2015 as seen by Swiss cartoonists

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© ALEX Alexandre Ballaman Humour is the answer to the deadly attack on the editorial offices of Charlie Hebdo in January 2015. Cartoons allowed only with police protection. The police tape reads "laughter scene". Alexandre Ballaman

© Carlo Schneider The political right – and in particular the conservative right Swiss People's Party – was the big winner of the federal elections in October. Helvetia, the symbol of the Swiss Confederation, stands on a board that slides to the right, supported by party figurehead Christoph Blocher (left) and the journalist Roger Köppel, who was newly elected to the House of Representatives. "Yes, yes, it's possible," says Köppel. Carlo Schneider

© SWEN Silvan Wegmann "Is it spring everywhere in Switzerland?" SWEN uses the Solar Impulse airplane as inspiration for an illustration showing the difficulties faced by the Liberal Green Party. After the 2011 elections, where they racked up a surprising victory, the party suffered a string of defeats in 2015: their people's initiative calling for replacement of the value-added tax with an energy tax was resoundingly rejected at the polls, and in the October federal elections the party lost five of its 13 members of the House of Representatives and both seats in the Senate. Silvan Wegmann

© ALEX Alexandre Ballaman No comment needed. It should be noted only that Sepp Blatter, outgoing president of the World Football Association FIFA, is Swiss. ALEX Alexandre Ballaman

© SWEN Silvan Wegmann Sepp Blatter was an inspiration for many cartoonists this year. SWEN Silvan Wegmann

© Patrick Chappatte A scandal for the end of the summer: tens of thousands of cars produced by Volkswagen were found to be outfitted with a software designed to simulate better emission values at auto inspections. Patrick Chappatte

© TOMZ Tom Künzli Two men have the parliament building on a leash. TOMZ comments on the untransparent lobbying by several Swiss politicians on behalf of Kazakhstan. Tom Künzli

© Max Spring The octopus Google stretches its tentacles around the entire planet. The Swiss telecommunications company Swisscom – holder of the local.ch news website – tries desperately to resist the US concern. Max Spring

© Patrick Chappatte A cry for war by French President François Hollande the day after the Paris attacks. Patrick Chappatte

© Felix Schaad Molenbeek, the neighbourhood in Brussels where several of the Paris assassins grew up. Reporter Tintin and his dog Snowy, the heroes of the Belgian comic strip, are suddenly blind. Felix Schaad

© SWEN Silvan Wegamnn On December 9, 2015, parliament elected Guy Parmelin, a member of the Swiss People's Party, to the Swiss cabinet. The new cabinet member is a vintner by profession. "Now let's divide up the ministries," he says. SWEN, Silvan Wegamnn

© Peter Schrank A wave of refugees floods Europe, which would rather ignore the situation. Peter Schrank

© TOMZ Tom Künzli The figurehead of the Swiss People's Party, Christoph Blocher, and his daughter Magdalena Martullo Blocher contemplate the parliament building, as he promises "This will all belong to you someday". But he is reminded that 20% will go to inheritance tax, which the party opposed. The patriarch gave his daughter control over his chemical company, the EMS Group, years earlier. In October she was elected to the Swiss parliament. Tom Künzli

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Migration, terrorism, elections, the FIFA scandal... the past year had no shortage of topics to inspire Swiss cartoonists.

Since 2008, around 50 Swiss cartoonists have presented their work as part of the exhibition GezeichnetExternal link. This year for the first time the exhibition can be seen at Bern’s Museum of CommunicationExternal link.

Members of the public are invited to vote for the cartoon of the year. The exhibit will also try to break down the cultural barriers between Switzerland’s four language regions.

“Swiss cartoons aren’t as spectacular as those of Britain or France, but for around 40 years there have been a multitude of outstanding caricaturists who also address international issues,” said art historian Philippe Kaenel in a swissinfo.ch article about satire. These include artists like Chappatte, whose cartoons appear regularly in prestigious newspapers like the New York Times, or Mix & Remix, whose drawings are often published by Le Courrier International.

Although 2015 was a year full of events that inspired cartoonists, it marked an especially tragic year in the annals of satire with the January attack on the editorial offices of the magazine Charlie Hebdo in Paris.

(Text: Daniele Mariani, swissinfo.ch)