Comiket Moments

The Quiet Comiket Accent UK table

Well that was a little disappointing, we made the long way down to London last weekend for the twice yearly Comiket Comic Fair show as part of the ongoing Comica Festival and well it was slow, very slow making for a long day, made worse by various train delays on the return journey meaning that I didn't get home till well past midnight,when of course I turn into a pumpkin - not recommended at Hallowe'en time!


The quiet hall

On the upside we met up with Gary Crutchley, stalwart artist on Accent UK's WesternNoir series, on arrival at Euston who joined us at the show. Its always good fun catching up with Gary and his infectious enthusiasm for comics in general and the WesternNoir series in particular and, with Dave, I was delighted to see a preview of Book 4's art which is almost complete and promises some real surprises. Book 3 has just had another great review here and Book 4 should be ready to make its splash around March next year when the new convention season gets underway, until then sorry you'll have to wait!

Gary Crutchley & Dave West pass the time (Add your own caption HERE!)

Back to Comica and this was the second show at Central St Martins College just behind Kings Cross Station London following the one back in April where although there was clearly some signage problems that show was a resounding success, being our best ever showing at Comiket. We therefore had high hopes for this one and despite again having signage problems and a change in the interior layout we weren't unduly worried by the slow start as things had picked up last time, however the 'kick' never came and things remained very slow throughout the long day to its 7pm finish. In the end we sold less than 1/2 what we had in April and although covering table costs we were well short of covering our travel costs down.


The live drawing parade with Takayo Akiyama

Everyone we talked to had a similar slow day but it was difficult to pinpoint why as the show had its usual talented guests bravely undertaking the on stage live drawing parade and eclectic mix of exhibitors but despite being free to enter it didn't have the attendance we'd experienced last time. Maybe a lot of students hadn't returned from half-term (do College students get 'half-term'?) or maybe it was a wider comic show fatigue, certainly the calendar is far more crowded than ever before and much of the exhibitor's talk was about the recent success of both The Lakes and last weekend's London MCM show where apparently 88,000 folk attended!

Whatever the spectre of other shows, Comiket remains unique in its eclectic mix, celebration and optimism of the comics medium and is a really friendly show with a pretty decent soundtrack too, so we really hope this was a one-off blip. In any case there were exciting plans announced for 2014 with Comiket's Spring outing likely moving to May or June to coincide with a new exhibition of British Comic Art which Paul Gravett (and I think John Dunning) are curating at the British Library with it planned that the Comic fair will also take place at the library!!

The full Joe Sacco Great War panoramic 'tapestry' at full length!

That exciting news and the great time we had in catching up with many good friends and familiar faces of the UK comic scene - including the recently returned world traveller and friend of Accent UK Cliodhna Lyons (and a host of others that there isn't enough room to cover), that and as always the glimpse of one or two potential interesting new projects, made the trip to London and Comica worthwhile - phew!


Unfortunately Blurry Col, Cliodhna & Dave



HAPPY HALLOWE'EN !!

Nuff Said !

 

The Lakes Comic Festival!

 

Wow, well that was The Lakes last weekend or I should say The Lakes International Comic Art Festival to give it its full Sunday name, but 'The Lakes' will do just fine I think, although 'The Rain' would also be a close second!

 

Actually its maybe a bit unfair to mention the weather for a comic show, however when that show takes over the whole lake district market town of Kendal and involves a wee bit of walking around, the weather plays its part, more so than the normal convention centre set show that we're used to. However although the frequent drizzly rain did its best, it failed to dampen the spirits of attendees, guests, exhibitors and volunteers as we encountered probably the friendliest and best-run debut show we've ever attended - no mean feat when we recall the previous contenders.

 

The Comics Clock Tower & some of Kendal's Signage!

But its true, the enthusiasm of the organisers and volunteers was infectious and helped overcome the few teething problems and the vagrancy's of the local weather. Our location, The Comics Clock Tower was in fact Kendal's town hall and as such, slap bang in the centre and not one you could really miss and ideal for reaching the nearby Brewery Arts Centre where most of the talks and events were held. I'm reliably informed that it was pretty close to the various other exhibition sites, library and 'pop-up' shops too etc but we didn't venture too far from the Clock Tower so sadly missed out on much of what else was going on but that tends to happen when you're exhibiting, but for attendees there was a lot more to see to keep you fully occupied both fun packed days and evenings!

