Pulitzer Prize Winning Cartoonist and Alumnus Berkeley Breathed to Address College of Communication Graduates, May 22

Event: Cartoonist, author, illustrator, director, screenwriter and alumnus Berkeley Breathed (BJ ’79) will deliver the College of Communication spring 2009 convocation address.

When: 3 p.m., May 22, 2009

Where: The Frank Erwin Center on The University of Texas at Austin campus, 1701 Red River. A map is available online.

Background: Breathed is best known for Bloom County, a 1980s cartoon-comic strip that dealt with socio-political issues as seen through the eyes of highly exaggerated characters (e.g. Bill the Cat and Opus the Penguin) and humorous analogies. The strip, which earned the Pulitzer Prize for editorial cartooning in 1987, appeared in more than 1,200 newspapers around the world until he retired the daily strip in 1989.

He replaced this strip with the surreal Sunday-only cartoon, Outland in 1989, which featured some of the Bloom County characters, including Opus the Penguin and Bill the Cat. He ended Outland in 1995. Eight years later, Berkeley began producing the comic strip, Opus, a Sunday-only strip featuring Opus the Penguin. His first regularly published strip, Academia Waltz, appeared in the Daily Texan in 1978.

In addition to his syndicated cartoon work, he also has produced seven children's books, two of which, A Wish for Wings That Work and Edwurd Fudwupper Fibbed Big, were made into animated films.

Breathed, his wife and their two children live in Southern California. His complete bio is available on his Web site: http://www.berkeleybreathed.com.

Learn more about the College of Communication commencement ceremony.

###

Contact:
Erin Geisler
(512) 475-8071