Guest Lecture and Workshop with French Cartoonist and Animation Director Aurel

On Thursday September 29, 2022, we held a stimulating guest lecture and workshop with French non-fiction graphic-novelist, editorial cartoonist and animation director Aurel whose movie Josep was honoured by the 2021 César Award for Best Animated Film.

My warm thanks to Aurel for his time and enlightening and captivating insights, and to La Fête, Beyond Animation Festival and Clémentine Arfi for making this meaningful cultural exchange possible!


We discussed animation/comics medium specificities, graphic non-fiction composition, science popularization through adult-aimed comics (with the in-depth analysis of a wonderful sequence from Aurel’s Singes, Futuropolis, 2021) with Thai and Myanmar students from my Visual Media Studies course developed for the Faculty of Communication Arts and hosted by BSAC (Bachelor of Science in Applied Chemistry), Chulalongkorn University.


Analysing comics motif braiding, page composition, text/image interplay, abstraction tricks, variety of techniques and standpoint inversion in a remarkable 12-page sequence from the comics Singes by Aurel.

The workshop consisted in applying the various graphic non-fiction composition techniques discussed during the guest lecture to the comics adaptation of an imposed paragraph excerpted from the chapter A Race of Cooks in Yuval Noah Harari‘s book Sapiens: A Brief History of Humankind (2011/2015). The 35 participating students -from Faculties and Departments of Literature, Architecture, Communication Design, Communication Arts, Psychology and Chemistry- had 30 minutes to compose individually a 2-page comics breakdown (drawn draft) of the paragraph. After completion, Aurel’s own graphic take on the Sapiens paragraph in his comics Singes and David Vandermeulen & Daniel Casenave’s comics adaptation in Sapiens: A Graphic History were introduced to the students to compare radically different approaches. Each student’s comics breakdown was later commented individually by yours truly.


Here are some results from the students’ workshop:

By Communication Design student Gun.
By Architecture/INDA student Plai.
By Communication Design student Pookla.
By Communication Design student Nut.

17 Traumics and Graphic Medicine narratives by Chulalongkorn University students (2021-22)

How do we communicate the unutterable?

When abandoned by words, muted or silenced, Comics Art allows for different strategies to represent -or allude to- ‘invisible/invisibilized’ inner wounds, health and mental issues. These -usually overlapping- meaning-making strategies include, but are not limited to, the narrative use of colors, art/line style, textures and techniques (pencils, ballpoint pen, digital paint…), graphic embodiment of the characters, space-time interplay (space as time; contiguity of various moments/spaces/panels), braiding of visual motifs and visual metaphors, panels’ sizes and shapes, page composition (segmentation, layout, negative space…), text spatialization, speech balloons’ shapes and lettering, multi-modality (text-image dynamic; anchorage/relay, intertextuality), abstraction or suggestion (closure, gap between the panels). More on ‘the interaction between the medium of comics and the discourse of healthcare’, and the representation of (psychic) trauma, can be found on the website Graphic Medicine, and books such as Documenting Trauma in Comics: Traumatic Pasts, Embodied Histories, and Graphic Reportage (Palgrave Macmillan), Hillary L. Chute’s Disaster Drawn: Visual Witness, Comics, and Documentary Form (Harvard University Press), Harriet E. H. Earle’s Comics, Trauma and the New Art of War (University Press of Mississippi) and Eszter Szép’s Comics and the Body: Drawing, Reading, and Vulnerability (The Ohio State University Press) among many other publications.

Harriet E. H. ‘Earle suggests that comics are the ideal artistic representation of trauma. Because comics bridge the gap between the visual and the written, they represent such complicated narratives as loss and trauma in unique ways, particularly through the manipulation of time and experience. Comics can fold time and confront traumatic events, be they personal or shared, through a myriad of both literary and visual devices. As a result, comics can represent trauma in ways that are unavailable to other narrative and artistic forms.’

On Harriet E. H. Earle’s Comics, Trauma and the New Art of War (University Press of Mississippi)

The following 17 ‘Traumics’ (comics on trauma) or Graphic Medicine narratives were produced by Thai or exchange students from various faculties (Psychology, Architectural Design, Language and Culture, Communication Design, Communication Arts, Engineering) at Chulalongkorn University, Thailand, during the Covid-lockdowns in 2021 and 2022 as the final creative projects of two of my courses: Imaginative Media, a comparative course on the representation of Refugee Narratives and Psychic Trauma in various media (literature, comics, movies, tv series, dance/choreographies, paintings…), and Visual Media Studies, a ‘General Education’ course mostly dedicated to the study of Graphic Narratives and Comics Art. Both courses include the study of Psychic Trauma and its representations through a series of lessons based on the seminal works of psychiatrists François Lebigot, Louis Crocq and Sándor Ferenczi, and on my conferences on Comics as a Language of Symptoms of Psychic Trauma. All students were made aware of the challenging nature and content of the courses on the first lesson (and could choose to drop the course, or skip the triggering content/lessons); they were free to select their graphic narrative’s topic, but it had to be related to psychic trauma or any other mental/health issues, and to change their topic at any point, if the ‘graphic’ composition felt too challenging. Some stories are based on personal experiences, other are based on research by the students. In preparation of the composition of their graphic narratives, we’ve analysed pages from a dozen trauma-related short comics or graphic novels from the US, Canada, Taiwan, Vietnam, Belgium or France. Along the semester, students worked on various (constrained/experimental) comics composition assignments. During the last weeks of the semester, individual consulting sessions with yours truly were held, one to discuss the first layout and a second to improve some elements of the advanced draft of their comics. Most of the students had no prior art/comics training, and the following stories are usually their very first comics narratives. Most stories reveal the crushing weight of social pressure/conformity in Thailand (and Asia), and that -if comics studies were rightfully considered and fully integrated in the university curriculum- students would be able to produce many more sophisticated and meaningful graphic narratives on social issues and as a means of self-expression and of mindful communication.

My deepest thanks to all my students as they were always fully dedicated to the ‘unconventional’ content of my courses and to the comics assignments they were given. More comics have been produced during these two courses, but some were either redundant with the stories presented here or need some additional editing before publication. More graphic narratives should be published online soon.

These ‘graphic’ narratives contain depictions of domestic violence, sexual abuse and harassment, child abuse, self-harm, suicide, eating disorders, body shaming, [cyber-] bullying, disasters/mass shootings, discrimination, nudity, offensive language, and more…

Reproduced with permission. All rights remain to the authors/artists.


