Monkey Day is an unofficial international holiday celebrated on December 14. The holiday was created and popularized in 2000 by controversial artists Casey Sorrow and

Eric Millikin Eric Millikin is an American artist and activist based in Detroit, Michigan. He is known for his pioneering work in artificial intelligence art, augmented and virtual reality art, conceptual art, Internet art, performance art, poetry, post-In ...

when they were art students at

Michigan State University Michigan State University (Michigan State, MSU) is a public university, public Land-grant university, land-grant research university in East Lansing, Michigan. It was founded in 1855 as the Agricultural College of the State of Michigan, the fi ...

. Monkey Day celebrates

monkey Monkey is a common name that may refer to most mammals of the infraorder Simiiformes, also known as the simians. Traditionally, all animals in the group now known as simians are counted as monkeys except the apes, which constitutes an incomple ...

s and "all things

simian The simians, anthropoids, or higher primates are an infraorder (Simiiformes ) of primates containing all animals traditionally called monkeys and apes. More precisely, they consist of the parvorders New World monkeys (Platyrrhini) and Catarrhi ...

", including other non-human

primate Primates are a diverse order of mammals. They are divided into the strepsirrhines, which include the lemurs, galagos, and lorisids, and the haplorhines, which include the tarsiers and the simians (monkeys and apes, the latter including huma ...

s such as

ape Apes (collectively Hominoidea ) are a clade of Old World simians native to sub-Saharan Africa and Southeast Asia (though they were more widespread in Africa, most of Asia, and as well as Europe in prehistory), which together with its sister g ...

tarsier Tarsiers ( ) are haplorhine primates of the family Tarsiidae, which is itself the lone extant family within the infraorder Tarsiiformes. Although the group was once more widespread, all of its species living today are found in Maritime Southeast ...

s, and

lemur Lemurs ( ) (from Latin ''lemures'' – ghosts or spirits) are Strepsirrhini, wet-nosed primates of the Superfamily (biology), superfamily Lemuroidea (), divided into 8 Family (biology), families and consisting of 15 genera and around 100 exist ...

s.Millikin, Eric. (December 14, 2012).
Eric Millikin: For Monkey Day, the 5 wildest monkey stories of 2012
. ''

Detroit Free Press The ''Detroit Free Press'' is the largest daily newspaper in Detroit, Michigan, US. The Sunday edition is titled the ''Sunday Free Press''. It is sometimes referred to as the Freep (reflected in the paper's web address, www.freep.com). It primari ...

'' Monkey Day is celebrated worldwide and often also known as World Monkey Day and International Monkey Day.

Origins

Monkey Day was created and popularized by contemporary artists Casey Sorrow (an internationally published illustrator and printmaker) and

(a Pulitzer Prize winning occult and artificial intelligence artist), beginning in 2000 when they were both art students at

. Sorrow jokingly scribbled Monkey Day on a friend's calendar,McKenzie, Charlie (December 8, 2005).
Holiday monkey business
". ''

Hour An hour (symbol: h; also abbreviated hr) is a unit of time conventionally reckoned as of a day and scientifically reckoned between 3,599 and 3,601 seconds, depending on the speed of Earth's rotation. There are 60 minutes in an hour, and 24 ho ...

''Klein, Sarah (December 10, 2003).
Monkeying around with the holidays
. ''

Detroit Metro Times The ''Detroit Metro Times'' is a progressive alternative weekly located in Detroit, Michigan. It is the largest circulating weekly newspaper in the metro Detroit area. History and content Supported entirely by advertising, it is distributed f ...

'' and then they first celebrated the holiday with other MSU art students, creating monkey artwork, wearing monkey costumes and imitating monkey behavior. The holiday continued to gain notoriety every year as Sorrow and Millikin included Monkey Day in their artwork and

alternative comics Alternative comics cover a range of American comics that have appeared since the 1980s, following the underground comix movement of the late 1960s and early 1970s. Alternative comics present an alternative to mainstream superhero comics which ...

that they published online and exhibited internationally along with other artists.Sorrow, Casey (December 14, 2006).
2006 Comics... It begins...
. ''Monkey Day Comics'' Since then, Monkey Day has been widely celebrated across countries such as the

United States The United States of America (U.S.A. or USA), commonly known as the United States (U.S. or US) or America, is a country primarily located in North America. It consists of 50 states, a federal district, five major unincorporated territorie ...

Canada Canada is a country in North America. Its ten provinces and three territories extend from the Atlantic Ocean to the Pacific Ocean and northward into the Arctic Ocean, covering over , making it the world's second-largest country by tot ...

