'Ridder Bauknecht'. Translation: "Woman ahead!" - "Open the gate!" - "It's not a woman! It's a ladyboy! A rebuilt man!" - "Close the gate!" - "With breast implants!" - "Open the gate a little!".
Jeroom is a Belgian cartoonist, comic artist, animator and comedian, best-known as one of the house cartoonists of the magazine Humo. Since 1998, he developed several short-lived comic features, among them 'Ridder Bauknecht' (2000), 'Tettenman' (2001), 'Reetman' (2002), 'Joske Het Debiele Ei' (2004) and 'Het Knuffelbos' (2011-2014). Apart from comics and cartoons, Jeroom co-created the satirical photo collage column 'Het Gat van de Wereld' (2006- ). In the 2010s, he additionally collaborated with Jonas Geirnaert on absurd comics built around colorful Flemish media celebrities. Characterized by absurd, offensive and surreal gags, Jeroom's comedy contrasts innocent, child-friendly imagery with outrageously violent and sexual punchlines. In the 2010s, his media fame increased thanks to his relationship and eventual marriage with athlete Élodie Ouédraogo. During this decade, he also became more active as a TV comedian, comedy writer and host. He is most recognizable to Flemish TV audiences as a comedic jury member in the popular TV quiz 'De Slimste Mens ter Wereld'.
"Honey, can you hand me the fake shark fin of the little one?" "What are you going to do with it, Frank?" "An is swimming there, a patient of mine, who'll come by tomorrow. But I'm going to give her a real scare now!" "An, you have aids."
Early life
Jeroom Sebastiaan Snelders was born in 1977 in the Antwerp district of Borgerhout as the son of two teachers. His father Julien Snelders (1948-2006) was an English teacher at the Onze-Lieve-Vrouw-van-Lourdes school in Edegem, who was also notable as an expert and lecturer on the 1915-1916 Battle of Gallipoli. According to Jeroom, his father often took his family on holidays to the Turkish town of Gallipoli, and even received death threats from a far-right Turkish militia called the Grey Wolves for telling the historical truth about this battle. Jeroom recalled that the former battleground in Gallipoli still showed bones from fallen soldiers. As a child, Jeroom enjoyed drawing small cartoons in the margins of his notebooks. At school, he already noticed that he had a unique sense of humor, laughing at things others didn't find funny. And even though he had no particular fondness for comics, he has later ranked Kamagurka, Luc Cromheecke and Ever Meulen among his main graphic influences.
Between 1996 and 1999, Jeroom studied Graphic Design at the Sint-Lucas School of Arts in Ghent, but halfway through changed his course to illustration. One of his teachers was the world renowned illustrator Ever Meulen. When Jeroom was 20 years old, his older brother Boris died at the early age of 24 from a rare type of peritoneum cancer. Ten years later, his father passed away in his late fifties from oesophagus cancer. Devastated by their early deaths, his humor became more cynical, while he put life into another perspective. In 2023, Jeroom honored his late brother by making the road trip through Canada Boris Snelders had always wanted to make. Accompanied by Jonas Geirnaert and hiphop musician Bockie De Repper, their trip was made into an eight-episode TV show, and ended with Jeroom scattering his brother's ashes in the Takakkaw Falls.
Gag strip with the character Rudy. "I'm so sorry, sir! It was an accident!" "It's okay, I was on my way to the doctor anyway!"
Humo
While Jeroom was still a student, his teacher Ever Meulen helped him make his professional debut in the pages of the magazine Humo, where decades earlier Meulen himself had started his graphic career. Starting in January 1998, Humo ran Jeroom's first cartoons and comic strips: typically absurd and shocking comic gags in the tradition of Humo's house cartoonist Kamagurka. After graduation, Jeroom spent one day working at a washing powder factory, but strongly disliked the heavy work and instead increased his involvement with Humo. For eight years, he shared a studio with Kamagurka, who taught him some tricks of the trade. On occasion, the two men collaborated, for instance on a series of gags with 'Ratman', about a man with a dead rat in his mouth. Together with Kim Duchateau, Nix, Bart Schoofs and Pieter de Poortere, Jeroom formed a new wave of Flemish absurdists that emerged in the 1990s.