Traumics by Thai student Mint (INDA, Faculty of Architecture). Two-pager comics.
Traumics by Thai student Mint (INDA, Faculty of Architecture). Page 1/2
Traumics by Thai student Mint (INDA, Faculty of Architecture). Page 2/2

Traumics on the 2014 Sewol ferry disaster which took the lives of 250 South Korean students, by Thai students Nattakit Pisitsup [Search] and Panupatr Limprasert [James] (Information and Communication Engineering, ICE; International School of Engineering, ISE). Pages 1 and 2 out of 4
Traumics on the 2014 Sewol ferry disaster which took the lives of 250 South Korean students, by Thai students Nattakit Pisitsup [Search] and Panupatr Limprasert [James] (Information and Communication Engineering, ICE; International School of Engineering, ISE). Pages 3 and 4 out of 4

Traumics by Thai student Khim Kanlayakon (CommDe). Page 1/2
Traumics by Thai student Khim Kanlayakon (CommDe). Page 2/2

Comics by Japanese exchange student Eirin. Page 1/2
Comics by Japanese exchange student Eirin. Page 2/2

Traumics by Thai student Torfun (BALAC; Language and Culture). Two-pager comics.
Traumics by Thai student Torfun (BALAC; Language and Culture). Page 1/2
Traumics by Thai student Torfun (BALAC; Language and Culture). Page 2/2

Graphic medicine narrative on polycystic ovary syndrome, by Thai student Nawara Pongsri [Klai] (BALAC; Language and Culture). Page 1/3 
Graphic medicine narrative on polycystic ovary syndrome, by Thai student Nawara Pongsri [Klai] (BALAC; Language and Culture). Page 2/3 
Graphic medicine narrative on polycystic ovary syndrome, by Thai student Nawara Pongsri [Klai] (BALAC; Language and Culture). Page 3/3 

Traumics by Mooksuda Chingnawan [Mook], Papichaya Indhavivadhana [Book]
Anchisa Asvahem [Ploy] (CommDe). Page 1/3
Traumics by Mooksuda Chingnawan [Mook], Papichaya Indhavivadhana [Book]
Anchisa Asvahem [Ploy] (CommDe). Page 2/3
Traumics by Mooksuda Chingnawan [Mook], Papichaya Indhavivadhana [Book]
Anchisa Asvahem [Ploy] (CommDe). Page 3/3

Traumics inspired by the Victoria Hall disaster (UK, 1883) by Thai student Chawin Sungkhapong [Tan] (International School of Engineering; ISE). Page 1/2
Traumics inspired by the Victoria Hall disaster (UK, 1883) by Thai student Chawin Sungkhapong [Tan] (International School of Engineering; ISE). Page 2/2

Traumics by Vietnamese exchange student Trang Pham (CommArts). Page 1/2
Traumics by Vietnamese exchange student Trang Pham (CommArts). Page 2/2

Comics, inspired by a personal experience, by Thai student Leila (Information and Communication Engineering, ICE; International School of Engineering, ISE). Two-pager.
Comics, inspired by a personal experience, by Thai student Leila (Information and Communication Engineering, ICE; International School of Engineering, ISE). Page 1/2
Comics, inspired by a personal experience, by Thai student Leila (Information and Communication Engineering, ICE; International School of Engineering, ISE). Page 2/2

WARNING: GRAPHIC CONTENT

Traumics on sexual abuse by Thai students Anna, Prim, Neng and Gene (INDA, Faculty of Architecture). Page 1/4

Traumics by Thai students Ant, Boss, Daniel, Nuno and Man (CommArts). Page 1/4
Traumics by Thai students Ant, Boss, Daniel, Nuno and Man (CommArts). Page 2/4
Traumics by Thai students Ant, Boss, Daniel, Nuno and Man (CommArts). Page 3/4
Traumics by Thai students Ant, Boss, Daniel, Nuno and Man (CommArts). Page 4/4

Graphic Medicine comics by Thai students Kat, Gift, Anna, Gun, Pleng and Pompam (CommArts). Page 1/4
Graphic Medicine comics by Thai students Kat, Gift, Anna, Gun, Pleng and Pompam (CommArts). Page 2/4
Graphic Medicine comics by Thai students Kat, Gift, Anna, Gun, Pleng and Pompam (CommArts). Page 3/4
Graphic Medicine comics by Thai students Kat, Gift, Anna, Gun, Pleng and Pompam (CommArts). Page 4/4

Traumics by Thai students Nana, Weal, Chacha, May, First and Care (CommArts). Page 1/4
Traumics by Thai students Nana, Weal, Chacha, May, First and Care (CommArts). Page 2/4
Traumics by Thai students Nana, Weal, Chacha, May, First and Care (CommArts). Page 3/4
Traumics by Thai students Nana, Weal, Chacha, May, First and Care (CommArts). Page 4/4

Traumics by -anonymous- Thai students (CommArts). Page 1/4
Traumics by -anonymous- Thai students (CommArts). Page 2/4
Traumics by -anonymous- Thai students (CommArts). Page 3/4
Traumics by -anonymous- Thai students (CommArts). Page 4/4

Comics by Thai student Wasita Uancharoenkul [Fune] (INDA, Faculty of Architecture). Page 1/6
Comics by Thai student Wasita Uancharoenkul [Fune] (INDA, Faculty of Architecture). Page 2/6
Comics by Thai student Wasita Uancharoenkul [Fune] (INDA, Faculty of Architecture). Page 3/6
Comics by Thai student Wasita Uancharoenkul [Fune] (INDA, Faculty of Architecture). Page 4/6
Comics by Thai student Wasita Uancharoenkul [Fune] (INDA, Faculty of Architecture). Page 5/6
Comics by Thai student Wasita Uancharoenkul [Fune] (INDA, Faculty of Architecture). Page 6/6

Comics by Thai students Panpornpach Musika [Pach] and Supharada Hirantrakul [Bambam] (JIPP, Faculty of Psychology), and Darapon Chaibal [Manao] (Faculty of Architecture). Page 1/5
Comics by Thai students Panpornpach Musika [Pach] and Supharada Hirantrakul [Bambam] (JIPP, Faculty of Psychology), and Darapon Chaibal [Manao] (Faculty of Architecture). Page 2/5
Comics by Thai students Panpornpach Musika [Pach] and Supharada Hirantrakul [Bambam] (JIPP, Faculty of Psychology), and Darapon Chaibal [Manao] (Faculty of Architecture). Page 3/5
Comics by Thai students Panpornpach Musika [Pach] and Supharada Hirantrakul [Bambam] (JIPP, Faculty of Psychology), and Darapon Chaibal [Manao] (Faculty of Architecture). Page 4/5
Comics by Thai students Panpornpach Musika [Pach] and Supharada Hirantrakul [Bambam] (JIPP, Faculty of Psychology), and Darapon Chaibal [Manao] (Faculty of Architecture). Page 5/5

Four Creative Workshops (2022)

During the second semester of the 2021-22 academic year, we welcomed spearheading Thai artists Peeraphat Kittisuwat, Faan Peeti, Superfah Jellyfish and Isaree Pipatpongsa who held workshops in three different courses, with the goal of introducing our Inter CommArts Thai and exchange students to new graphic and narrative techniques in order to develop their visual literacy & composition skills in preparation of their final creative projects.


