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Dotter in Naples
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Shop for Christmas at the Comics Clocktower!
It’s still open, you know! Check out the Virtual Clocktower on the website of the Lakes International Comic Art Festival. It’s a great place to buy directly from artists, writers and small press in the comics world. With 72 fabulous pages to browse through, there’s something for all ages!If this is sounding like advertising script, that’s because it is. While you’re in there why not check out our stall? You can pick up copies of Grandville Force Majeure, The Red Virgin of Utopia and Dotter of her Father’s Eyes. Free postage, signed, sketched and dedicated on request. The perfect present!
But be quick to beat the Christmas post! Not to mention the last-minute stockpiling as Br**it looms… -
Dublin Worldcon 2019
So, we came back from Dublin Worldcon late on Monday. Our initial reason for being there was to attend the amazing Worldcon Philharmonic Concert. As I explained in my last post, the programme included three short movements of an ambitious work-in-progress: an opera based on Dotter of her Father’s Eyes.You can see from the programme that she was in very good company indeed!
Carrie Fisher Tribute: Princess Leia’s Theme It was impossible to take good photographs of the dance from back in the auditorium. They were moving so fast!
The Dispute of Lucia and James Young Mary Seeks Attnetion The Death of Lucia We also participated in other events. Bryan was on a panel with Declan Shalvey (see below).
As we seem to have forgotten to take any photos of the lovely people we socialised with over the weekend, there’s a restaurant photo below shamelessly purloined on Facebook.
Chaz and Karen Brenchley, Mary Talbot, Jenny Campbell, Bryan Talbot, Ramsey Campbell View from the Green Room, Dublin Convention Centre. Samuel Beckett Bridge visible below -
Dotter goes to Dublin
Well, here’s a thing! Dotter of her Father’s Eyes is going on stage again. Three movements will be performed as part of the Worldcon Philharmonic Concert at the 77th World Science Fiction Convention in Dublin. An operetta based on Dotter has been an ambitious work-in-progress for composer Gary Lloyd and choreographer Bettina Carpi for quite some time. I’ve joined forces with them in developing their three music and dance pieces (created and first performed in 2015 for the Huddersfield Literary Festival) by composing accompanying lyrics. With voices and a full orchestra, the performance is going to be awesome!
So, we’ll be off to Dublin Worldcon, which is based in the Dublin Convention Centre from 15-19th August 2019. As we’re there, we’ve been asked to participate in some programme events, as follows:Saturday 17th
12.00 Grandville and the anthropomorphic tradition
ECOCEM Room (Convention Centre Dublin)
Presenter: Bryan Talbot15.30 Signature style
Odeon 1 (Point Square, Dublin)
Most of us can recognise our favourite artists just by their style of drawing or painting. But what if you want to work in more than one style, or your style goes out of fashion? We ask some artists who stands out for them, who and why that is, and whose styles have stood the test of time.Panellists: Jackie Burns, Kaja Folio, Sultana Raza and Bryan Talbot
Sunday 18th August
16.30 Politics in art and art in politics Odeon 3 (Point Square, Dublin)
As communication and control of perception become increasingly important in politics, visual storytelling is an increasingly necessary skill in persuading others. Creators of stories already know this. What are the best examples of political storytelling through art, and how are today’s politics influencing our work now?Panellists: Jim Fitzpatrick, Siobhan Murphy, Dominic Riemenschneider and Mary Talbot
Monday 19th
13.00 Familiarity breeds…comics
Liffey Room-2 (Convention Centre, Dublin)
There’s no place like home. And that’s why comic creator Bryan Talbot (Alice in Sunderland) and Declan Shalvey (Savage Town) chose to set their graphic novels in their respective home towns of Sunderland and Limerick. But was that decision an easy pitch to collaborators and retailers? Did any unexpected difficulties arise? And what did they learn about their homes that they had never known before?Panellists: Declan Shalvey and Bryan Talbot
14.00 When the rain comes
Liffey Room-2 (Convention Centre, Dublin)
Rain is a complete departure from Bryan and Mary Talbot’s previous biographical and historical collaborations. It deals instead with the here and now of environmental degradation that threatens us all. The story follows the everyday experiences of ordinary people, while engaging with pollution, climate change, moorland mismanagement and the disruption, misery and loss that they bring. The characters are fictitious: what’s happening around them is shockingly real.Presenters: Bryan Talbot and Mary Talbot
Hoping to see some of you there!
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Comics Salopia and a Norwegian Bloomsday: events coming up in June
The festival season has come around again and this June we’re off to Shrewsbury and Oslo. We’re guests at Comics Salopia in Shrewsbury next weekend, 1st and 2nd June. It’s the first international free-entry comics festival there and it seems to be taking over the town, so that it sounds very much as if it’s modelled on the established Lakes International Comic Art Festival (every October in Kendal). On Saturday morning we’re doing an illustrated talk on our work together, including the forthcoming book Rain. It’s in the Guild Hall at the University and it’s billed as “The Power of the Graphic Novel”. Come along!