Cartoon by Jeroom. Translation: "And can you liberate that fish?" - "No, he's stuck too." - "My God, what a tragedy!".
Ridder Bauknecht
In 2000, Jeroom created his first recurring character in Humo, 'Ridder Bauknecht' ("Bauknecht the Knight"). This gag comic was a parody of Willy Vandersteen's chivalry comic 'De Rode Ridder', with the titular knight sharing his name with the German household appliance company Bauknecht. Bauknecht goes on absurd quests, though is mostly interested in "tetten" ("titties"). He is often seen in the company of his loyal friend, "Frans de Dode Ridder", whose name ("Frans the Dead Knight") is a pun on 'De Rode Ridder' ("The Red Knight"). As his name implies, Frans is literally a corpse. In 2013, publisher De Harmonie released a 'Ridder Bauknecht' comic book under the title 'Te Lui voor 3D' ("Too Lazy for 3D").
Tettenman
In 2001, another character with a certain durability was introduced in Humo's pages: 'Tettenman' ("Tittiesman"), a blond-haired superhero who, much like Ridder Bauknecht, is only interested in "titties". The storylines imply that he doesn't just want to see women naked, but even buys chopped off breasts from a plastic surgeon. Humo used this superhero parody in advertisements for the 2001 edition of the Werchter rock festival. Promos featured Tettenman with the tagline: "He's not here for the music!". Consequently, Tettenman was the first Jeroom character used for promotional purposes.
'Reetman'. Translation: "Goodbye!" - "One never gets used to it: your children leaving the house to live alone..."
Reetman
In 2002, Jeroom created an unexpected hit feature with 'Reetman' ("Assman"). Named after a body part, just like Tettenman, Reetman has a colossal hairy behind. Jeroom thought Reetman up while he was waiting in line in a Delhaize supermarket, staring at a tiny man with a huge behind. Many 'Reetman' gags feature the titular character using his asshole for all kinds of gross purposes. People hide inside it or rent it as their home. Other gags are more straightforward silly jokes, and the big-assed man even met the children's TV character Kabouter Plop and visited the Smurf village.
For reasons Jeroom never quite understood, Reetman struck a nerve with Humo's readers. Teens and young adults kept talking about the character in Humo's humorous readers' letters section 'Uitlaat', coming up with new jokes and one-liners. All while Jeroom had originally only intended Reetman for a few throwaway gags. But the success motivated him to use the big-assed buffoon more often. Again Jeroom used his creation for commercial purposes, such as Toshiba computers and Abanderado underwear. He also tried out some follow-up characters like Kutman ("Cuntman"), a man whose head is a literal vagina, but these didn't catch on.
Advertisement for Humo's pocket agenda 2011 starring Jeroom's Joske and Jonas Geirnaert's Kabouter Wesley.
Joske het Debiele Ei
In August 2004, Jeroom introduced his next popular character, 'Joske het Debiele Ei' ("Joske the Moronic Egg"), an anthropomorphic egg with a mustache. He constantly says stupid things which are obviously wrong or false. Most of his quotes refer to himself or his location. The simple, silly jokes appealed to Humo's readers and Joske was also featured in a lot of Humo advertisements. The character soon teamed up with Reetman in crossover episodes. Interviewed by Humo (issue #3458, 12 December 2006), Jeroom confessed that he had created Joske out of financial need. He wanted a simple character with instant commercial appeal.
'Het Knuffelbos' (Humo #3750, 20 July 2012).
Het Knuffelbos
In 2011, Humo's readership met the animals of 'Het Knuffelbos' ("The Cuddly Forest", 2011-2014). This gag comic stars a group of cute forest animals who have an obsession with dancing. Among them are a yellow rabbit, a mole, a panda and a piglet. They often make racist comments, and mutilate or rape other creatures. But whenever somebody complains or cries in agony, they simply yell: "Dansen!" ("Let's dance!") and form a polonaise, ignoring the problem. The concept bears a canny resemblance to the animated web series 'Happy Tree Friends' by Kenn Navarro and Rhode Montijo. 'Het Knuffelbos' was also used in a lot of Humo merchandising, including a smartphone app in which users could fill in their own speech balloons.
