The Lakes International Comic Art Festival is delighted to announce more guests for its Festival weekend (12th – 14th October 2018) in Kendal, including Kate Evans and Frank Quitely.
The latest guests revealed are Hunt Emerson (Calculus Cat, Bloke’s Progress), the Etherington Brothers (Long Gone Don, Monkey Nuts), Kate Evans (author of Threads from the Refugee Crisis), New Yorker cartoonist The Surreal McCoy(author of The Wolf of Baghdad), Luke McGarry (Sad Chewie), Frank Quitely(Judge Dredd Megazine, All Star Superman), Bryan Talbot (Grandville), Mary Talbot (Dotter of her Father’s Eyes) and Emma Vieceli (BREAKS).
Guests announced so far for this year’s Festival weekend are Steven Appleby, Yomi Ayeni, Sayra Begum, Elizabeth Breitweiser, Corey Brotherson, Stanley Chow, Guy Delisle, Alan Grant, Ottilie Hainsworth, Rian Hughes, Kripa Joshi, Joe Kelly, Ian Kennedy, Kaisa Leka, Victoria Lomasko, Steve McGarry, Graeme McNee, Mikiko, Emmi Nieminen, Ken Niimura, Ian Rankin, David Silverman, Orijit Sen, Seth and John Wagner.
The Festival is the only one of its kind in the UK, taking place in one of the country’s most beautiful areas – the English Lake District, in the market town of Kendal. Modelled on European-style festivals, such as Angouleme in France, it takes over the whole town for a weekend of comic art. Its aim is to celebrate the whole spectrum of comic art, inspiring existing comic art fans and creators and, it hopes, generating new audiences and creators too. It invests in creators through a commissioning programme and has an emphasis on developing international collaborations.
“We’re delighted to be welcoming both new and returning faces to this year’s Festival,” said Festival Director Julie Tait. “Together with guests already announced, the latest creators to be announced, who include some of our patrons, reflect the wide range of ‘comic voices’ we want to bring to the attention of both comics fans and the wider public.”
“Another great line-up of guests that reflects the diversity always promoted by LICAF,” says Festival patron Bryan Talbot of this year’s growing guest line-up. “Whatever your taste in comics, you won’t be disappointed. This year will be bigger than ever.”
Guest Spotlight – Hunt Emerson
Hunt Emerson was born in Newcastle-upon-Tyne in 1952, and has drawn cartoons and comic strips since the early 1970’s. His work has appeared in countless magazines and comics, and he has regular long-running spots in The Beano(children’s comic), Fiesta (sex magazine) and Fortean Times (journal of unexplained phenomena and weird stuff). Hunt has published around 30 comic books and albums, mainly with Knockabout Comics (London).
Titles of Hunt’s books include Calculus Cat, Hot Jazz, You are Maggie Thatcher (with Pat Mills) and his hilarious comics adaptations of Lady Chatterley’s Lover, Casanova, The Rime of the Ancient Mariner and Dante’s Inferno. His latest work Bloke’s Progress (with Kevin Jackson) is based on the ideas of Victorian critic and philosopher John Ruskin and is released by Knockabout Comics in May.
Hunt has been given several comics industry awards including Strip Cartoonist of the Year and he has been the guest of comics and cartoon festivals around the world ranging from Rathdrum, Ireland to Murmansk, USSR. In 2000 he was named as one of the 75 Masters of European Comics by the CNBDI, the noted French comics Academy.
Guest Spotlight – The Etherington Brothers
The Etherington Brothers have been making all-ages comic adventures for over a decade, and are the creators of Long Gone Don, Monkey Nuts, Freaky and Fearless, Baggage and Von Doogan. They have also created comics, stories and art for Star Wars, How to Train Your Dragon, Transformers, Kung Fu Panda, Wallace & Gromit and James Bond.
The brothers have toured the world performing sold out shows on creativity and storytelling. Using their unique blend of humour, improvisation and enthusiasm, they have empowered hundreds of thousands of children to take their first creative steps into the greatest storytelling medium on Earth – COMICS!
Guest Spotlight – Kate Evans
Kate Evans is a cartoonist, artist, author, mother and activist.
She is the author of Threads from the Refugee Crisis, graphic reportage from the refugee camps of Northern France, the first graphic novel to be nominated for The Orwell Prize. She has also written Red Rosa: a graphic biography of Rosa Luxemburg, as well as Funny Weather, a graphic guide to climate change, Copse, about environmental protest, The Food of Love, on breastfeeding and Bump, about pregnancy and birth.
Current projects include the children’s book Don’t Call Me Princess and a forthcoming graphic biography of Antonio Gramsci.
She is unafraid of tackling serious subjects through the light-hearted medium of comics. “If you can make someone laugh, you’re halfway to changing their mind.”
Guest Spotlight – Carol Isaacs aka The Surreal McCoy
The Surreal McCoy is a cartoonist published in the New Yorker, Spectator, Sunday Times and many other unlikely places, illustrating books by Sandi Toksvig and Alex Bellos.
Also known as Carol Isaacs she is a musician who has worked in pop and world music with artists such as Indigo Girls (USA) Sinead O’Connor (Ireland), Squeeze (UK), Phongsit Khampee (Thailand) and Ahmed Mukhtar (Iraq).
