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Santiago Bara is an artist from Spain who creates humorous and aesthetically pleasing illustrations as a commentary on modern life. He started making these "little cartoons" as practice for more serious jobs, but they unexpectedly evolved into something bigger than that, and now the artist has more than 7k followers on Instagram.

Santiago's creations attract attention with their simplicity and accurate depiction of the present-day world. He makes people laugh by highlighting the absurd elements of today's society. Santiago's inspiration comes from the real world and his interactions with people. The artist believes that the clash between one's expectations of the world and what one then finds in everyday situations can be a good starting point for a comic.

If you want to see more Bored Panda posts about Santiago and his work click here or here.

More info: Instagram | sbara.bigcartel.com

Bored Panda has reached out to Santiago again, wanting to find out more about his recent work. First, we asked how he decides which ideas to pursue and turn into full-fledged comics. He told us: “Well, for the ideas for the comics, I don't set out to find a theme, but they come up in everyday life and the things I see or read. Although looking at what I do in retrospect, in reality, it's clear that I'm almost always circling around no more than two or three themes (love, memory, alienation...).”

We wanted to know his view about the role humor plays in art, and in society. Santiago said: “Humor works as a lightener, a sugar coating that makes it bearable to talk about certain things. Although there are certain people for whom humor on some subjects is not tolerable. Especially jokes related to identity issues, both political and tribal.”

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Incisive And Hard-Hitting New Comics By Artist Santiago Bará (24 Pics)

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Elena Doyle
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12 months ago DotsCreated by potrace 1.15, written by Peter Selinger 2001-2017

From what I am interpreting from this: kids start out as thinking outside the box and using creative thinking skills and through the years with the public school system, they are compressed mentally into what the school wants them to be. Their creative skills are discouraged and it is basically like a really slow process of brainwashing. That’s the public school system for you… and it’s only getting worse. I think the video for Pink Floyd’s “Another Brick in the Wall” describes this perfectly.

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Asked about particularly challenging or rewarding experiences he has had as a comic creator, Santiago mentioned: “The most satisfying experience making the comics I do is the sharing of my work. That it reaches readers anywhere in the world, and they empathize with it and feel represented.”

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Incisive And Hard-Hitting New Comics By Artist Santiago Bará (24 Pics)

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Nikki Sevven
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12 months ago DotsCreated by potrace 1.15, written by Peter Selinger 2001-2017

Playing expressively is much more pleasing to your audience. They won't notice the slight departures from strict tempo, but they'll remember how the song made them feel.

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Next, we wanted to know what in his opinion sets his artwork apart from that of other comic creators. Santiago explained: “I don't think there are any major aspects that differentiate me from other creators. Maybe some of my vignettes tend to be a bit ambiguous, or even abstract and do not leave a 100% clear resolution. But, although those are my favorites, I think that in general, they are the ones that people like the least.”

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Lastly, we were curious if there are any artists or creators who have influenced Santiago’s work. He told us: “I'm influenced by everything I come across. For example, I've recently been reading about Frida Kahlo, and beyond the icon that everyone knows, there is a very inspiring life and work. I found it very motivating. Or another recent example, which has nothing to do with the art world, are the interviews I've seen with biologist Michael Levin. I think I understand about 10% of what he says, but what ideas? Very crazy.”

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Incisive And Hard-Hitting New Comics By Artist Santiago Bará (24 Pics)

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Bec
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12 months ago DotsCreated by potrace 1.15, written by Peter Selinger 2001-2017

Sometimes it upsets me to visit museums with mummies, it's weird that it is somehow ok to dig a person up and display them. Cremation for me.

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Incisive And Hard-Hitting New Comics By Artist Santiago Bará (24 Pics)

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Charlee C.
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12 months ago (edited) DotsCreated by potrace 1.15, written by Peter Selinger 2001-2017

Bored Panda. Censoring suicide is certainly part of the problem. For f**k's sake.

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Incisive And Hard-Hitting New Comics By Artist Santiago Bará (24 Pics)

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The Original Bruno
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12 months ago (edited) DotsCreated by potrace 1.15, written by Peter Selinger 2001-2017

God, I remember the way the pro-marijuana protestors would absolutely trash the parks. I haven't seen trash like that since before trash clean-ups of greenspaces started to become a thing in the late '70s.* I know there have been some unfair and misdated images of environmental protests; I do not mean those. But Hell, pot-heads I you gotta do better. (Maybe they do by now, this was a long time ago.) (*When I was a kid, urban greenspaces would often collect trash for years. You really can't imagine how disgusting it was. America went through its own phase of looking like those pictures you see of India's trash... not so long ago.)

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Incisive And Hard-Hitting New Comics By Artist Santiago Bará (24 Pics)

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StrangeOne
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11 months ago DotsCreated by potrace 1.15, written by Peter Selinger 2001-2017

The stem is where we start out and it branches out in many directions. Notice the different veins have different lengths, and the points of the leaf, as well. We take many paths in our lives and each one determines how far we'll make it out to old age.

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Incisive And Hard-Hitting New Comics By Artist Santiago Bará (24 Pics)

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The President
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11 months ago DotsCreated by potrace 1.15, written by Peter Selinger 2001-2017

The jury let's their organs decide? One follow the heart, one follows the brain, guts, etc? These are all so good because there's no one meaning to it.

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Incisive And Hard-Hitting New Comics By Artist Santiago Bará (24 Pics)

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fair_weather_rose
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12 months ago DotsCreated by potrace 1.15, written by Peter Selinger 2001-2017

I think this roughly translates to "I need you to need to be important to me," but I'm honestly slightly confused

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Incisive And Hard-Hitting New Comics By Artist Santiago Bará (24 Pics)

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jBeachey
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11 months ago DotsCreated by potrace 1.15, written by Peter Selinger 2001-2017

There needs to be explanations with these illustrations so we know what point he’s trying to make.

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