'Het Gat van de Wereld' from Humo #4109, 4 June 2019, poking fun at the Flemish extreme-right party Vlaams Belang.
'Het Gat van de Wereld' and other collage comics
Since 2006, Jeroom has been one of the creative brains behind Humo's satirical three-page editorial column 'Het Gat van de Wereld' ("The Hole of the World", with the word "gat" having a double entendre, also meaning "asshole"). Launched in collaboration with Jonas Geirnaert and Hugo Matthysen, this weekly two-page newspaper parody features fake news stories and photo comics. They poke fun at recent media events, both national and international. The style is very similar to the satirical news column 'Deng Herald' in the short-lived left-wing magazine Maomagazine (2001-2002) and its successor Deng (2003-2006). Since many of that magazine's editors later joined Humo, this similarity is perhaps not too surprising.
Although Jeroom has designed most episodes of 'Het Gat van de Wereld' himself, colleagues at Humo have also contributed jokes. Besides Matthysen and Geirnaert, among the most recurring gag writers have been Kamagurka, Bert Delapierre and former chief editor Guy Mortier. Most of the photos used in the collages are taken from Humo's personal archives, television screenshots or pictures found on the Internet. They receive humorous headlines or descriptions. Others are re-edited into photo comics. Jeroom has a huge collection of vulgar pornographic photographs which he also used for these montages. He often jokes that the police would probably arrest him if they saw all this filth together without context. In 2011, the best episodes of 'Het Gat van de Wereld' were compiled into the book 'Het Allerbeste uit Het Gat van de Wereld' (2011). A second volume was published in 2016.
On 4 November 2008, 'Het Gat van de Wereld' indeed got into legal troubles, although for entirely different reasons. One of their articles poked fun at the Belgian police chief Fernand Koekelberg who was accused of having an affair with his secretary. Rumors went around that the woman had benefited from their affair to receive a promotion. Jeroom depicted Koekelberg in a photo montage where he was given fellatio by nude women. Koekelberg and his secretary Sylvie Ricour sued and the judge ordered all issues of Humo that week to be retrieved. The editors obeyed and replaced them with issues which had blackboxed the controversial 'Gat van de Wereld' gag. Unavoidably, the controversial image had already been shown uncensored in TV journals for millions of viewers, while Humo's sales skyrocketed.
Jeroom strip from the 21 December 2016 issue of Humo. "Inhabitants of Molokai! I'm Father Damien, your new priest!" "It's a shame no other priest wants to lead the parish here!" "Yes, and that only because we are lepers!"
Since 'Het Gat van de Wereld' is published on a weekly basis, it left Jeroom with less time to draw. Most of his later comics were no longer hand drawn, but digitally created collage comics. He either traces photographs with a digital pen or makes montages based on pictures he found online. Jeroom also selects imagery from old-fashioned, realistically drawn illustrations and Photoshops them into new, weird and vulgar combinations. As a result, many of the later Jeroom comics are a mishmash of styles, combining hyperrealistic biblical sceneries or Ku Klux Klan pictures with imagery from Disney movies or cartoon characters like Bumba the clown. As the artist explained himself: "I combine two images and then you get something that exceeds the sum of those two parts".
Both his collage comics and work for 'Het Gat van de Wereld' have been imitated by other Flemish publications too, most notably De Standaard and Knack, who in the late 2000s introduced similar weekly satirical columns. Interviewed by Humo (issue #3877, 23 December 2014), Jeroom said that he dislikes most of his early comics, "because they are drawn so crummy". This explains why he mostly switched to photo collage comics and cartoons.
"Just ask me whatever you want, dearest. I'll make all your wishes come true..." "I want to feel like a woman through and through in a romantic environment..."