Italy Italy ( it, Italia ), officially the Italian Republic, ) or the Republic of Italy, is a country in Southern Europe. It is located in the middle of the Mediterranean Sea, and its territory largely coincides with the homonymous geographical re ...

India India, officially the Republic of India (Hindi: ), is a country in South Asia. It is the seventh-largest country by area, the second-most populous country, and the most populous democracy in the world. Bounded by the Indian Ocean on the so ...

Pakistan Pakistan ( ur, ), officially the Islamic Republic of Pakistan ( ur, , label=none), is a country in South Asia. It is the world's List of countries and dependencies by population, fifth-most populous country, with a population of almost 24 ...

Estonia Estonia, formally the Republic of Estonia, is a country by the Baltic Sea in Northern Europe. It is bordered to the north by the Gulf of Finland across from Finland, to the west by the sea across from Sweden, to the south by Latvia, a ...

, the

United Kingdom The United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland, commonly known as the United Kingdom (UK) or Britain, is a country in Europe, off the north-western coast of the continental mainland. It comprises England, Scotland, Wales and North ...

Colombia Colombia (, ; ), officially the Republic of Colombia, is a country in South America with insular regions in North America—near Nicaragua's Caribbean coast—as well as in the Pacific Ocean. The Colombian mainland is bordered by the Car ...

Thailand Thailand ( ), historically known as Siam () and officially the Kingdom of Thailand, is a country in Southeast Asia, located at the centre of the Indochinese Peninsula, spanning , with a population of almost 70 million. The country is bo ...

, and

Turkey Turkey ( tr, Türkiye ), officially the Republic of Türkiye ( tr, Türkiye Cumhuriyeti, links=no ), is a list of transcontinental countries, transcontinental country located mainly on the Anatolia, Anatolian Peninsula in Western Asia, with ...

. Laverne, Lauren (December 14, 2009).
BBC Radio with Lauren Laverne
. ''

BBC Radio BBC Radio is an operational business division and service of the British Broadcasting Corporation (which has operated in the United Kingdom under the terms of a royal charter since 1927). The service provides national radio stations covering th ...

Hallmark Cards Hallmark Cards, Inc. is a private, family-owned American company based in Kansas City, Missouri. Founded in 1910 by Joyce Hall, Hallmark is the oldest and largest manufacturer of greeting cards in the United States. In 1985, the company was award ...

describes the holiday as a "day when monkey business is actually encouraged." ''

The Washington Post ''The Washington Post'' (also known as the ''Post'' and, informally, ''WaPo'') is an American daily newspaper published in Washington, D.C. It is the most widely circulated newspaper within the Washington metropolitan area and has a large nati ...

'' describes Monkey Day as a day to "learn something about these adorable and highly intelligent primates. Or you could use this day to act like a monkey." Monkey Day is particularly popular among animal rights and environmental activists, and visual artists and arts institutions. Monkey Day's celebrants and supporters include

Jane Goodall Dame Jane Morris Goodall (; born Valerie Jane Morris-Goodall on 3 April 1934), formerly Baroness Jane van Lawick-Goodall, is an English primatologist and anthropologist. Seen as the world's foremost expert on chimpanzees, Goodall is best know ...

Greenpeace Greenpeace is an independent global campaigning network, founded in Canada in 1971 by Irving Stowe and Dorothy Stowe, immigrant environmental activists from the United States. Greenpeace states its goal is to "ensure the ability of the Earth t ...

National Geographic ''National Geographic'' (formerly the ''National Geographic Magazine'', sometimes branded as NAT GEO) is a popular American monthly magazine published by National Geographic Partners. Known for its photojournalism, it is one of the most widely ...

, the National Portrait Gallery in London, the

Louvre The Louvre ( ), or the Louvre Museum ( ), is the world's most-visited museum, and an historic landmark in Paris, France. It is the home of some of the best-known works of art, including the ''Mona Lisa'' and the ''Venus de Milo''. A central l ...

Museum, the

Metropolitan Museum of Art The Metropolitan Museum of Art of New York City, colloquially "the Met", is the largest art museum in the Americas. Its permanent collection contains over two million works, divided among 17 curatorial departments. The main building at 1000 ...

, and the

Smithsonian Institution The Smithsonian Institution ( ), or simply the Smithsonian, is a group of museums and education and research centers, the largest such complex in the world, created by the U.S. government "for the increase and diffusion of knowledge". Founded ...

