Here is our interview with him:

What was the theme of the third Olense Kartoenale contest?

‘A visit to the museum’

Please tell us about your work.

I have sent several cartoons to this contest, but the one that received the prize is a cartoon I created in eighties when I was a student. I recreated it two times and sent it.

Please describe it a little. What is in that person's hand? I think the circle where the image of people eating is his imagination and a reference to the Last Supper?

The subject I worked on was visiting the museum, and in this work, you see a picture of a chef entering the museum and delivering 13 pizzas, the same as the number of characters in Da Vinci's Last Supper painting.

In this work, I was thinking of a simple situation comedy, and I simplified it as much as possible so that the main subject would be more visible.

Being a winner of a contest for two times shows the importance of your works and it may also question the winner. What is the reason in your opinion?

 I am very happy about this and I consider it as a grace of God. Unfortunately, despite winning five international awards, no one supported me, and nobody even thinks about how artists cope with this situation, this is what bothered me.

 I have an institution and due to the Corona and the difficult regarding the high rent, I have terminated the contract and stayed at home. Even the newspapers publish cartoons no longer. There used to be workshops that are no longer held.

And regarding the prizes, unfortunately, we cannot receive our prizes due to the sanctions. It is very difficult for us to receive prizes through intermediaries because it takes several months for this to happen and if we do not have someone living abroad, we may not receive them at all! Thank God my brother lives in US and I was able to get some of my rewards through his account.

What other prizes have you received?

 I won first prize of the 32nd Belgian Cartoon Competition last year, and less than a month later I won second prize of the Yomitos International Competition in Greece. After that, I won the special prize of the Montenegro International Competition and the second place in the International Press Cartoon Competition of India.

Recently, we have been witnessing the creation of caricatures by you. What is the reason?

I have always wanted to gain experience at caricaturist.

Mahatma Gandhi’s caricature by Hamid Soufi in which signs of special style can be seen

What does matter more for you in caricature?

I wish I could have my own painting style in caricature which is a long way to take.

What activities are you doing these days?

I mostly paint and I do book illustrations

Do you want to add something more?

Thank you, I hope the government pays more attention to the artists and this attention will not be limited to just remembering them. Many friends are alive with their work, otherwise they will die. I wish they would be supported as long as they are alive, because no dead person expects from anyone.

We congratulate you for your prizes.  Wish you success.