Style
Some have described Jeroom's style as the perfect mix between the elegant artwork of Ever Meulen and the brutal and absurd minimalism of Kamagurka, although Jeroom refuted that claim, stating that he just likes to use nice artwork for a good joke. Most of Jeroom's jokes involve a seemingly innocent situation which is subverted afterwards. The cartoonist has a preference for corrupting cute, sentimental, family-friendly or romantic moments and characters. His jokes are often sadistic and politically incorrect, but at the same time, he also enjoys poking fun at celebrities with a stuffy public image, particularly politicians. Interviewed by Humo, Jeroom explained that he doesn't make his comedy for everybody. His target audience are teenagers and tweens, as his crude, silly shock comedy appeals best to this demographic.
Humo covers of 5 August 2008 (with cameos by Tettenman, Reetman, Willy Vandersteen's Wiske (topless) and Belgian politician Bart De Wever riding a white rabbit, in reference to a real-life candid photograph the press took of him and his son at a theme park ride) and 28 June 2011 (featuring Ridder Bauknecht and a gorilla whose testicles cover Merlin's face, while being buried underneath the sand).
Success
In 2002 and 2003, the publishing company Grint released the first Jeroom compilation books, 'Rudy - Het Boek' and 'In het Hol van de Reet', followed in 2006 by 'Beerschot'. Recurring features like 'Tettenman', 'Het Knuffelbos' and 'Ridder Bauknecht' have later also received their own book publications, while his collage gags were collected in the book 'Hammertime' (De Harmonie, 2010).
Thanks to the sudden success of 'Reetman', Jeroom quickly got more commercial offers. He has made illustrations for the Averbode school magazines Reflector and Blikopener, as well as the Toneelhuisgazet. In the Netherlands, his work has appeared in NRC Handelsblad (where he illustrated cartoons written by Kamagurka) and the men's magazine Maxim. In England his work ran in the music magazine Mojo. Jeroom's cartoons have also been translated into German (in the German magazine Kreuzer and Swiss magazine Strapazin), French and Swedish. He also became a more prominent fixture in Humo, eventually taking over Kamagurka's place as official house cartoonist. He redesigned the logo of some of the magazine's weekly columns, such as the readers' sections 'Open Venster' and 'Uitlaat', and his cartoons were also featured more prominently in advertisements to promote the magazine.
In the social media era's "meme culture", many of Jeroom's cartoons were picked up internationally, and went viral through platforms like 4chan and Reddit.
"Excuse me sir, but the painter asks if we can move your table." "My table remains where it is! I have just as much right as other customers!"
Controversy
Oddly enough, despite his success at home and abroad, Jeroom still has to water down his style for some magazines and advertisers. Once Toshiba wanted to use his big-assed character Reetman in a promo ad, but didn't want his butt to be too visible. Jeroom then made a drawing in which Reetman's behind was sawed shut, with blood dripping down. He expected to be turned down, but they actually greenlighted this image. By the same token, Jeroom also noticed that the Dutch magazine Maxim only accepted his cartoons if Kamagurka had scripted them. Each time he sent them something he had created on his own, it was rejected for being too offensive. Some people have actually felt offended by Jeroom's cartoons. Journalist and TV humorist Marc Reynebeau, who has an eye condition called strabismus, didn't like two Jeroom cartoons that poked fun at his cross-eyed look.
Another time Jeroom used a throwaway character named "the Walloon without a job" and had him appear in the background of well-known crowd scenes. In one episode the character popped up in a waffle feast picture from Marc Sleen's comic strip 'Nero'. Sleen complained about this unauthorized use of his characters and Jeroom offered a public apology in Humo's next issue. On 16 December 2016, Jeroom made a parody of a Christmas card, written for children who suffer from Tourette's syndrome. It read: "I wish you a merry... Cunt! Turds! Piss!". An advocay group for Tourette's registered an official complaint at Unia, the Interfederal Centre for Equal Opportunities and Opposition to Racism and Discrimination. Another time, Jeroom depicted Catholic humanitarian activist Mother Teresa in bikini, driving a motorcycle. A Christian community wrote an angry mail, announcing that they would boycot Humo magazine from now on, "so they could feel the pain they felt when seeing this image."