A) “TRANSITION WORKSHOP” with Thai designer & cartoonist PEERAPHAT KITTISUWAT

February 22, 2022. First on-site guest lecture/workshop in 2 years! The Inter CommArts students of my Creative Writing (Section 11: Experimental Comics) course welcomed Thai designer and cartoonist khun Peeraphat Kittisuwat, founder of P. Library Design Studio. After introducing us to his different works (in experimental and live-drawing animation, mural painting, book design of The Art of Thai Comics…) related to his stunning cutout & double-sided non-linear comics leporello in-between, khun Peeraphat invited our students to play with his book’s print proofs to compose new looped graphic narratives by cutting/pasting/rearranging sequences with new “twists”. The 11 students presented their narratives at the end of the workshop, getting comments and feedbacks from our guest. PS: it felt good to get back to a communal creative experience with the students (while respecting all Covid safety measures).


Some works by guest artist Peeraphat Kittisuwat:


Students at work during Peeraphat Kittisuwat’s workshop:


Students’ presentations in front of the classroom, and some graphic narratives produced during the workshop:


B-C) “SHAPE & TEXTURE DOUBLE WORKSHOP” with Thai illustrators FAAN PEETI and SUPERFAH JELLYFISH

March 07, 2022. The Inter CommArts students of my Creative Writing (Section 10: Non-Fiction Graphic Narratives) course welcomed Thai artists Faan Peeti (book illustrator and cartoonist who explored creative panel layouts in her Manustrip series for a day magazine) and Superfah Jellyfish (painter, tattoo artist, and author of challenging old-school zines such as Having Sex First Time and The Intimates). They held two creative workshops exploring the symbolic use of comics panels/borders and body positivity through acrylic painting with markers. These were wonderful and inspiring midterm workshops meant to prepare the students for their final creative project. [All safety measures were respected with mandatory masks, hand-washing, and ATK tests before the lesson for all participants].

Our students with guest artists Faan Peeti & Superfah Jellyfish, and yours truly.

A short introduction, by yours truly, on creative uses of comics panels preceded Faan Peeti’s workshop.


Some works by guest artist Faan Peeti:

Opening of Faan Peeti’s first solo exhibition “Yindee’s Mysterious Friends” at River City, 2022.

Some works by guest artist Superfah Jellyfish:


Pictures from Faan Peeti’s talk and workshop on the creative use of comics panels/borders. Students were then asked to compose an autobiographical or autofictional comics page playing with the symbolism of comics panels/borders.


Pictures from Superfah Jellyfish’s talk and workshop on the creative use of acrylic painting and black markers to address body positivity.


D) “SHŌJO MANGA & RAPE CULTURE” TALK & WORKSHOP with Thai illustrator ISAREE PIPATPONGSA

March 29, 2022. Fourth and final guest lecture/workshop for the semester. The Inter CommArts students of my Imaginative Communication course welcomed Thai artist Isaree Pipatpongsa (Izary P. Pipat). Khun Isaree talked about her thesis Rape culture awareness campaign through the female perspectives and Shojo Manga influences (School of Fine and Applied Arts, Bangkok University), with an introduction to the history of Shōjo Manga, her take on the genre to address the issue of Rape Culture in Thailand, her thesis process and design concepts, and a presentation of the resulting [and stunning] A1 comics digital prints, animation and journey kit. The students then participated in a workshop, revisiting Shōjo Manga pages with various techniques (drawing, tracing paper layers, screentones, diplopia effect, collage…) to reveal insidious aspects of the Rape Culture. It was a fascinating talk and highly meaningful and creative workshop! [All safety measures were respected with mandatory masks, hand-washing, and ATK tests before the lesson for all participants].


Pictures from Isaree Pipatpongsa’s talk, with an introduction to the history of Shōjo Manga, her take on the genre to address the issue of Rape Culture in Thailand, her thesis process and design concepts.


The students got the opportunity to take a close look at Isaree Pipatpongsa’s stunning A1 comics digital prints and thesis journey kit.


Students were provided with relevant manga pages, and their tracing paper versions as well as screentone sheets. Applying various techniques (drawing, tracing paper layers, screentones, diplopia effect, collage, black-out poetry…), they composed new pages addressing the Rape Culture issue and the victim’s traumatic experience. Here are some pictures of the workshop, with guidance by Isaree Pipatpongsa, and of the class presentations and the resulting graphic narratives.

Our students with guest artist Isaree Pipatpongsa.

 My warmest thanks to khun Peeraphat Kittisuwat, khun Faan Peeti, khun Superfah Jellyfish and khun Isaree Pipatpongsa for these wonderful talks and workshops!

Non-Fiction Comics Composition Course [part 2/2]

After several preparatory assignments [see dedicated post for details], CommArts students from the Creative Writing: Non-Fiction Comics Composition course [Chulalongkorn University, Thailand] were asked to produce their final assignment: an autobiographic comics. As mentioned in the previous post, the two main challenges were to compose a short comics without prior art training, and to write an autobiographic narrative in a country where the autobiographical genre is almost absent from local literature (and comics) as it is seen as ill-mannered in Thai culture to talk about oneself, and as shortcomings or mishaps are not to be disclosed in a context where [to save (i.e. preserve)] the face or self-image is essential. Their final and individual comics projects weren’t limited in size, length or technique; each student had to pick the best fitted format to convey his/her autobiographic narrative. The stories were composed over a period of one month, instead of two due to the pandemic outbreak. Individual comment sessions were held weekly via the Zoom platform.

Here are some of the resulting graphic narratives! More coming soon!

[All artworks are reprinted with the consent of the students, and remain their property. Some nicknames have been changed at student’s request].


Autobiographic comics by student B. (with some help from her sister).


Autobiographic (GIF) comics by exchange student Alex


Autobiographic comics by student Smile

Page 8/8 of student Smile’s autobiographic comics.


Autobiographic GIF comics by student May


Autobiographic comics by student Por (with some help from Peera Tayanukorn)

Student Por’s autobiographic comics. Click on pic to enlarge.

Autobiographic comics by student Pranang (a handheld game console format containing a long comics strip that can be scrolled manually and with a main character -Pranang’s alter ego- which can be moved up and down).