Traditional celebrations

Zoo and animal sanctuary events

Many zoos hold annual Monkey Day events. For example, the

Lahore Zoo Lahore Zoo ( Punjabi: , ur, لاہور چڑیا گھر) in Lahore, Punjab, Pakistan, established in 1872, one of the largest zoos in Pakistan. It is currently managed by the Forest, Wildlife and Fisheries department of the Government of Pakistan. ...

in Pakistan holds an annual World Monkey Day celebration that includes art competitions and educational events about monkeys, including over a hundred children wearing monkey masks, poetry readings about monkeys, and performances to highlight monkey evolution as well as the threats monkeys face. The

Tallinn Zoo Tallinn Zoo is a zoo in Tallinn, Estonia, that was founded in 1939. It is the only zoo in Estonia, and as of 2012, it housed 13,336 animals representing 548 species. Since 2009, it is the most visited zoo in the Baltic states. History In 1937, a ...

in Estonia celebrates Monkey Day by auctioning artwork created by chimpanzees and performing intelligence tests on

Japanese macaque The Japanese macaque (''Macaca fuscata''), also known as the snow monkey, is a terrestrial Old World monkey species that is native to Japan. Colloquially, they are referred to as "snow monkeys" because some live in areas where snow covers the gr ...

s. The

Indira Gandhi Zoological Park Indira Gandhi Zoological Park is located amidst Kambalakonda Reserve Forest in Visakhapatnam, Andhra Pradesh, India. It is the third largest zoo in the country. The zoological park is named after the former Prime Minister of India, Indira ...

in India organizes Monkey Day programs to educate children about wildlife issues and encourage people to adopt monkeys. The Faruk Yalçın Zoo and Botanical Park in

Darıca Darıca ( el, Δάριτζα, from the Byzantine τὰ Ῥίτζιον) is a town and district of Kocaeli Province in the Marmara region of Turkey. It was ceded from Gebze district in 2008. The current mayor is Şükrü Karabacak, former head co ...

, Turkey, hosts Monkey Day events to draw attention to declining monkey populations. The

Edinburgh Zoo Edinburgh Zoo, formerly the Scottish National Zoological Park, is an non-profit zoological park in the Corstorphine area of Edinburgh, Scotland. The land lies on the south facing slopes of Corstorphine Hill, from which it provides extensive v ...

in Scotland uses Monkey Day events including monkey story telling to raise awareness of the dangers that primates face worldwide. Since 2009, the Colombian Association Primatological ''APC'' (for its acronym in Spanish) has celebrated Monkey Day. During the week of Monkey Day, the

National Zoo & Aquarium The National Zoo and Aquarium is a privately owned zoo and aquarium in the Australian capital city of Canberra. It is located in Yarralumla at the western end of Lake Burley Griffin, next to Scrivener Dam. It recently had a major expansion, wi ...

in Australia holds a range of activities and educational talks, raising awareness for all primates and raising money for conserving critically endangered species like Cotton-top Tamarins in Columbia. The Zoo Debrecen in Hungary celebrates Monkey Day by allowing visitors to share meals with

tufted capuchin The tufted capuchin (''Sapajus apella''), also known as brown capuchin, black-capped capuchin, or pin monkey is a New World primate from South America and the Caribbean islands of Trinidad and Margarita. As traditionally defined, it is one of th ...

s and

mantled guereza The mantled guereza (''Colobus guereza''), also known simply as the guereza, the eastern black-and-white colobus, or the Abyssinian black-and-white colobus, is a black-and-white colobus, a type of Old World monkey. It is native to much of west ...

Art exhibitions

Prominent artists like Sorrow, Millikin,

Rob Balder Robert T. Balder is a professional cartoonist and singer-songwriter. He graduated from Roanoke College with a major in English in 1993 and, after a variety of jobs, entered a seven-year career in IT, starting as a manager of database development ...

, and

David Malki ''Wondermark'' is a webcomic created by David Malki which was syndicated to ''Flak Magazine'' and appeared in ''The Onion'' print edition from 2006 to 2008. It features 19th-century illustrations that have been recontextualized to create humorous ...

have created Monkey Day themed comics and artwork.Sorrow, Casey (December 16, 2005).
The End of Monkey WebComics 2005
. ''Monkey Day Comics'' For Monkey Day 2012, Millikin created ''The 12 Stars of Monkey Day'', a series of paintings published by ''

USA Weekend ''USA Weekend'' was an American weekend newspaper magazine owned by the Gannett Company. Structured as a sister publication to Gannett's flagship newspaper ''USA Today'' and distributed in the Sunday editions of participating local newspapers, i ...

