Brighton Ho!

“One of Those People” – Comics & Medicine 2013, Brighton, July 5-7

I’m heading off to Brighton to the fourth Comics & Medicine Conference: Ethics under cover. Four days of illness, disability, trauma, care and comics. I went to the second conference in Chicago (missed last year’s, unfortunately), and thoroughly enjoyed it. A hugely diverse crowd of creators – both from inside and outside the medical professions, and a really sparky buzz throughout the whole conference as a result. I expect no less this time around!

There’s a great schedule: keynote talks by Paul Gravett, David B and Nicola Streeten, a special edition of Ladeez Do Comics at the Phoenix Gallery, and a chance to catch up with comics people I’ve met at previous conferences: Mita Mahato, MK Czerwiec, Ian Williams, Andrew Godfrey and Emma Mould, Katie Green and Paula Knight.

I’m giving a paper on Saturday: Those People – That Problem: The ethical journey of a collaborative comic on dependence, which touches on some of the ethical hurdles I’ve encountered in the course of my current “comics & medicine” comic project, One of Those People. It’ll be a chance to put some of those issues into context and show how they’ve affected the development of the book. Plus I’ll have a table in the marketplace, with various comics and other stuff on sale.

All that to look forward to – plus some fantastic weather! Hurrah!

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Ivy

I’ve been invited to contribute a two or four page comic to the lovely collaborative comics zine Ivy, put together by the wonderful Mita Mahato (theseframesarehidingplaces.com) and MK Czerwiec (comicnurse.com). Mita and MK are part of that excellent crowd of people I met two years ago at the Graphic Medicine conference in Chicago – that enthusiastic gang of comics creators and thinkers that included talents like Sarah Leavitt and Ian Williams.

The theme for Ivy 2 is “place“, and so I’ve been thinking about all sorts of things to do with places I’ve been and places I’ve worked in over the years. I’ve got a head full of ideas at the moment, so I’ve been scribbling away in my sketchbook this morning. I love the theme – seems both cosy and remote at the same time. I’ve promised to send Mita and MK sketches and ideas as they emerge for the Ivy blog, so head on over there to check progress.

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Comics Forum videoblog

Comics Forum 2012 interviews at Graphixia – graphixia.cssgn.org

There’s a Comics Forum videoblog over at Graphixia, filled with interviews from the two-day conference. Peter Wilkins from Graphixia talks with various people I got to know at the conference – like Damon Herd (Ticking Boy), Pr. William H. Foster III, and Hattie Kennedy.

Interesting to hear what people thought of the conference and various papers. Particular thanks to Damon for giving a shout-out to my own paper – and for the Eddie Campbell reference!

Thanks to Peter Wilkins and Graphixia for taking the time to put the interviews together, and thanks to MK Czerwiec (Comic Nurse) for flagging the video.

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