Autobiographic comics by student Jay

Page 4/4 of Jay’s autobiographic comics.

Autobiographic comics by student G.


Autobiographic comics by student Pin

Page 3/3 of student Pin’s autobiographic comics.

Autobiographic graphic narrative by student Paint


Autobiographic comics by student Plai

Student Plai’s autobiographic comics. Click on pic to enlarge.

Pages from exchange student Meg Hoogendam’s digital comics book on HSP


Autobiographic comics by student Eve

Click on pic to enlarge.
Click on pic to enlarge.

Autobiographic comics by student Rika


Autobiographic comics by student Frongki


Autobiographic comics by student Pop


Autobiographic comics by student Namfon


Autobiographic comics by student Pecky


MORE COMING SOON…

PS: I’m so proud of you all ! #ProudAjarnNicolas

Non-Fiction Comics Composition Course [part 1/2]

As of January 2020, undergraduated students at the International Programme in Communication Management [Faculty of Communication Arts, Chulalongkorn University] are able to choose between two Comics Composition sections as part of their Creative Writing curriculum: experimental/fiction comics composition and non-fiction comics composition. The latter is a new 16-week [3 credits] section open to 30 students without any drawing/art training. I’m introducing in this post the preparatory assignments of the “non-fiction comics” section, meant to facilitate the composition of the semester final project; a short autobiographic comics. The two main challenges were to compose a short comics without prior art training, and to write an autobiographic narrative in a country where the autobiographical genre is almost absent from local literature (and comics) as it is seen as ill-mannered in Thai culture to talk about oneself, and as shortcomings or mishaps are not to be disclosed in a context where [to save (i.e. preserve)] the face or self-image is essential. However, in a globalizing world and because of the “international” nature of the programme and of the students’ education [often in international schools], I considered these challenges worth facing.

The class was composed of 34 students [29 female students and 5 male students], and included 6 exchange students from abroad. All artworks are reprinted with the consent of the students, and remain their property.


ALL-SEMESTER ASSIGNMENT: GRAPHIC DIARY

On the first week of class, students were asked to acquire a notebook and draw an entry related to their daily life every day and over the complete 16-week semester. The goal was to help the students to familiarize themselves with the act of drawing and the observation of their surroundings and inner thoughts and feelings. Progress was checked in the classroom every two weeks, then online when the Faculty closed its doors due to the pandemic. At times, the graphic diaries revealed the frustration, the angst and sometimes the isolation experimented by the students during the lockdown.

Pages from student Paint’s graphic diary. In January 2020, before the spread of the Covid pandemic, face masks were already worn due to the high level of PM 2.5 air pollution.
Page from student Eve’s graphic diary. On February 3, French cartoonist Freddy Nadolny Poustochkine was our guest to talk autobiography, comics, time/space and memory, and show us pages from his own notebooks.

WEEK 01 ASSIGNMENT: SELF-PORTRAIT

After a first short lecture introducing non-fiction comics [autobiography, confessional comics, graphic medecine and comics journalism; with examples from Julie Doucet, Wimmen’s Comix, Robert Crumb, Joe Matt, Yoshiharu Tsuge, Neeske Alexander, Jennifer Hayden and Joe Sacco), students were asked to draw their self-portrait “in situation” in a Chas Addams’ cartoon from which the upper part had been blanked out.

Left: Noisy Neighbor by Charles Addams, The New Yorker, circa 1950. Right: edited version provided to the students.​
Self-portrait by student Gam.

WEEK 02 ASSIGNMENT: 10 MEMORIES

Students were asked to write down 10 memories, 10 crucial moments -positive or negative- that still impact/haunt/enlight their lives up to this day. I discussed individually with each student to know which memory he/she is eager and confortable adapting into a comics narrative [narrative/graphic potential]. Two memories are sometimes related [theme/period/figures] and were selected to be merged into one narrative. This list/thematic approach comes from Tom Hart‘s guide The Art of the Graphic Memoir (St. Martin’s Griffin, 2018). Numerous references and resources were borrowed from his useful book.


WEEK 03 LECTURE: CHARLOTTE SALOMON

We explored, among others, the work of German artist Charlotte Salomon and her series of nearly 800 goauches Life? Or Theatre? produced between 1940 and 1942.


WEEK 03 ASSIGNMENT: TEXT SUBSTITUTION

Each student was asked to develop -at home and in written form- his/her selected memory over an A4 page. In class, we analyzed Chris Ware’s short comics I Guess [click on link for full story] in which the written text [the sensitive memories of a child] is imposed -seemingly arbritrarily- in the captions and speech/thought balloons of a six-page Golden-Age-style superhero adventure. However, beyond the “disjunctive form of verbal/visual interplay”, some words or sentences seem to echo drawn elements and to form a braiding of motifs; Chris Ware plays here with the fact that comics readers are drawn to look for meaning in the interaction of the pictorial and the linguistic.

After the analysis of I Guess, students were asked to compose a graphic narrative using the same concept by simply imposing the text of their ‘selected and extended memory’ [A4 page] in the emptied captions and speech balloons from three pages of French cartoonist Xavier Mussat’s autobiographic comics Sainte Famille. The latter book was selected as Xavier Mussat extensively plays with visual metaphors and allegories and because these could become generative of unexpected and accidental resonances with my students’ written memories.

Page 1/3 of student G’s autobiographic text laid down over Xavier Mussat’s comics pages.
Page 2/3 of student G’s autobiographic text laid down over Xavier Mussat’s comics pages.
Page 3/3 of student G’s autobiographic text laid down over Xavier Mussat’s comics pages.
Page 1/3 of student Dear’s autobiographic text laid down over Xavier Mussat’s comics pages.
Page 2/3 of student Dear’s autobiographic text laid down over Xavier Mussat’s comics pages.
Page 3/3 of student Dear’s autobiographic text laid down over Xavier Mussat’s comics pages.

WEEK 04 ASSIGNMENT: DIFFERENT TONE

In order to further explore the memory selected by each student, I asked them rewrite their text but as if written by their younger self -in a personal diary- at the age they were when the chosen event took place. The text was to be written on black and white photocopies of some pages from French-Canadian cartoonist Julie Delporte‘s pencil-color and organic diary Journal (Koyama Press, 2013).


The following pages show student G’s memories [to be compared with her version on Xavier Mussat’s pages above], written down as a personal diary, along with Julie Delporte’s drawings on which G added watercolor.

Text and watercolor by student G over drawings by Julie Delporte’s Journal.