 

John Wagner & Carlos Ezquerra take the stage

And that was true of Accent UK too, we had a fun, enjoyable time at the show and in Kendal, with this, like the recent Glasgow MCM show being accompanied by (some of ) our families which is good to all get away and share the comics fun. We were delighted to also be accompanied by long term friend Garen Ewing of Rainbow Orchid fame and I note that Garen has already posted his thoughts on the show here before scooting of to Essen in Germany for another show, busy man!

Dave, Garen and Col - add your own caption!

Its always fun sharing time with Garen and as he was also staying with us en-route before and after the show, we had plenty of time to catch up which was great and that's one thing that perhaps Dave and I have missed a bit in more recent comic shows, in terms of catching up properly with other comic folks. Too often its just a quick hello and wave then you're busy behind your table and before you know where you are, the shows over and you've still not had a decent chat with these seldom seen friends.

10 or even 5 years ago, there weren't that many comic shows in the UK so you could almost guarantee that 'everyone' would be there and you'd usually see them about town or in the same hotel etc but since those heady heights of Bristol and Birmingham, the UK has seen an explosion of shows so there's less need to chase round the country when you can just as easily stay closer to home, meaning though that the UK comics 'scene' has arguably become more splintered than it ever was, albeit independent comics are themselves possibly more accessible than ever before?



However, The Lakes had that good old fashioned feel of 'everyone' being there as you could hardly walk down the street without bumping into familiar comic faces in unfamiliar surroundings which was nice, seeing how many people had made the effort to travel to the show.

Still I heard of a possible 3 new UK shows next year and its unclear whether the UK can really support them all? Anyway The Lakes should have no such worries, confidently announcing its 2014 dates alongside its debut programming. With the promise of even better to come, it could really become the jewel in the UK comics' crown with the real potential to match France's revered Angouleme Festival which it is using as its model.




The view of the Clock Tower first floor from the gallery

While we happily give The Lakes a positive endorsement, it was difficult to say just how busy it was with actual attendees as judging purely from our Clock Tower view, it was steady footfall without being spectacular - bear in mind our last show was MCM Glasgow's amazing 20,000 crowd! - and sales, particularly during Saturday were slow but unusually almost busier on the Sunday and while overall, our sales were respectful, they were not the high numbers we'd recently encountered. That in some ways is to be expected in a new show when really everyone is investing in the shows future and of course there was a great choice available for the punter's pound - I won't list everyone here or all our shout outs as it would take too long, but have a look again at the Clock Tower's floorplan for the names of many great creators, publishers and dealers! 

Ivan and his Elsie and Mairi new book

One special 'shout-out' I will give is to Ivan Petrus, he of 'The Nieuport Gathering' book I picked up when first meeting him at the London Super Comic Convention earlier this year. Ivan had bravely driven from his home in Belgium to Kendal, which is a long, long way and he didn't have the best of journeys but accompanied by his very good friend Gert, he settled into the show and again turned out some wonderful full water coloured paintings in his books. Sadly although he had finished the next book in his World War 1 series, Elsie en Mairi, the English version is not yet available but I had a good look at the Dutch version Ivan had brought with him, which again looks great, so fingers-crossed I won't have too long to read it, if not I may just have to try and learn Dutch!



The Brewery Arts Centre

The Graphic Memoir panel

The Lakes was also special for the fact that both Dave and I took the opportunity to attend a couple of the talks, one each each day which was a rare treat with it being years since we'd done so but The Lakes programme was so good we couldn't resist! I saw the 'Graphic Memoir' panel with Al Davison, Katie Green, Nye Wright and Mary Talbot which was very good, moving and thought provoking in places with the panelists being very open with their experiences behind their very personnel stories and the reactions they'd encountered. Ably chaired by Nicola Streeten, the hour flew by very quickly.

 

Joe Sacco with Steve Bell (can you spot Tin Tin!) 

