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News Review July 2016

Americas

Canada

Culture

Pierre Huard’s thesis La parodie dans la bande dessinée franco-belge: Critique ou esthétisme? was posthumously published through the Presses de l’Université du Québec. Link (27/07/2016, French, BC)

USA

Culture

The Blacker the Ink: Constructions of Black Identity in Comics and Sequential Art, edited by Frances Gateward and John Jennings, won the Eisner Award for Best Academic/Scholarly Work. Link (English, WG)

The Comic Book Education Foundation (CBEF), a non-profit organisation promoting comics in the classroom to improve literacy, is hosting an event in Denver Colorado between the 7th and 9th October called the iCons Experience. It boasts Lectures, Roundtable Discussions, Critiques, and Networking Opportunities with over a dozen professionals from the comics industry. However, the website is still under construction. Link 1 (English, WG), Link 2 (English, WG)

Obituary

Richard Thompson, cartoonist for the comic strip Cul de Sac, has passed away at the age of 58. Link (27/07/2016, English, WG)

Jack Davis, a cartoonist perhaps best known for his work for EC Comics and Mad Magazine, passed away on the 27th July, aged 91. Link (28/07/2016, English, WG)

Research

There is a call for paper for the conference panel, Comics of the Margins: Visions from the Periphery in World Graphic Narratives, which takes place NeMLA’s annual convention in Baltimore between the 23rd and 26th March 2017. Abstracts are due by the 30th September 2016. Link (English, WG)

The call for submissions to the journal, Mechademia 2.0: Second Arc, has been extended to the 5th August. The theme for this issue is on “Childhood”. Link (08/07/2016, English, WG)

There is a call for papers for the collection, Comics and Medical Controversies. Submissions are due by the 31st October. Link (11/07/2016, English, WG)

From Daniel Boone to Captain America: Playing Indian in American Popular Culture, by Chad A. Barbour, has been published through the University Press of Mississippi. Link (English, WG)

There is a call for comics for the collection, Graphic Truths: The Making (and Unmaking) of a Doctor, to be published by Penn State University Press. Submissions are due by the 31st December. Link (English, WG)

Europe

Belgium

Obituary

Comics colorist Nine Culliford has passed away. She was the wife of Smurfs creator, Peyo. Link (05/07/2016, French, BC)

Research

Greice Schneider’s monograph What Happens When Nothing Happens: Boredom and Everyday Life in Contemporary Comics was published through Leuven University Press in their “Studies in European Comics and Graphic Novels” series. Link (15/07/2016, French, BC)

France

Culture

Jacques Tardi has been admitted to the Will Eisner Hall of Fame at the 2016 San Diego Comic-Con. Link (25/07/2016, French, LT)

Obituary

Didier Savard, creator of the Dick Hérisson series published by Darguad, has died aged 65. Link (06/07/2016, French, LT)

Germany

Culture

This year’s Animagic convention took place in Bonn from the 29th until the 31st July; guests included Takaya Kagami and Yamato Yamamoto. Link (German, MdlI)

An exhibition on comics in the GDR will be shown in Gera from the 6th August 2016 until the 19th February 2017. Link (28/07/2016, German, MdlI)

Research

A conference on superheroes and supervillains will take place in Berlin on the 22nd and 23rd September. Link (18/07/2016, German, MdlI)

The most widespread German library classification, Regensburger Verbundklassifikation (RVK), has been updated to incorporate comics and comics research. Link (25/07/2016, German, MdlI)

Portugal

Culture

The second book fair of independent illustration and comics in Lourinhã will take place from the 23rd July until the 6th August at the the OVO (Obras Visuais e Ofícios) building. Link (Portuguese, RR)

Until the 12th August, the book store El Pep is hosting a collective exhibition titled ‘Asian Graphic Documentary’. This exhibition has original works, published by Slowork Publishing, by five Asian comic artists from Taiwan, Hong Kong and Manila. Link (28/07/2016, Portuguese, RR)

Spain

Culture

The website Entrecomics has announced that it will cease its activities 10 years after its creation. Link (19/07/2016, Spanish, EdRC)

The Spanish journal El País has announced the creation of Ka-Bboom, a new digital space dedicated to comics. Link (18/05/2016, Spanish, EdRC)

Obituary

Paco Camarasa, editor and founder of Ediciones de Ponent, has passed away. Link (11/07/2016, Spanish, EdRC)