The objective of the “text substitution” and “different tone” assignments is to lead the students -without prior art training- to get a sense of the graphic potential of their stories as a comics narrative, to consider the use of visual metaphors, allegories and motifs, as well as the narrative use of color and ‘voices’, and to trigger new and unexpected (and maybe forgotten) elements to feed their narrative through additional layers.


WEEK 05 ASSIGNMENT: WAIT! STOP, YOUNGER VERSION OF ME!

Now that students have been drawing in their daily graphic diary for a few weeks, and that they have played with their written texts in relation to pictures through various substitutions, they were asked to draw their first comics (in the classroom). The assignment is to draw a comics over 4 pages with imposed regular grids, and with an imposed speech balloon (containing the sentence: “Wait! Stop, younger version of me!”) in the third panel of the first page. The balloon was borrowed from American cartoonist Jess Fink’ sci-fi graphic memoir We Can Fix It! (Top Shelf, 2013) where the author goes back in time with a time machine to warn her younger self of -and thus try to avoid- mistakes she made in her past. Students were asked to write such a meeting with their younger selves.



Student Paint meets her younger self, pages 1 and 2 (out of 4).
Student Paint meets her younger self, pages 3 and 4 (out of 4).

Student Por meets her younger self, pages 1 and 2 (out of 4).
Student Por meets her younger self, pages 3 and 4 (out of 4).

“Like how does something happen, and… how does it reverberate through time? And that act of memory is important, and comics are great for memory. Like even when you have a short comic, like a three-panel comic, you’ve got a past, a present and a future as soon as you look at those three boxes. And that allows you to reflect and compare times.”

Art Spiegelman, in: Conan, N. (2011). MetaMaus: The Story Behind Spiegelman’s Classic; radio interview, Oct 5.

WEEK 05 LECTURE: COMICS, TIME AND SPACE

We explored the interplay of Time, Space and Memory in comics narratives by Richard McGuire, Lilli Carré, Alan Moore & Dave Gibbons & Rick Veitch, Frank Miller, Kevin Huizenga, Chris Ware, Art Spiegelman, Matt Madden, Nick Sousanis and Kiriko Nananan.


WEEK 05 – SPECIAL GUEST: FREDDY NADOLNY POUSTOCHKINE

On February 03, we were honoured to welcome French cartoonist Freddy Nadolny Poustochkine as a guest. We talked time, space, the fabric/material of memory and comics art in his creative process from his autobiographical comics La chair des pommes (ego comme x) to his Cambodia-set La colline empoisonnée  (Futuropolis) and his ongoing project; and of the seminal importance of (his) sketchbooks. More pictures on this dedicated post.

Guest talk with French cartoonist Freddy Nadolny Poustochkine, here discussing the importance of his sketchbooks in his creative process.

WEEK 06 ASSIGNMENT: THE MEMORY TREE

Based on works by Chris Ware and ideas borrowed from the previous lecture and Freddy’s talk, students were asked to map their memory on an A3 page, adding photographs of themselves, of related places and characters, and of artworks (posters, paintings, quotes…) echoing the emotions they experienced during the ‘life-changing’ event they will tell in comics form as their final project.

A lifetime: example of non-linear storytelling by Chris Ware.
Assignment brief.

Student Frongki’s memory tree.

WEEK 07: ORAL PRESENTATIONS ON NON-FICTION COMICS

Students were asked to form 10 groups and to read and discuss 10 challenging non-fiction graphic novels [and zines] by introducing their classmates to remarkable features (technique, narrative voice, topic, layouts..). The oral presentations were held online, due the Covid outbreak. The books I proposed them to tackle were: Les Têtards (and zines) by Pascal Matthey and Badaboom Twist (and other zines) by David Libens, Chicken with Plums by Marjane Satrapi, Sunny by Taiyo Matsumoto, Becoming Unbecoming by Una, Piero by Edmond Baudoin, Daddy’s Girl by Debbie Drechler, Pyongyang: A Journey in North Korea by Guy Delisle, Don’t Go Where I Can’t Follow and The End by Anders Nilsen, and Rosalie Lightning by Tom Hart. Diversity of topics, techniques, origins informed my selection to provide students with a large array of references and approaches.


WEEK 08 [MIDTERM] LECTURE: COMICS ESSAY COMPOSITION

The composition of comics essays in small groups was originally considered as an assignment during the semester. Sadly, due the Covid outbreak, group projects were canceled at midterm. As we weren’t yet aware of that fact, one early lecture was dedicated on [non-fiction] comics essay composition; I explained the process of creating a comics essay based on a two-pager I wrote for a special issue of KaiHuaRoh magazine with art by Ployjaploen “Bamie” Paopanlerd. I went through the various stages of composition, from the first idea [informed by numeorus influences] to thumbnailing and other schaffoldings leading to a clear non-linear narrative (with much help from the artist).


WEEK 08 [MIDTERM]: COMMENTS AND SUGGESTIONS

As for examples, a useful reference was Rob Stolzer‘s students work from his Graphic Narration class.


After reading the students ‘memory trees’, I suggested to each student various approaches, comics references or motifs/connections worth exploring before adapting his/her selected memory into a comics narrative.




WEEKS 09 TO 16: INDIVIDUAL [ONLINE] CONSULTING AND FINAL RESULTS

The autobiographic comics composed by the students will be published in an upcoming post! [Their final and individual comics projects weren’t limited in size, length or technique; each student had to pick the best fitted format to convey his/her autobiographic narrative]. More soon!

Because it’s sweet… Thanks mademoiselle Plai!

Thai Black Lives Matter: “Maniq not Sakai” knowledge comics

As part of the “Thai Culture for Communication: Graphic Narratives” course, fresh.wo.men at the International Program of the Faculty of Communications Arts (Chulalongkorn University, Thailand) were asked to compose a knowledge comics on the usually-derogatory representation of the indigenous Maniq ethnic group in Thai culture. Known asNgo Paa’ in Thai (and sometimes referred to as Negritos or Sakai), the MAniq people live in the forests of Southern Thailand and were essentiliazed as a dark-skinned traditional folktale figure. The following graphic narrative -composed by students Tiara, Prim, Name and Praewah- offers an interesting insight on this Thai population, and on the cultural biases and unfair treatments they suffered, as well as a message of understanding and hope. Because #BlackLivesMatter in Thailand too.


A portrait of Kanang, a Maniq orphan welcomed by King Chulalongkorn at the court in the early 20th century.