'Wouter Beke' (Humo #3703, 23 August 2011), starring real-life christian-democratic politician Wouter Beke. When a provincial governor dies, he discovers his "provincial warrants" and wants to take them, but his conscience interferes, asking him what legendary head of the christian-democratic party Wilfried Martens "would do"? Beke then thinks about Martens' secret love affair with fellow party member Miet Smet (whom the real-life Martens would later marry).
Collaborations with other artists
In the early 2000s, Jeroom illustrated some gag comics written by Kamagurka and Urbanus. Later that decade he sometimes made crossover cartoons and drawings combining 'Joske het Debiele Ei' and Ever Meulen's character 'Balthazar de Groene Steenvreter'. However, Meulen didn't draw Balthazar himself, but simply gave Jeroom permission to use the character. Since the 2010s, Jeroom has often teamed up with fellow Humo cartoonist Jonas Geirnaert, featuring their respective characters Joske and Kabouter Wesley in crossover strips and Humo merchandising. Together they also made nonsensical comics about Flemish media celebrities. One featured Wouter Beke, a christian-democratic politician with a rather stuffy public image. Geirnaert and Jeroom portrayed him as some kind of superhero, fighting against other politicians. In the end, the comic helped Beke gain fame among people otherwise uninterested in politics. In 2012, the comics were compiled by Borgerhoff & Lamberigts in the book 'Wouter Beke - De Niet-Geautoriseerde Biografie'.
During the 2012 and 2018 World Championship Football, Geirnaert and Jeroom made a comic series about the Belgian national association football team The Red Devils, portraying the individual players in similar absurd adventures. Jeroom and Geirnaert wrote the gags and the stories together, but Jeroom was the sole artist. He took pre-existing photographs of the celebrities, which he "clumsily" traced and colorized with a computer graphics program.
'Rode Duivels' (Humo #3852). The Red Devils make their faces "unrecognizably ugly" to avoid unauthorized use of their likenesses. After the man who complained about it left, football player Steven Defour is told that "he can remove his ugly face again" (with others unaware that it IS his real face).
TV career
In 2011 Jeroom was a contestant in the popular TV quiz 'De Slimste Mens ter Wereld'. He didn't win, but managed to survive enough rounds to make it to the finale. Viewers found him funny and so he returned the next season as a permanent member of the jury panel. Like all other recurring jury members, he serves as a comedic sidekick, telling jokes in between questions and rounds. Jeroom also wrote gags for humorous shows on the Flemish TV channel Vier, including 'De Idioten' (2015-2016). Together with Jan Dircksens and Jan Reymen, he wrote the sitcom 'Geub' (2019), broadcast on the pay channel Play More, starring Philippe Geubels and Jonas Geirnaert.
In the Netherlands, Jeroom became a recognizable face by hosting 'De Roast of Johnny de Mol' (2016) on Comedy Central. In this program Dutch celebrities were lovingly ridiculed and insulted in a comedy "roast". He also co-hosted the game show 'Praat Nederlands Met Me' (2018) on RTL4 and provided a funny look on current events in the summer talkshow 'Zomer met Art' (2019). Jeroom additionally directed the 2009 music video for 'I'm With My Girl' by the Belgian rock band The Galacticos, who won Humo's Rock Rally that year. Jeroom brought a goat to the video recording, which made it into the clip. In 2020, he presented 'Junior Bakeoff', a juvenile spin-off of the cooking show 'Bakeoff Vlaanderen'. Together with Philippe Geubels, he has hosted the Dutch edition of the 'LOL: Last One Laughing' format, in which comedians share a house together but are not allowed to laugh.
Still from a 'Daan en Seppe' short.