Research

A new number of the free academic journal Cuadernos de Cómic is available on-line to download. Link (01/07/2016, Spanish, EdRC)

Switzerland

Culture

An Aline Kominsky-Crumb and Robert Crumb exhibition is being shown in Basel until the 13th November. Link (05/07/2016, German, MdlI)

Research

A series of video interviews with comic creators has been published by Lucerne University of Applied Sciences and Arts. Link (English, MdlI)

UK

Jobs

There is a job listing that seeks a Lecturer/Senior Lecturer in Comics, Graphic Novels and Sequential Arts at Teesside University. The application deadline is the 10th August. Link (English, WG)

Research

Jillian Fleck reports on the Graphic Medicine 2016 Conference: Stages & Pages, held at the University of Dundee in early July. Link (29/07/2016, English, WG)

The Comics Grid has published its special collection, “Brilliant Corners: Approaches to Jazz and Comics”. Link (English, WG)

A new research network about comics and graphic novels has been set up by The Oxford Centre for Research in the Humanities (University of Oxford) called Comics and Graphic Novels: The Politics of Form. Link (11/07/2016, English, WG)

There is a call for papers for the conference, TRANSITIONS – New Directions in Comics Studies, which takes place at Birkbeck College, London, on the 19th November. Abstracts are due by the 26th August. Link (English, WG)

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Correspondents: Enrique del Rey Cabero (EdRC, Spain), Benoît Crucifix (BC, Belgium and Canada), William Grady (WG, United States and UK), Martin de la Iglesia (MdlI, Germany and Switzerland), Renatta Rafaella (RR, Portugal) and Lise Tannahill (LT, France).

Click here for News Review correspondent biographies.

Click here to see the News Review archive.

 
 

News Review June 2016

Africa

South Africa

Culture

Icon Gaming Convention took place in Johannesburg. For the first time the event featured panel discussions regarding animation, comic books and cartooning. All talks were live streated and will be available on YouTube within two weeks. Link 1, Link 2, Link 3 (English, MR)

Americas

Canada

Research

Canadian Graphic: Picturing Life Narratives, edited by Candida Rifkind and Linda Warley, has been published by Wilfrid Laurier University Press. Link (English, WG)

USA

Culture

75 years worth of Superman memorabilia will be exhibited at Cleveland Public Library. Link (21/06/2016, English, WG)

Research

In connection with the Billy Ireland Cartoon Library & Museum’s new exhibit on children’s comics, they offer a free to download edited collection of original essays on children’s comics entitled, Good Grief! Children and Comics. Link (English, WG)

Visualizing Jewish Narrative: Jewish Comics and Graphic Novels, edited by Derek Parker Royal, has been published through Bloomsbury. Link (English, WG)

There is a call for papers for the edited collection The Comics of Alison Bechdel: From the Outside In. Abstracts are due by the 1st December. Link (English, WG)

There is a call for papers for the conference, ‘Monstrous Women in Comics—an Interdisciplinary Conference on Women in Comics and Graphic Novels’, which takes place in May 2017 at the University of North Texas. Abstracts are due by the 1st September. Link (English, WG)

There is a call for papers for a range of panels relating to comics at the Northeast MLA Baltimore Conference, which takes place in March 2017. The deadline for proposals is the 30th September 2016. Link (English, WG)

Asia

Japan

Culture

Onthe 7th August, there will be a talk event with manga artist Eguchi Hisashi at Kyoto International Manga Museum. An exhibition of the work of the same artist, ‘KING OF POP’ is running until the 4th September. Link (English, JBS)

Obituaries

Shojo manga artist Sato Tomoe, who debuted in the popular girls manga magazine Ribon in 1965, has passed away at the age of 83. Link (02/06/2016, Japanese, JBS)

Europe

Belgium

Research

There is a call for papers for the upcoming conference titled ‘Tintin au XXIe siècle: territoires et temporalités’ in Louvain-la-Neuve on the 17 until the 20 May, 2017. Abstracts are due by the 15 September, 2016. Link (09/06/2016, French, BC)

France

Culture

The Strasbulles comics festival in Strasbourg held an exhibition on British comics, with Posy Simmonds, Pat Mills and Dave McKean. It also held a series of conferences on comics by young comics scholars of LaBrèche. Link (10/06/2016, French, BC)

Twelve comics experts and authors – among which Florence Cestac and François Schuiten – have proposed a project titled Angoulême, la renaissance, which offers propositions to renew the International Comics Festival of Angoulême, responding to the severe polemics the festival had faced in January. Link (03/06/2016, French, BC)