“During the period that Kanang lived with King Chulalongkorn, he was generally considered as the King’s adopted son (Duangjan 1988). At the court, Kanang was taught how to dance and play the part of the Negrito in the Sangthong play, and he became the regular actor of this role in performances before the king’s guests. The sensational moment in the drama is when Prince Sangthong takes off his ‘ugly’ Negrito mask to reveal his beautiful noble self. The audience was shocked to see that under the mask was a real live Ngo Paa.” ​Nathan Porath [“Developing indigenous communities into Sakai in South Thailand and Riau (Indonesia)”, 2003]


“Thai Consent”, guest talk & traumics composition

Bangkok, 11 February 2020. This semester for the “Imaginative Media: [How to Tell the Unutterable]” course at the Faculty of Communication Arts (Chulalongkorn University), our distinguished guest is khun Nana Wipaphan Wongsawang, founder of the Thai Consent platform which aims at providing [testimonial and illustrated] references for victims of sexual abuse who need useful materials to understand themselves better. An inspiring & challenging talk on the critical issues of sexual abuse, rape culture, consent and representation. After studying the mechanisms of Psychic Trauma and its depictions in tv series, movies, choreographies or graphic novels, our students will compose trauma-related short comics [or #Traumics] on sexual abuse, and will present them to khun Nana in a month. Later, students will also propose various [innovative] campaign ideas to promote & support the Thai Consent platform.
Also on FaceBook: Thai Consent
Thank you/merci/khopkhunkhrap khun Nana!

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Khun Nana Wipaphan Wongsawang, founder of the Thai Consent platform, with the students of the International Program in Communication Management, Faculty of Communication Arts, Chulalongkorn University.

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Khun Nana Wipaphan Wongsawang, founder of the Thai Consent platform, discussing issues of representation.

A Refugee’s Journey: Adapting Nick Sousanis’ “Grid and Gestures”

During the second lesson of the “Imaginative Communication” course [a Comparative Media course in which we explore the theme “To Say the Unutterable” by analyzing and comparing the depiction of Psychic Trauma in various visual media, from comics to animated & live-action movies, tv series or choreographies], I asked my Thai & exchange students at the Faculty of Communication Arts (Chulalongkorn University) to do the “Grid and Gestures” exercise developed by Nick Sousanis, professor of Humanities & Liberal Studies at San Francisco State University, and author of the groundbreaking comics dissertation Unflattening published by Harvard University Press in 2015.

[Course: Imgt Comm, 2800217, International Program, CommArts, Chulalongkorn University, 20 January 2020, with 35 students]

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Above and below: CommArts students at work on the “Grid and Gestures” exercise

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The purpose statement for the exercise provided by Nick Sousanis is as follows:

 “So here’s how to think about Grids & Gestures. Quickly, have a look at your ceiling tiles or other grid-ish things around you. If you then imagine putting these features to music, you might have regular long notes on the tiles, some shorter notes, and maybe rapid staccato beats on a ventilation grill. Ok, now come back to a comics page – and think about the idea that in comics, time is written in space. Comics are static – and it’s in the way we organize the space that we can convey movement and the passage of time. Unlike storyboards, to which comics are frequently compared, in comics we care not only about what goes on in the frame, but we care about the size of the panel, its shape, orientation, what it’s next to, what it’s not, and its overall location within the page composition. The way you orchestrate these elements on the page is significant to the meaning conveyed – there are some strong correspondences between comics and architecture in terms of thinking about the way the entire space operates together.

Having briefly thought about this, I want you to take a single sheet of paper (any size, shape will do) and drawing with a pencil or pen, carve it up in some grid-esque fashion that represents the shape of your day. It can be this day, a recent day, a memorable day, or a typical/amalgamation day. And then inhabit these spaces you’ve drawn on the page with lines, marks, or gestures that represent your activity or emotional state during those times represented. The emphasis here is to do your best to not draw things. (You can always do that later!) And also, you can leave space blank on your page – but that has to mean something. This isn’t writing where you can finish a final sentence mid-page. Every inch of the composition is important in comics – so be aware of that as well. Finally, when I do this in class or with groups, I give people about 5-10 minutes to do it, so they have to make decisions quickly. Try to give yourself a similar limit.”

Nick Sousanis (excerpted from this page)

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Above: CommArts student at work on the “Grid and Gestures” exercise

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“Grid and Gestures” by Thai student Nanz. Description: “(1) I wake up late so I started the page with the cloud shape which refers to my dream. Then I have to hurry to take a shower and prepare myself to go to the University. I go to university by BTS [skytrain] and the station is crowded. When I arrive at the station near the campus, I notice that the sky is gloomy. (2) Suddenly, it starts raining. I’m stuck at the station and I’m worried I’ll be late in class. Moreover, I’m hungry since I forgot to eat something this morning. I have to figure out the way to reach my Faculty on time. I try to book a Grab taxi but there is no response. I have to walk under the rain to try to catch a taxi. (3) Finally, I reach the Faculty and I’m in class on time. When the course is finished, I come back home and take a shower. Before going to bed, I watch a movie on Netflix. Then I go to sleep. :)”


Adapting the exercise to depict a refugee’s journey

After this first exercise was completed, I asked the students to draw a second “Grids and Gestures” page but, instead of depicting a personal day/travel/experience, they had to draw the perilous travel of Syrian refugee Rania Mustafa Ali, 20, who had filmed her journey from the ruins of Kobane in Syria to Austria.

“Her footage shows what many refugees face on their perilous journey to Europe. Rania is cheated by smugglers, teargassed and beaten at the Macedonian border. She risks drowning in the Mediterranean, travelling in a boat meant to hold 15 people but stuffed with over 50. Those with disabilities are carried across raging rivers and muddy fields in their wheelchairs.” (The Guardian).

During the 22′ footage, some students drew the “Grids and Gestures” of Rania as her narrative was unfolding while other students preferred to take some notes and draw Rania’s grid right after the end of the film.

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Students watching, drawing and/or taking notes during the projection of Rania’s footage.

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Student Paar drawing Rania’s “Grid and Gestures” during the projection.

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Student drawing Rania’s “Grid and Gestures” during the projection.


The outcome has been positive as students focused [more than usual] their attention on the emotions and struggles experienced by the refugees, trying to capture Rania’s emotional states, and discovering -as they were drawing on a limited space- the physicality and volume of incessant ups-and-downs (hopeful/hopeless…) and turns of events (wait/treks/dead ends/returns) faced during these precarious and usually dramatic odysseys. I’ll try to find time to study the results of this experiment in detail, and see if it tends to raise awareness/mindfulness (Sati/สติ) and empathy towards refugees. A promising exercise.


Here are some of the “grids and gestures” depicting the journey of Syrian refugee Rania Mustafa Ali and composed by CommArts students:

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Ranias’s journey by Thai student Nanz.

Palmmy 02
Ranias’s journey by Thai student Palmmy.

