(from screen 1) From there the show moves chronologically through his years at The Village Voice. The anxieties of contemporary man (read Jules Feiffer) — marital, sexual, occupational — are wittily chronicled along with the hypocrisies of presidents and other politicians, the kind of satire that brought him a Pulitzer Prize in 1986.Although he is decidedly liberal in his own leanings, he is apolitical in his targets. As Mina Weiner, the curator of the exhibition, said, “Jules is an equal opportunity satirist.”

In the exhibition five fellow cartoonists pay tribute to Mr. Feiffer. Art Spiegelman praises him “for reinventing comics.” Garry Trudeau says, “No other cartoon in strip format was dealing on a regular basis with themes as adult as sex, politics, psychiatry.”

Reflecting on his career, Mr. Feiffer said, “I was always going to be a cartoonist.” At 17 he fulfilled a dream by being apprenticed to Will Eisner, the creator of the comic book hero the Spirit, but he soon realized that he was unable to draw in that bold, thick-brushed style. So he had to invent his own style, which is loose to the point of being wispy. His figures, including his self-caricature, are as wiry as a Giacometti sculpture.

As a humorist he came along in the late 1950's at the same time as Mike Nichols and Elaine May and the rise of improvisational comedy, and he felt there was an undeniable link. (Later Mr. Nichols was to direct the film “Carnal Knowledge,” written by Mr. Feiffer.) “It always seemed to me that doing cartoons is improvisation on paper,” he said.

From the start his drawings were very verbal, often talking heads with large text blocks. Gradually they became more physical. Speaking about the change, he said he began to emphasize “body language,” something he discovered while writing children's books. (continued on screen 3)