Richard Short’s The Modern Child

For this month’s installment of Drawn to MoMA, cartoonist Richard Short created a story inspired by the 2012 MoMA exhibition Century of the Child: Growing by Design 1900–2000, which explored the ways in which artists and designers sought to protect children from the cares and corrupting influences of adult life. Based in London, Short is best known for comics featuring the lovelorn cat Klaus, most recently collected in Haway Man, Klaus! (2021). “The story touches on the space between the idealized childhood and the real,” says Short. “It features an imagined artist, perhaps someone like Isamu Noguchi, who believes in the power of aesthetic decisions to influence everyday life.” Many of the story’s references are personal. “The visual influences and objects featured in the story include my own childhood references like Early Learning Centre wooden railways, Willis Toys wooden puzzles (the colors of which I loosely borrowed), and Johillco lead soldiers, together with later interests like 1930s Italian comics and the artist Mizumaru Anzai.”

Richard Short is a cartoonist and lawyer from Northeast England. He lives in London.