Rika 02
Ranias’s journey by Japanese student Rika.

Paar 02
Ranias’s journey by Thai student Paar.

Meg 02
Ranias’s journey by Dutch exchange student Meg.

Por 02
Ranias’s journey by Thai student Por.

Ink 02

Ranias’s journey by Thai student Ink.

Pure 02
Ranias’s journey by Japanese exchange student Pure.

 

#UltraVioletChallenge – Part 2

The inaugural post explaining the constraints of the #UltraVioletChallenge exercise is available HERE. And more results are available there.

For this post, I wanted to display results by students who never pursued any drawing formation. The 3rd and 4th Year Performing Arts students of my “Imaginative Media” course accepted the challenge, and the results are again interesting and varied… and fun!

#UltraVioletChallenge: “Making Sense of Signs (and Fragments)” in-class creative assignment (“Imaginative Media” course, Thai Program, Faculty of Communication Arts, Chulalongkorn University); create a figurative comics based on an imposed abstract comics (duration: 90′). Based on a constrained comics exercise used at Pierre Feuille Ciseaux international comics residency-lab.

Imposed abstract comics page #UltraVioletChallenge
Imposed abstract comics page #UltraVioletChallenge

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#UltraVioletChallenge by Performing Arts students Day and Prang.

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#UltraVioletChallenge by Performing Arts students Mean and Save.

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#UltraVioletChallenge by Performing Arts students Mui, Kitty and Dome.

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#UltraVioletChallenge by Performing Arts students Kay and Mew.

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#UltraVioletChallenge by Performing Arts students Gene and Yongyong.

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#UltraVioletChallenge by Performing Arts students Coon, Earth and June.

#VforVersion(s): alteration of foreign language text in a transformative constrained comics exercise

#VforVersion(s); alteration of imposed comics pages in foreign language -to the participants- (German edition of British creators Alan Moore and David Lloyd‘s V for Vendetta, and original edition of French cartoonist Lewis Trondheim‘s Psychanalyse) by partial deletion with white-out liquid of textual elements -such as sentences, words, letters or letter parts- to form a new text in English language which would be consistent with the unaltered pictorial sequence.

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Fig 1. A. – Tier from the 1988 American color collected edition of V for Vendetta by DC Comics/Vertigo (original text). B. – Tier from the 2003 German edition of V for Vendetta (V wie Vendetta) by Speed Comics, with black and white pages as serialized in the 1982 original British edition. C. – Same tier of the German edition but with partial alteration (elements of the text are whited out) by Thai student Mon to form English words and sentences. D. – Same tier as before but with Mon’s selected letters and words reassembled for ease of reading. Credits: V for Vendetta, co-created by Alan Moore (script) and David Lloyd (art) with colors by Steve Whitaker, Siobhan Doods and David Lloyd.

1. Introduction

April 2018. The 62 students of the Creative Writing for Printed Matter course (sections 10 and 11; “Graphic Writing”) at the International Program (BA) in Communication Management (Faculty of Communication Arts, Chulalongkorn University, Bangkok , Thailand) were provided with a series of imposed comics pages excerpted from the 2003 German edition of V for Vendetta (1 to 3 pages depending on section), of the 1996 edition of Lewis Trondheim‘s Psychanalyse (2 consecutive pages in French language), and of the American edition of the ongoing manga series Sunny by Japanese cartoonist Taiyō Matsumoto (2 consecutive pages).

“Ajarn [teacher], where do you find all the ideas you torture us with every week?”

Student Gam during the in-class assignment. Answer: Oupus series, OuBapo FB page, and my tortuous mind.

Winsor McCay Melissa Eddings Mancuso.jpg
A remarkable example of white-out text alteration by Melissa Eddings Mancuso for Matt Madden’s online course about constraints for The Pennsylvania Academy of the Fine Arts. In a comic strip from the series Dream of the Rarebit Fiend (launched in 1904) by Silas (aka Winsor McCay), Melissa “looked for names of body parts in the original dialogue and then simply whited out the other letters,” providing us with instant poetry.

Under a “transformative constraint (which alter existing works)” students -in teams of 2 to 5 participants- were asked to do a partial alteration of the written texts, by erasing/covering with white-out liquid some textual element in order to form new sentences which would be consistent with the unaltered pictorial sequence. Additionally, students had to compose English (words and) sentences by respecting the order of appearance of the selected letters (or groups of letters). The most painstaking -if not painful- aspect of the exercise was related to the pages in German and French languages, two foreign languages that participating Thai and exchange students do not speak. If text alteration constraints aren’t new in Literature or Comics Art (see Lettrism, Tom Phillips, blackout poetry, cut-up techniqueTNT en Amérique by Jochen Gerner [Fig 2], OuBaPo), the use of texts written in a language not spoken by the participant(s) seems to me less usual (as far as I know). The inability to understand the content of the foreign text and the constraint to propose an altered text in a mastered language (here English) are indeed quite a radical restrictions.

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Students Pat and Nymph whiting out fragments of text from imposed pages of Taiyō Matsumoto’s Sunny and Alan Moore and David Lloyd’s V for Vendetta to create new narratives.

Even if German, French and English languages share the same Roman script (with sometimes additional letters) and if they share numerous cognates (or words with a common etymological origin) as neighboring Indo-European languages, these cognates have taken different forms (such as “colleague” in English, “collègue” in French and “Kollege” in German). Unable to use cognates (or false cognates or false friends) unless sharing identical spellings, participants are thus forced to compose English words (and sentences) with smallest units of writings like graphemes or syllables (or digraphs or larger groups of successive letters). In the first illustration (Fig 1), student Mon was forced to the radical alteration of the German sentence “Den Zorn, der Feuer vom Himmel regnen liess.“(Fig 1B; That Wrath which did rain fire from the Heavens) to compose the English clause “No lie” (Fig 1 C, D). Participants also came to appreciate (sigh) the different ratios of vowels and consonants, as well as the different frequencies of letters and syllables, in German, French and English languages… Students noted the low frequency of the vowel ⟨o⟩ in German (2.594%) compared to French (5.796%) and English (7.507%). Consequently, the newly formed English sentences tended to be quite short. Using V’s theatrical tirades (and Alan Moore’s verbose writing) was truly convenient in this regard. Let’s note here that the high frequency of the vowel ⟨e⟩ and ⟨d⟩, ⟨o⟩, ⟨t⟩) in French language will be put to good use by students Por and Jean in their hilarious story “DOT” altering pages of Lewis Trondheim’s Psychanalyse (see Fig 5). Accidentally and to the delight of the French speakers, the two students ended their narrative on an English-French false friend word (and within the purest Lewis Trondheim tradition). Quite a revealing slip of the pen, would have said Freud and Lacan.