'' that were "in part inspired by the many pioneering

space monkeys The Space Monkeys are an English alternative band, formed in Middleton, Greater Manchester in 1995. The band consisted of Richard McNevin-Duff, Tony Pipes, Dom Morrison and Chas Morrison. After working with the band for a number years, Neil ...

who rode into the stars on rockets, leading the way for human space flight."Millikin, Eric (December 12, 2012).
The 12 Stars of Monkey Day
". ''

'' In 2013,

created a

mail art Mail art, also known as postal art and correspondence art, is an artistic movement centered on sending small-scale works through the postal service. It initially developed out of what eventually became Ray Johnson's New York Correspondence Scho ...

series where he mailed Monkey Day cards to strangers, including Koko the sign-language gorilla and President

Barack Obama Barack Hussein Obama II ( ; born August 4, 1961) is an American politician who served as the 44th president of the United States from 2009 to 2017. A member of the Democratic Party, Obama was the first African-American president of the U ...

.Millikin, Eric (December 12, 2013).
Eric Millikin sends Monkey Day cards to strangers
. ''Detroit Free Press'' For Monkey Day 2014, Millikin created a 3D monkey experience. Since 2016, Millikin has created the ''Danger Beast'' series of

street art Street art is visual art created in public locations for public visibility. It has been associated with the terms "independent art", "post-graffiti", "neo-graffiti" and guerrilla art. Street art has evolved from the early forms of defiant graff ...

portraits of endangered animals created out of endangered plants, including a portrait of

Harambe Harambe (May 27, 1999 – May 28, 2016) was a western lowland gorilla who lived at the Cincinnati Zoo from 2014 to 2016, and previously at the Gladys Porter Zoo for 15 years. On May 28, 2016, a three-year-old boy climbed into a gorilla enclosu ...

the gorilla made from

Venus flytrap The Venus flytrap (''Dionaea muscipula'') is a carnivorous plant native to subtropical wetlands on the East Coast of the United States in North Carolina and South Carolina. It catches its prey—chiefly insects and arachnids—with a trapping ...

s. In addition to his monkey-themed artwork, Sorrow also maintains a comprehensive "Monkeys in the News" blog with stories on topics like monkey attacks, monkey smuggling, and monkey science. Every Monkey Day, Sorrow's "Monkeys in the News" blog counts down the previous year's "top 10 Monkey and Primate News highlights".Sorrow, Casey. (December 14, 2012).
Happy Monkey Day 2012!
. ''Monkeys In The News''

Fundraising

Often, Monkey Day celebrations involve raising money for primate-related issues. In 2008, the official Monkey Day celebrations included an art show and silent auction to benefit the Chimps Inc. animal sanctuary; the show and auction included art by human artists as well as paintings from chimps Jackson and Kimie, residents of the sanctuary. The Biddle Gallery in Detroit also celebrated Monkey Day in 2008 with an annual Monkey Day art sale that included a free banana with each purchase. For 2013, the

International Primate Protection League The International Primate Protection League (IPPL) is a not-for-profit animal welfare organization founded in 1973 in Thailand by Shirley McGreal. IPPL's main focus is to promote the conservation and protection around the world of all non-huma ...

celebrated Monkey Day and raised money for conservation by offering life-drawing classes where people could learn to draw portraits of Gary the

gibbon Gibbons () are apes in the family Hylobatidae (). The family historically contained one genus, but now is split into four extant genera and 20 species. Gibbons live in subtropical and tropical rainforest from eastern Bangladesh to Northeast India ...

.Strong, Sharon (December 9, 2013).
Celebrate Monkey Day: Paint it Forward for IPPL
. ''Charleston Patch''(December 5, 2013).
Painting for Primates on International Monkey Day
". ''International Primate Protection League''

says "Monkey Day is the perfect time to swing into action and help protect primate habitat by becoming a forest defender."

Parties

The holiday is also celebrated with costume parties intended to help draw attention to issues related to

s, including medical research, animal rights, and

evolution Evolution is change in the heritable characteristics of biological populations over successive generations. These characteristics are the expressions of genes, which are passed on from parent to offspring during reproduction. Variation ...

