Americas

Canada

Research

Bart Beaty will speak about his research into Archie at the Modern Literature and Culture Research Centre, Ryerson University, on the 8th December. Link (English, WG)

United States

Business

The publisher that has brought the franchise, Assassin’s Creed, to the video game console has signed a distribution agreement with Diamond Comic and Diamond Book Distributors. Ubisoft currently offers their game-inspired graphic novels to book markets such as Amazon and Barnes and Noble, but these will soon be available at the local comic book stores as well. Link (English, MB)

Walking Dead #132 (Image), Death of Wolverine #4 (Marvel) and Thor #1 (Marvel) took the top three spots of Top 100 Comics for October, based on total unit sales invoiced. Other superhero stories to finish in the top ten included Avengers, X-Men, Batman, Spider-Man and Harley Quinn. Link (English, MB)

Marvel’s Ms Marvel Volume 1: No Normal and Hawkeye Volume 3: LA Woman placed in the top two spots for the Top 100 Graphic Novels for the month of October, based on total unit sales invoiced. Batman Volume 4: Zero Year Secret City from DC Comics rounded out in the third spot overall. Link (English, MB)

Culture

The Comic Book Legal Defense Fund and the Museum of Comic & Cartoon Art will host a holiday celebration at the Society of Illustrators Hall of Fame Gallery on the 10th December in New York City. Special guests include Paul Pope, Chip Kidd, Bob Fingerman, and Gregory Benton. Link (25/11/2014, English, MB)

Ohio State University’s Billy Ireland Cartoon Library & Museum will be celebrating the opening of the exhibition, King of the Comics: William Randolph Hearst and 100 Years of King Features, which takes place between the 13th December and the 15th March 2015, with a series of events taking place on the 13th December. Link (20/11/2014, English, MB)

Diamond Comic Distributors has announced they will partner with Baltimore Comic Con to bring the 2015 Retailer Summit to Baltimore. The show, in its 15th year, will take place between the 25th and 27th September 2015. Link (English, MB)

The Columbus, Ohio based Cartoon Crossroads Columbus (CXC) has announced its formation and intention to stage a four-day, yearly comics festival beginning in Fall 2016. Link (English, WG)

Research

Andrews McMeel Publishing just released the hardcover of The Art of Richard Thompson, by Bill Watterson, Nick Galifianakis, Chris Sparks, David Apatoff, and Michael Rhode. Thompson was the creator of the comic strip Cul de Sac. Link (25/11/2014, English, MB)

Michigan State University has announced its annual Comics Forum will be held between the 20th and 21st February 2015, with guest speaker the award winning cartoonist Sergio Aragones. The deadline for proposals for the conference is the 20th December. Link (24/11/2014, English, MB)

The Modern Language Association has announced it is seeking proposals addressing various approaches to teaching comics in the upcoming meeting titled, Developments in Comics Pedagogy, which is being held in Austin, Texas between the 7th and 10th January 2016. Statements summarising approaches are due by the 1st March  2015. Link (19/11/2014, English, MB)

The collection edited by Joseph J. Darowski, The Ages of the Avengers: Essays on the Earth’s Mightiest Heroes in Changing Times, has been published through McFarland. Link (English, WG)

Death, Disability, and the Superhero: The Silver Age and Beyond, by José Alaniz, has now been published through the University Press of Mississippi. Link (English, WG)

American Comics, Literary Theory, and Religion: The Superhero Afterlife, by A. David Lewis, has now been published through Palgrave Macmillan. Link (English, WG)

Asia

Japan

Culture

Kyoto International Manga Museum’s exhibition “Crossing Borders: Mahler’s Manga Park”, showcasing works by Austrian cartoonist Nicolas Mahler, is running from the 2nd December until the 8th February 2015. On the 6th December, there is a related event, where the artist will talk about his views of cartoons, comics, and manga. Link (English, JBS)

The exhibition “Yasuko Aoike’s 50th anniversary; A world of beautiful artwork from Eroica to Falco”, at Kyoto International Manga Museum is open until the 1st February 2015. On January the 17th, the artist will hold an autograph session. Link (Japanese, JBS)

Literary and poetry magazine, Eureka, published a special issue on the Yuri genre on the 27th November. The special issue contains essays by both Japanese and foreign experts. Link (27/11/2014, Japanese, JBS)

Professor and manga artist Keiko Takemiya, President of Kyoto Seika University, received the Purple Ribbon Award (by the Japanese government) for outstanding performance in the field of academic or artistic invention, improvement, and creation. Link (Japanese, JBS)

Research

The gender and sexuality group of the JSSCC (Japanese Society for Studies in Cartoons and Comics) is holding its 40th research meeting on the 21st December. Link (Japanese, JBS)

Europe

Austria

Culture

A 30 minute documentary feature on Nicolas Mahler was shown on German-language television. Link (23/11/2014, German, MdlI)

Belgium

Business

Bande dessinée publisher Dargaud is in talks to open a bande dessinée school to train artists in Marcinelle, Belgium. Link (27/11/2014, French, LTa)

France

Business

A watercolour of Corto Maltese auctioned in Paris has sold for €391,800, beating the “world record” for works concerning Hugo Pratt’s iconic character. Link (23/11/2014, French, LTa)

Satirical BD newspapers Charlie Hebdo and Siné Mensuel are both in serious financial difficulties, and are calling on readers for support. Link 1 (18/11/2014, French, LTa), Link 2 (14/11/2014, French, LTa)