In her recent work, The Wolf of Baghdad – a memoir of a lost homeland, the Surreal McCoy explores her Iraqi-Jewish roots through a graphic memoir with its own musical soundtrack. Based on her family’s memories and recollections of their life in Baghdad, the wordless memoir will be shown as an animated slideshow accompanied by a live band (including her) playing music of Iraqi and Judeo-Arabic origin.
This audio-visual work is funded by Arts Council England and Dangoor Education (in memory of Sir Naim Dangoor).
Guest Spotlight – Luke McGarry
Originally from Manchester, illustrator, cartoonist, animator and designer Luke McGarry has quickly become the most sought-after young cartoonist in Los Angeles.
He has created animated commercials for clients as diverse as the IFC movie channel and VISA, and animated music videos for major label recording artists including Jack Black and Tenacious D. His print clients range from Bloomberg Businessweek to the NY Observer, he’s the go-to designer for some of the biggest festivals and music promoters in the States, and his online work for clients such as Myspace and Super Deluxe routinely goes viral, whether it’s Kanye West Valentine cards or the recent Sad Chewie series that has sent Star Wars fans into a retweeting frenzy.
Along with his twin brother Joe, he heads up design outfit Fantastic Heat Brothers, and he sings, plays bass and twiddles knobs in their indie duo Pop Noir, who have shared the stage with the likes of Doves, The Wombats, Robyn and Sebastien Tellier.
Guest Spotlight – Frank Quitely
Frank Quitely started his career in his native Glasgow, writing and drawing “The Greens” for the independently published Electric Soup. This lead to fully painted strips for the Judge Dredd Megazine, black and white shorts for Paradox Press, and coloured shorts for Vertigo.
He has worked on a number of one-shots, limited series, monthlies and graphic novels, notably Flex Mentallo, The Authority, New X Men, Sandman: Endless Nights, We3, All Star Superman and Jupiter’s Legacy.
Still based in Glasgow, he has come full circle, and is back to writing and drawing his own independently published material.
Guest Spotlight – Bryan Talbot
Winner of many comic awards, including an Eisner award, Le Prix SNCF and several Eagles, Bryan Talbot has been working in the medium for forty years. He’s produced underground and alternative comics, notably Brainstorm!, science fiction and superhero stories such as Judge Dredd, Nemesis the Warlock, Teknophage, The Nazz and Batman: Legends of the Dark Knight.
He’s worked on DC Vertigo titles including Hellblazer, Sandman (with Neil Gaiman), The Dreaming and Fables and has written and drawn the graphic novels for which he is best known, including the first British graphic novel, The Adventures of Luther Arkwright, its sequel, Heart of Empire, The Tale of One Bad Rat, Alice in Sunderland, Cherubs! (with Mark Stafford) and Metronome.
Bryan is published in over twenty countries, is a frequent guest at international comic festivals, and has been awarded an honorary Doctorate in Arts and an honorary Doctorate in Letters. His recent solo books are the Grandville series of anthropomorphic steampunk thrillers featuring Detective Inspector LeBrock of Scotland Yard, a two-fisted badger with the deductive abilities of Sherlock Holmes. The fifth and final volume of the series, Grandville Force Majeure was published in October 2017.
Dotter of Her Father’s Eyes, the first graphic novel he produced with his wife Dr Mary M Talbot, was the winner of the 2012 Costa Biography Award, making it the only British graphic novel to win a major literary award. Their second collaboration, Sally Heathcote, Suffragette won awards in Spain, where it is now in its seventh printing.
Their latest book, The Red Virgin and the Vision of Utopia, was published in May 2016. They are currently working on their fourth graphic novel together.
They are two of the three founding patrons of The Lakes International Comic Art Festival, now in its sixth year.
Guest Spotlight – Mary Talbot
Mary Talbot is now a freelance writer, working primarily on woman-centred innovations in the graphic novel format. She previously held academic posts for over twenty-five years, including Reader in Langage and Culture at Sunderland University. Her research and teaching interests have been, broadly, in language, gender and power, particularly in relation to media and consumer culture.
Her first graphic novel Dotter of her Father’s Eyes (with Bryan Talbot; Cape 2012) won the 2012 Costa Biography Award, making it the only British graphic novel to gain a major literary award. Her second Sally Heathcote, Suffragette (with Kate Charlesworth and Bryan Talbot; Cape 2014) brings a strong narrative approach to complex historical material. The Spanish edition has received Best International Graphic Novel Awards from Gremio de Libreros de Madrid and Splash Segunt Cómic. Her third, The Red Virgin and the Vision of Utopia (with Bryan Talbot) appeared in May 2016, with funding from Arts Council England. Earlier this year, they received an International Trajectory Award for the creative coherence of their work together from Splash Segunt C0mic.
Mary is currently working on Rain with Bryan Talbot, an environmentally-themed graphic novel centring on the late 2015 flooding in the North of England. This fourth collaboration also has Arts Council England support.
She has also collaborated with Kate Charlesworth on a chapter for the dystopian SF graphic novel IDP: 2043, with Alwyn Talbot on a short strip for Cross: A Political Satire Anthology, with Kate and Bryan again for an Amnesty International anthology, Here I Stand, and with Bryan in a contribution to Traces of the Great War.
Mary is a founder patron of the Lakes International Comic Art Festival.
Guest Spotlight – Emma Vieceli