In mid June we’re going to Oslo for a rather different kind of event. The Norwegian Irish Society has invited us over for this year’s Bloomsday celebrations on the evening of 16th June. James Joyce’s Ulysses is set on a single day: 16th June 1904 (the date Joyce met the love of his life, Nora Barnacle). Every year, it’s the day the reknowned Irish writer is remembered worldwide. Our contribution to the Oslo Bloomsday Celebrations will be a presentation of Dotter of her Father’s Eyes. The day before we’re doing another talk and a signing at the Outland bookstore in Oslo. If you happen to be in town, come along to these events too!
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Sheffield Hallam event coming up next Wednesday
The evening event is open to the public. Why not come along? Free entry!
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Happy New Year from Dotter & Co!
Last month I was contacted by Isabella Ford, a student at Lancaster University. I was delighted to hear that she’d been introduced to Dotter of her Father’s Eyes on her English Literature course there. How times have changed! Comics really are gaining a foothold as a legitimate art form. And about time too!I knew there were people working at Lancaster who liked the book; they invited me to do a keynote at a conference on literary celebrity a couple of years ago. Nevertheless it’s nice to know I’m on the syllabus now as well!
Isabella runs a careers website for women and she asked to interview me for it. Here’s the result, published yesterday. The website’s called She Works and it’s well worth a look.
All the best for a happy and healthy 2017 and try to keep cheerful in these interesting times. My slogan for last year was “Pessimism of the Intellect; Optimism of the Will”. I can’t remember who coined it, but I think I’ll be using it again this year.
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York Literature Festival coming up!
The Talbots will be in York in mid March!On the 12th March 2016 we will be signing at Travelling Man, 54 Goodramgate, York, YO1 7LF from 2-3pm.
This will be followed by an appearance at York St John Con (part of York Literary Festival), where we will be will be discussing our work, including our forthcoming graphic novel The Red Virgin and the Vision of Utopia. There’s a festival programme available for download here.
4 – 6pm 12th March: Temple Hall, York St John University, Lord Mayor’s Walk, York YO31 7EX
“Illustrator and writer Bryan Talbot, and writer and academic Mary Talbot, have been described by Bleeding Cool as ‘true powerhouses of the British graphic novel scene.’ Among many other prizes and plaudits, their collaboration, Dotter of Her Father’s Eyes, won the Costa Award for Biography in 2012. In this feature event, Bryan will discuss his Hugo-nominated Grandville series and the anthropomorphic tradition; and Mary will discuss the much-anticipated Red Virgin and the Vision of Utopia, due out May 2016.”This will be followed by a signing.
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Back from Barcelona comics festival
We had a very pleasant few days in Barcelona last week, where we’d been invited to attend as guests at FICON, the city’s International Comics Fair. With three new books out in Spain, between us we had a lot of promotion to do. The Spanish Sally – Sally Heathcote Suffragista – came out in February, so we were signing copies at the La Cúpola stand, as well as doing two talks and numerous interviews with journalists in the press room. It was good to see that the Spanish Dotter – La Niña de sus Ojos – is still selling well.
The third and fourth Grandville books have recently been published in Spanish, so Bryan was kept busy at the Astiberri stand too.
Though we didn’t see much apart from the convention centre, it was great to socialise with our hosts as well as with fellow guests. Here we are out to dinner with some of the Astiberri crew and friends.
Left to right: Bryan, Laureano, Frederik, Jason, me, Héloïse and Javier. Thanks for dinner, Laureano!
The convention centre was just off the Plaza España. On our last afternoon we had time to walk up the hill towards the Catalonia Museum of Art, so we could take in the view.
Then on our last evening we had a quiet meal in the hotel with Scott and Ivy McCloud. The Sculptor sounds like a phenomenal success.
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March update
This month’s activities have been varied and really rather interesting. Bryan and I did the first two of our talks on Sally Heathcote Suffragette for Read Regional 2015. So that’s Hull and North Tyneside library authorities done – seven more to go! We also took part in the exciting Dotter-based event on Storytelling &Adaptation for Huddersfield Literature Festival -which I’ve already posted about here.I’ve also done a couple of solo talks at universities. Last year, to my great surprise, I was invited to do the keynote lecture for a Lancaster
conference on Discourse on Literary Celebrity Across Genres. Stevie Marsden, one of the delegates, has just posted this lovely write-up. Some very agreeable post-grads at Queen Mary University had invited me to talk as well, so I’d tried out the lecture with them a couple of weeks previously.
Another busy month ahead. So where’s next, you ask? Barcelona, as guests of the Barcelona International Comics Fair. Now that should be nice!