. Often there are competitions to see who has the best costumes, who can act like a monkey the longest or perform the most amusing impression of one, or speed

knitting Knitting is a method by which yarn is manipulated to create a textile, or fabric. It is used to create many types of garments. Knitting may be done by hand or by machine. Knitting creates stitches: loops of yarn in a row, either flat or i ...

of monkey dolls.GateHouse News Service (Dec, 14, 2010).
Morning Minutes for Tuesday, December 14
. ''Herkimer Telegram'' Other Monkey Day activities include going on shopping sprees for

Paul Frank Paul Frank (full name Paul Frank Sunich, born August 29, 1967 in Huntington Beach, California) is an American cartoonist, artist and fashion designer. He is the creator of all the characters from Paul Frank Industries, including Julius the mon ...

"Julius the Monkey" fashions, eating

Ben & Jerry's Ben & Jerry's Homemade Holdings Inc., trading and commonly known as Ben & Jerry's, is an American company that manufactures ice cream, frozen yogurt, and sorbet. Founded in 1978 in Burlington, Vermont, the company went from a single ice cream p ...

Chunky Monkey ice cream, and spending the day at the zoo.Brenner, Lisa (December 14, 2010).
Party Like Rhesus Witherspoon: Today Is Monkey Day!.
". ''

LAist Gothamist LLC is the operator, or in some cases franchisor, of eight city-centric websites that focused on news, events, food, culture, and other local coverage. It was founded in 2003 by Jake Dobkin and Jen Chung. In March 2017, Joe Ricketts, ...

'' Often when monkeys cause trouble, such as a monkey driving away in a stolen bus, the monkey is said to be honoring the traditions of Monkey Day.

Movies and music

Films and music about monkeys and other nonhuman primates are popular at Monkey Day events. In 2005,

Peter Jackson Sir Peter Robert Jackson (born 31 October 1961) is a New Zealand film director, screenwriter and producer. He is best known as the director, writer and producer of the ''Lord of the Rings'' trilogy (2001–2003) and the ''Hobbit'' trilogy ( ...

's ''

King Kong King Kong is a fictional giant monster resembling a gorilla, who has appeared in various media since 1933. He has been dubbed The Eighth Wonder of the World, a phrase commonly used within the franchise. His first appearance was in the novelizat ...

'' was released on the fifth anniversary of Monkey Day. For Monkey Day 2014, the creators of '' Night at the Museum: Secret of the Tomb'' released a short feature starring Crystal the Monkey. Mainstream American films like ''King Kong'' and ''

Planet of the Apes ''Planet of the Apes'' is an American science fiction media franchise consisting of films, books, television series, comics, and other media about a world in which humans and intelligent apes clash for control. The franchise is based on Frenc ...

'' films are popular at Monkey Day parties,The Times Leader (Dec, 10, 2012).
FIVE THINGS TO KNOW THIS WEEK: Monkey Day, a piece of cake, and Gollum's 'precious'
". ''

Times Leader The ''Times Leader'' is a privately owned newspaper in Wilkes-Barre, Pennsylvania. Founding Founded in 1879, it was locally owned until being purchased by Capital Cities in 1978. Early history On November 27, 1907, the ''Wilkes-Barre Time ...

'', pg. 1A as well as

monkey Kung Fu Monkey Kung Fu or Hóu Quán (猴拳, "monkey fist") is a Chinese martial art which utilizes ape or monkey-like movements as part of its technique. There are a number of independently developed systems of monkey kung fu. Some are integrated ...

films like ''Lady Iron Monkey''. Monkey-themed songs, such as Major Lance's " The Monkey Time" and

The Rolling Stones The Rolling Stones are an English rock band formed in London in 1962. Active for six decades, they are one of the most popular and enduring bands of the rock era. In the early 1960s, the Rolling Stones pioneered the gritty, rhythmically d ...

song "

Monkey Man Monkey Man may refer to: Fiction *Monkey Man (film), ''Monkey Man'' (film), a film starring and directed by Dev Patel * Axwell Tiberius, the eponymous simian character in the 1993–1999 comic book series ''Monkeyman and O'Brien'' Songs *Monkey M ...

", are also part of Monkey Day festivities.Jackson, Ashawnta. (December 4, 2012).
A December Holiday Playlist (No, Not That Holiday)
". ''

WNYC WNYC is the trademark and a set of call letters shared by WNYC (AM) and WNYC-FM, a pair of nonprofit, noncommercial, public radio stations located in New York City. WNYC is owned by New York Public Radio (NYPR), a nonprofit organization that di ...

References

External links

Monkey Day website
{{Apes December observances Unofficial observances Monkeys in popular culture Apes in popular culture