The following day was the Joe Sacco in conversation with political cartoonist Steve Bell event which I was very excited about, I am a huge admirer of Joe's work and was genuinely excited about the prospect of hearing him talk. I was pleased to again bump into Jeremy Briggs of comics news blog Down The Tubes (see Jeremy's own Kendal photo report here) amongst the packed audience and we greatly enjoyed the casual and revealing discussion between these two talented artists as they explored each others creative styles, deadlines and sensitivities in dealing with often challenging material. Their talk veered around different subjects in the same way that a conversation between two friends does and while always interesting I would have liked to hear a bit more about the nuts and bolts of Joe's techniques but I did learn that he kept very detailed journals which he carefully indexed, the art for a finished page usually takes him 2.5 days to complete and with a book like Footnotes in Gaza taking some 7 years to complete, he's now turning his attention to shorter form stories as seen in the recent Journalism collection.
 

One of Joe Sacco's amazing panoramas from his new Great War book

I was though very delighted to meet Joe at his signing afterwards and spend a few moments with him as he kindly signed my books, he was indeed as gracious as I'd hoped and, as far as I could see, made time for everyone who queued for him, a real gent and a real joy.

And that joy was mirrored around everyone I encountered at The Lakes, chatting to volunteers, strangers in event queues, signings, the locals and is a major factor in the success of the show. Despite the weather and the respectful sales, this was a timely reminder that a true comics festival is more about the experience rather than just numbers and on that level The Lakes is a major success and one we hope becomes a regular fixture of the UK calendar, so congratulations and thanks to all involved, see you next year please!



The Lakes Haul

Missing Frank!

Well the only disappointing aspect of attending this weekend's Lakes Comic Festival in Kendal is taht we'll miss the biggest event in Timperley's calendar with the unveiling of the legendary Frank Sidebottom's statue! Frank's alter-ego Chris Sievey was a one man wonder in promoting Timperley in his music, TV shows and broadcasts in the late 80's, 90's and beyond before sadly succumbing to cancer 3 years ago.

I never had the chance to meet Chris, put I was certainly aware of Frank and had seen him on the telly back while still living in Scotland, most likely on Channel 4's the Tube or some such, he was quite unforgettable in his distinctive paper mache head ! So I was aware of Timperley's existence as Frank (and Little Frank's) cherished home long before we made it our own home some 15 years ago (gosh is it really that long!).

There has been a determined campaign to remember Chris and the spotlight he gave Timperley and the donations raised in his memory have resulted in a fantastic looking statue set to be unveiled in the heart of Timperley village this Sunday at 11:37, so while I won't be there in person I will be there in spirit and will make a point of having a wee stroll into Timperley on my return to see the fantastic statute in its pride of place.

Donations are still being invited to go towards the Marie Curie Cancer charity here.

Looking To The Lakes?

 

Here's another of my recent sketches, again I see showing someone looking wistfully into the middle distance! Well this was inspired by the old Victorian book covers for boys adventure stories that became very popular leading to the likes of (of course) Boys Own magazine, Union Jack, Chums and many, many more leading up to the popular range of boy's adventure comics from the mighty D.C Thomson!

Maybe though our friend above is looking for the way to The Lakes International Comic Art festival  this coming weekend in sunny Kendal, Cumbria. Getting quite excited about the show now and will be catching up with good friend, Garen Ewing (he of the wonderful Rainbow Orchid) later as he makes the trip up for the show, so an ideal chance for anyone not yet  acquainted with the adventures of Julius Chancer to purchase a copy and maybe, if you ask real nice, have it sketched and signed by the man himself!

The Complete Rainbow Orchid Collection

The Very Special Rainbow Orchid Supplement



Oh and  I would be remiss not to remind you that you can of course also catch up with all the latest Accent UK titles at The Lakes show including the recent Missing:Have You Seen The Invisible Man? which has just received another fine review thanks to Jeremy Briggs and those good folks at Down The Tubes. 

 

A fine example of Joe Campbell's artwork from the Dave West scribed story

 

Looking For Livingstone?

I do still enjoy sketching and have done a few recently in between writing stories, planning and attending comic shows, (and of course work!) so here's a wee bit of one featuring my favourite explorer David Livingstone who's bicentenary is being celebrated this year with several events still to come.

Accent UK Interview !

 

Dave and I, wearing our Accent UK hats, were recently interviewed by the talented Mr Crutchley for the top indie on line magazine, Self-Publisher, and the new edition is now available to download to your ipad and android device here if you would like to read more about Accent UK and our approach to comics publishing alongside some other very interesting articles and previews.