Culture

Titeuf creator Zep and satirical cartoonist Plantu have both launched bande dessinée blogs on the website of Le Monde. Link (13/11/2014, French, LTa)

The programme for the 2015 Angoulême Festival has been revealed. Link (27/11/2014, French, LTa)

Germany

Business

Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung has ceased publishing comic strips. Link (02/11/2014, German, MdlI)

Culture

The Intercomic comics fair took place in Cologne on the 8th November; guests included Sarah Burrini and Burkhard Ihme. Link (02/11/2014, German, MdlI)

An exhibition of artists’ biographies in comics is shown in Ludwigsburg from the 23rd November until the 8th February 2015. Link (06/11/2014, German, MdlI)

Keith Knight held a series of lectures on ethnicity and police violence at universities in Siegen, Bremen, Osnabrück, Bochum and Berlin. Link (17/11/2014, English, MdlI)

The 15th annual comic market report, COMIC!-Jahrbuch, has been published. Link (20/11/2014, German, MdlI)

Obituary

Mosaik creator Hannes Hegen died on the 8th November. Link (13/11/2014, German, MdlI)

Research

Björn Hammel has published a book on webcomics. Link (German, MdlI)

The first issue of Closure, a new comics studies journal from Kiel, has been published and is available online. Link (German, MdlI)

Daumenkino, an online film magazine, has published a series of essays on comics-to-film adaptations. Link (German, MdlI)

Portugal

Culture

From the 5th to the 7th December, the city of Matosinhos will be hosting Comic Con Portugal, the first mega-event of pop culture. The program includes a range of national and international artists. Link (English & Portuguese, RR)

On the 21st November, João Amaral published the comic book, A Viagem do Elefante (The travel of the elephant). The book consists of the comics version of the book with the same title by well-known Portuguese author José Saramago. Link (12/11/2014, Portuguese, RR)

Romania

Culture

The first edition of ICE Comic Con took place in Bucharest. It featured American and European cartoonists, as well as workshops, exhibitions, gaming and cosplay competitions. Link (English, MP)

Spain

Culture

The exhibition Francisco Ibáñez, el mago del humor, which explores the work of the most successful Spanish comics author, is being shown at Círculo de Bellas Artes (Madrid) from the 21st October until the 18th January 2015. Link (20/10/2014, Spanish, EdRC)

The 15th edition of Encuentro del cómic y la Ilustración de Sevilla, which includes talks, exhibitions and workshops, will take place between November and December in Sevilla. Link (15/11/2014, Spanish, EdRC)

Juan Díaz Canales and Juanjo Guarnido have been awarded 2014’s Premio Nacional del Cómic (National Comics Prize) for their album Blacksad 5: Amarillo. Link (11/11/2014, English, EdRC)

Black is Beltza, a multimodal exhibition project about the comic of the same name, written by Herkaitz Cano and Jorge Alderete, is being shown at La Alhóndiga, Bilbao, from the 13th November until the 2nd February 2015. Link (05/11/2014, Spanish, EdRC)

Paco Roca. Dibujante ambulante, an exhibition about the work of Paco Roca, is being shown at Fundación Telefónica, Madrid, from the 20th November until the 15th February 2015. Link (10/11/2014, Spanish, EdRC)

Antonio Altarriba and Iosu Mitxelena will be hosting Cómic. Tertulia literaria, a cycle of conferences and analysis of major contemporary international comics from October 2014 to June 2015 in San Sebastian. Link (20/10/2014, Spanish/Basque, EdRC)

Issue 110 of the literature magazine, Peonza, is dedicated to international graphic novels. Link (22/11/2014, Spanish, EdRC)

Education

El cómic: nueva y poderosa herramienta en ética y comunicación, a seminar about the role of comics in medicine and ethics took place on the 12th November at the University of Zaragoza. Link (12/11/2014, Spanish, EdRC)

Research

Javier Mesón has started a crowd-funding project to self-publish Historia de un gángster sin alma, a book about the famous Spanish comic Torpedo. Link (25/11/2014, Spanish, EdRC)

Manga: Made in Japan, the eleventh and last volume of the encyclopedic Del tebeo al manga. Una historia de los comics, by Antonio Guiral, has been published and was presented on the 21st November. Link (18/11/2014, Spanish, EdRC)

UK

Culture

Forbidden Planet report on Thought Bubble 2014. Link (26/11/2014, English, WG)

Education

The University of Dundee has advertised places for AHRC-funded PhD studentships available in English. Specifying research proposals relative to Comics Studies, applications are due by the 22nd December. Link (14/11/2014, English, WG)

Research

The Inaugural Lecture of Professor Laurence Grove, “How to Get Away with Reading Comics in an Ancient University”, will take place on the 17th December at 5.15pm in The Humanity Lecture Theatre, University of Glasgow. Details can be found through the link under the “Inaugural Lectures” tab. Link (English, WG)

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News Editor: Will Grady (comicsforumnews@hotmail.co.uk)

Correspondents: Jessica Bauwens-Sugimoto (JBS, Japan), Michele Brittany (MB, North America), Enrique del Rey Cabero (EdRC, Spain), William Grady (WG, UK), Martin de la Iglesia (MdlI, Austria & Germany), Mihaela Precup (MP, Romania), Renatta Rafaella (RR, Portugal), Lise Tannahill (LTa, Belgium & France).

Click here for News Review correspondent biographies.

Click here to see the News Review archive.

Suggestions for articles to be included in the News Review can be sent to Will Grady at the email address above.