Animation career
In the 2000s, some of Jeroom's cartoons were animated, usually to serve as advertisements for Humo, the Rock Werchter Festival or as video bumpers during Humo's annual Pop Poll Shows. Between 2004 and 2005, Jeroom directed animated TV commercials for the SMS service of the music video channel TMF. The shorts featured two characters he created exclusively for TMF, namely the youngsters Daan and Seppe, voiced by Adriaan Van Der Hoof (Seppe) and Tom De Wispelaere (Daan). Each episode had the obese Seppe give the short-sized, squeaky-voiced Daan far-fetched tips on how to pick up girls. The shorts always ended with Seppe accidentally wounding Daan, although Daan always acted as if it was nothing. In 2005, the characters also starred in a music video based on a remix of Willy Sommers' classic 1971 pop song 'Zeven Anjers, Zeven Rozen'. Under the influence of LSD, the duo praises the schmaltzy lyrics. The concept was very similar to the animated music video of 'I Got You Babe' (1994), in which Mike Judge's Beavis & Butt-head interact with pop singer Cher. In 2014, Jeroom also signed a contract with the American TV channel Comedy Central to create 30 animated shorts based on his comics, broadcast on the show 'TripTank'.
Private life
In 2010, Jeroom gained media fame outside of the Humo audience through his relationship with the former Belgian athlete Élodie Ouédraogo. They married in 2011 and have one son together. Since she is a black woman of Burkinabé descent, it also silenced criticism of some of Jeroom's more politically incorrect cartoons, which target women and black people. Interviewed by Humo (issue #3458, 12 December 2006), Jeroom clarified that these jokes are meant within the boundaries of a left-wing, progressive and anti-racist magazine like Humo and that it would horrify him if they ever appeared on a far-right or Neo-Nazi site. In 2014, vandals wrote the slur "Nigger!" on the house of TV journalist Peter Verlinden and his Rwandese wife. Jeroom reacted by posting a photoshopped picture of his home, with an official plaque reading the offensive word. In a Twitter message, he explained: "Here at home, we're way ahead of vandalism."
Cartoon by Jeroom, mocking Disney's 'The Little Mermaid'.
Graphic contributions
Jeroom designed the album cover for 'Het Ergste uit 'Het Leugenpaleis' (2005), a compilation of memorable moments from the comedy radio show 'Het Leugenpaleis' by Bart Peeters and Hugo Matthysen. He is also the house illustrator for Matthysen's rock parody band The Clement Peerens Explosition and creative director for The Foodmaker, a Belgian producer of fresh salads for supermarkets, run by Jeroom's close friend Lieven Vanlommel. In June 2010, Jeroom was one of several cartoonists to pay tribute to Kamagurka and Herr Seele's 'Cowboy Henk' character in a special homage comic strip published in Humo. On 16 April 2014, it was revealed that Jeroom had decorated the personal Ferrari of cycling champion Tom Boonen in his trademark photo collage style. Among the images on the car's bonnet were Mother Teresa depicted as a pin-up.
On 1 January 2017, several Belgian cartoonists and graphic designers, including Jeroom, Gal, Zaza and Jonas Geirnaert, teamed up to redecorate various out-of-use "70 km/h" speed signs. The signs had become useless after 70 km/h became the new regular speed norm outside of the inner city. They were exhibited in Studio Herman Teirlinck in Brussels and the profits went to the non-profit organization Rondpunt. On 8 April 2021, Jeroom made a design for a few BMW M2 Racing Cup Benelux racing cars.
Recognition
In 2002, Jeroom won the Press Belgium Cartoon Award for a cartoon poking fun at the troubled cyclist Frank Vandenbroucke. At the time, Vandenbroucke had been caught doping, but claimed that the illegal medication in his house was actually meant for his dog. Jeroom therefore drew a cartoon depicting Vandenbroucke's dog with enormously developed muscles. His TV show 'Boris' won the "HA! van Humo" award for Best TV program of 2023, as well as the 2024 Kastaar media award for "Best Newcomer".
Legacy and influence
Jeroom has been cited as an influence by Tom Borremans, Katrien van Schuylenbergh and Kim Duchateau, and his particular style of collage humor can also be compared with the Dutch internet humorist Kakhiel.
Jeroom with his Knuffelbos characters. Photo: Yorick Jansens.