Research

In collaboration with the comics festival titled ‘On a marché sur la bulle in Amiens’, the Université Picardie Jules Verne hosted a study day on women and comics on the 2 June. Link (02/06/2016, French, BC)

Benoît Berthou and Jacques Dürrenmatt organised a study day, La Bande dessinée : quelles recherches? on the 10 June at the Sorbonne in Paris, bringing together Francophone scholars in order to think about the current state of comics studies. Link (10/06/2016, French, BC)

Germany

Culture

The award, Gustav-Heinemann-Friedenspreis für Kinder- und Jugendbücher, goes to Der Traum von Olympia by Reinhard Kleist this year. Link (17/06/2016, German, MdlI)

The festival, CosDay, will take place in Frankfurt am Main on the 9th and 10th July; guests include Martina Peters. Link (English, MdlI)

Law & Politics

Public funding for comic creators has been discussed in the Berlin state parliament. Link (13/06/2016, German, MdlI)

Research

A symposium on comics and animation will take place in Hanover in November 2016. Link (German, MdlI)

The half-day workshop, Blood in the Gutter: Uncertainty and Speculation in Contemporary American Comics, will take place in Bayreuth on the 15th July. Link (16/06/2016)

The ComFor panel presentations at this year’s Comic-Salon Erlangen have been made available as videos on YouTube. Link (23/06/2016, German, MdlI)

Portugal

Culture

On the 23rd and 24th July, the School Manuel António Pina, in Vila Nova de Gaia, will host the ‘Central Comics Fest’16’. Link (26/06/2016, Portuguese RR)

From the 23rd June until the 26th August, the Bedeteca of Amadora gallery is hosting an exhibition by the authors Augusto Trigo and Jorge Magalhães. The exhibition is organized by the Clube Português de Banda Desenhada. Free admission. Link (06/06/2016, Portuguese, RR)

Spain

Business

A new website for comics professionals (editors, authors, etc.) to share ideas and their work has been created. Link (09/06/2016, English, EdRC)

Culture

The 10th FNAC-Salamandra International Graphic Novel Prize is open to an original, totally new and completely unpublished graphic novel from any nationality and language. The competition is open until the 2nd December 2016.Link (06/06/2016, Spanish, EdRC)

The exhibition titled ‘Prehistòria i còmic’ can be visited at the Museu de Prehistòria de València until November. Link (06/06/2016, English, EdRC)

The exhibition ‘Valencia. Línea Clara’ can be visited at the Institut Valencià d’Art Modern until October. Link (09/06/2016)

Switzerland

Research

The essay collection Pucks en stock. Bande dessinée et sport, edited by Benoît Melançon and Michel Porret, was published through Georg. Link (05/06/2016, French, BC)

UK

Culture

9 Panels Comics Industry Conference took place on the 1st July, and hosted a range of academic and comics industry speakers. Link (English, WG)

Job

There is a job advertisement seeking a PR Assistant at Rebellion Comics. Link (English, WG)

Research

There is a call for papers for a special blog series for US Studies Online entitled, ‘Beyond the Graphic’ – Considering Violence, Sexuality and Obscenity in Comics. Abstracts are due by the 31st August. Link (English, WG)

Comics, Politics, and Adaptation was a one day symposium that took place at the University of Nottingham on the 1st July. Link (English, WG)

Oceania

Australia

Culture

The symposium Super Heroes and Me will be held at the Australian Centre for the Moving Image (ACMI) in Melbourne from the 8th until the 9th December 2016

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Correspondents: Enrique del Rey Cabero (EdRC, Spain), Benoît Crucifix (BC, Belgium, France and Switzerland), William Grady (WG, Canada, United States and UK), Martin de la Iglesia (MdlI, Germany), Renatta Rafaella (RR, Portugal), Moray Rhoda (MR, South Africa) and Jessica Bauwens Sugimoto (JBS, Japan).

Click here for News Review correspondent biographies.

Click here to see the News Review archive.

 

 
 

The Representation of Music and Musicians in Caricatures and early Comics (1830–1930): Three Case Studies.

Christian A. Bachmann

This article is the first part of a short series that deals with the representation of music and musicians in cartoons and early comics. European magazines such as Charivari (Paris), Punch (London), and Fliegende Blätter (Munich) published caricatures and picture stories about the virtues of music and her practitioners throughout the 19th century and beyond. Preoccupied with making their readers laugh, artists such as Grandville or Wilhelm Busch have often depicted the failing musical aspirant who makes his instrument and his audience churn. The rise of and constant debate about Wagnerian ‘modern music’ spurred the idea of oversized instruments, powered by steam engines that, accordingly, made the very same noise rather than delightful music. With the ascent of Franz Liszt and other virtuoso musicians in the 1830s and 1840s, a new stereotype entered the stage of the satirical magazines. The ideas, characters, motifs, and techniques developed for representing music and musicians were by no means limited to Europe, but also carried over to the United States where they were adapted for an American magazine readership and became part of the ideas and techniques on which the early newspaper comics were based. Unsurprisingly, because artists like Frederick Burr Opper and Frank M. Howarth, both of whom drew pictures stories about musicians, started out with their careers in US-magazines like Puck and Judge, before moving on to work for the newspaper industry around the turn of the century.

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Posted by on 2016/06/24 in Guest Writers

 

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The Bi-Monthly ComFor Update for June 2016

by Nina Heindl

The first half of 2016 has passed and it is time for a new bi-monthly update on comics studies-related news from Germany. Let me start with one of the biggest and certainly one of the highlights regarding comics-related events in Germany, the 17th Erlangen International Comic-Salon, which took place from May 26 to 29. A central part of the Comic-Salon is the trade fair with more than 150 exhibitors. Among the many simultaneous exhibitions was one dedicated to manga artist Jiro Taniguchi, one about comics and satire in Turkey, and one on Indian comics. As in past years, the ComFor contributed a lecture series to the supporting program. Organized by Clemens Heydenreich, five comics scholars gave talks on different aspects of the general topic “Drawn Borderline Walks. Comic Culture(s) Internationally”. The webcomic initiative Comic Solidarity also had an astonishing program, entitled “Webcomic in Focus” and directed by Lukas R.A. Wilde and organized by Eva Junker, with talks, discussions, workshops on digital comics, and book-signing sessions.

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Posted by on 2016/06/14 in ComFor Updates

 

CFP Comics Forum 2016 – Genre: A Conference on Comics

Comics Forum 2016

Comics Forum 2016 – Call For Papers

Genre: A Conference on Comics

Leeds Central Library, 3rd – 4th November 2016

Genre has played an active role in generating and shaping our knowledge and understanding of comics. It is a term that has been used to describe the medium itself (e.g. comics as a genre of literature), formats within the medium (e.g. the graphic novel as a genre of comics), and the various thematic clusters of stories told within comics (romance, western, horror etc.). Comics may support and adhere to the conventions, styles, structures and effects of a given genre, or they might redefine, challenge, and violate its definitions and boundaries through their form and content. While comics scholars have undertaken studies of genre in comics – particularly a strong and expanding corpus focusing upon the superhero genre, for instance – the subject remains relatively underdeveloped in Comics Studies by comparison with other fields such as Film Studies and Literary Studies. Comics Forum 2016, the eighth event in the annual conference series, will present a sustained discussion upon a wide range of subjects relating to comics and genre, and abstracts are invited for talks to be given at the event.

Subjects for discussion may include, but are not limited to:

-Specific genres or sub-genres in comics
-Genre blending and genre mash-ups in comics
-Genres in and/or across national comics traditions
-Bodies of work in a specific genre by an artist/writer
-Comics adaptations of genre works
-Comics and genre theory, or theoretical approaches to genre in comics
-Temporal approaches to genre in comics, or genre comics as social/historical constructs
-Comparative approaches to genre in comics
-Questions of genre and form
-Association of specific genres with gender and/or race
-Issues of production, distribution, censorship and reception of certain genre comics
-Arguments for/against genre classifications in comics

Proposals of 250 words are invited for talks of up to 20 minutes in length, and should be emailed along with a short biography (around 100 words) to comicsforum@hotmail.co.uk. Please put the phrase ‘CF2016 Paper Submission’ in your subject line. Proposals for panels of either 60 or 75 minutes are also welcome. If you wish to submit a panel proposal, please include the line ‘CF2016 Panel Submission’ in your subject line and make sure you include an indication of the panel’s length and biographies of all your speakers in your abstract. The deadline for submission is 25th July 2016 and notification of acceptance or rejection will be emailed by or before 8th August 2016.

 
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Posted by on 2016/06/10 in Comics Forum 2016