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Students Belle, Fame and Prim whiting out fragments of text from imposed pages of Lewis Trondheim’s Psychanalyse, Taiyō Matsumoto’s Sunny and Alan Moore and David Lloyd’s V for Vendetta to create new narratives.

The two main objectives of this exercise under radical restriction were: first, to prevent the participants from relying to much on familiar words and clauses that could be used without much alteration; second: to ensure that the altered text would be a complete creation with a new set of meanings, not influenced by the original content of the written text (as its meaning isn’t understood by the participants who don’t speak the language in which it is written) but mostly by their own interpretation of the visual sequences they are imposed with. The accompanying visual sequence is an additional productive constraint which led to the selection of possible themes and story-lines. The alteration of the comics pages excerpted from Lewis Trondheim’s Psychanalyse -a proto-OuBaPian comics itself using the constraint of iconic iteration applied to only two different panels (see below)- was in this respect less productive; the minimal visual “context” complicated the selection of a theme or concept (within the allocated time). However, it led to the brilliant “DOT” story by students Por and Jean (see Fig 5). The challenge was, as I said, painstaking -if not painful at times (sorry, kiddos!)- but the resulting pages were worth the effort, filled with comics poetry -if not Poetic Justice- and concert tickets for AC/DC (see Fig 20)…

Additional comments on the constraints:

  • The choice of V for Vendetta pages was made for several reasons: first, as a nod to the Master Class held two years ago during this course by V for Vendetta‘s co-creator and artist David Lloyd; second, the pleasure to enjoy his starck chiaroscuro technique with masterful use of negative spaces, third; to make the use of Alan Moore’s verbose script in the process of extended deletion of text; fourth, because the graphic novel V for Vendetta is sadly as relevant now than it was then, moreover in current Thai context.
  • Time limit for the in-class assignment was 3 hours for section 10’s teams (with all three V for Vendetta pages to be altered) and 2 hours for section 11’s teams (with only one V for Vendetta page to be altered).
  • As mentioned earlier, many letters are not as frequent in German or in French as in English. To alleviate their suffering, students were allowed to tamper with some letterforms but only by reduction (deletion/erasing). The leg of ⟨K⟩ could be white out to form a ⟨Y⟩; same goes for ⟨R⟩ turned into a ⟨P⟩ (or even a ⟨D⟩). The diagonal stroke of ⟨Z⟩ was turned in a typographical slash (to form the slash in AC/DC). ⟨E⟩ could become ⟨I⟩ or ⟨L⟩ or ⟨F⟩; ⟨N⟩ turned into ⟨V⟩; or “NV” into ⟨W⟩ with erasure of the first stroke and some stretch of closure. Digraphs could be transformed into punctuation marks, such as “TR” into an ellipsis (“…”).

TNT en Amérique
Fig 2. Left: page from Tintin en Amérique (Tintin in America) by Hergé. Right: radical reduction (with only fragments of the original text remaining) of the Tintin page by Jochen Gerner for TNT en Amérique“.

“The main interest for me of the comic strip is the infinite possible links between text and image : a system of representation continually confronting , in a kind of alchemy, text and picture . This is the field I endeavour to explore on my own or with OuBaPo (Ouvroir de Bande dessinée Potentielle).
The idea ‘TNT en Amérique’ sprang from these remarks with OuBaPo, from exercises, experiments. I try to find new reading perspectives. I dismantle a given material to make something else of it.” Jochen Gerner (source).

  • The use of logograms was also allowed. With ⟨N’⟩ for “and”, ⟨C⟩ for “see”, ⟨U⟩ for “you”, ⟨R⟩ for “are”, etc. Usage of slang was permitted too. The slang shortnening “Da” for “the” was accepted as well as “De” for “the” as it remained consistent with the accent of a German character (see Fig 3: A.B. Frost‘s comics, #VforVomans!).
  • Lewis Trondheim’s handwriting in Psychanalyse tended to complicate the browsing of the text to find usable graphemes and words. However, some ambiguous handwritten letterforms were put at good use with some ⟨O⟩ used as ⟨D⟩ (or conversely), ⟨U⟩ as ⟨V⟩, or ⟨L⟩ as ⟨C⟩.
  • WARNING: GRAPHIC LANGUAGE [sic]. We do apologize for the use of graphic language in the resulting pages, but the high frequency of the letters ⟨F⟩, ⟨U⟩, ⟨K⟩, ⟨C⟩ or ⟨B⟩, ⟨I⟩, ⟨T⟩, ⟨H⟩ in German language led to the formation of some English swear words; that’s explanation I’ve decided to provide anyway… And yes, “underwear” was spelled “underware” (see Fig 22), because it’s how I pronounce it with my French accent, I guess… #PoeticLicense #PardonMyFrench #Sic

AB Frost 1
Fig 3. #VforVomans! American cartoonist A. B. Frost’s first comic: a German attempts to pronounce English-language “th” phoneme. “De man, dis horse, dose vomans!” In: Harper’s News Monthly, December 1879.


2. Results for Psychanalyse

Note on Psychanalyse. In the pages of his minicomic series ACCI H3319 self-published between 1988 and 1990, then-debuting French cartoonist Lewis Trondheim produced comic strips and single-page comics narratives relying only on the repetition of a photocopied single panel or a highly limited set of different panels. For instance, in the series of strips collected under the title Psychanalyse [Psychoanalysis] (by Le Lézard Noir, and later by L’Association), each comics page is built only with 4 different panels -but duplicated and arranged following the constraint of “iconic iteration”- presenting, in close-up, the minimalist depiction of a patient discussing with his psychiatrist (kept off-panel). Our transformative constrained exercise is thus applied to comics pages built themselves on proto-OuBaPian productive constraints.

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Fig 4. CLICK ON THE PIC TO ENLARGE. Two imposed consecutive pages (in French language) of Lewis Trondheim’s Psychanalyse.

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Fig 5. CLICK ON THE PIC TO ENLARGE. Same pages of Lewis Trondheim’s Psychanalyse but with partial alteration (elements of the text are whited out) by Thai students Por and Jean to form English words and sentences. Their “DOT” comics, accidentally and to the delight of the French speakers, ends on an English-French false friend word (and within the purest Lewis Trondheim tradition). “Bite” usually defines the “use the teeth to cut into something” in English, but can be a (vulgar) synonym of “penis” in French language. Quite a revealing slip of the pen, would say Freud and Lacan.

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Fig 6. CLICK ON THE PIC TO ENLARGE. Same pages of Lewis Trondheim’s Psychanalyse but with partial alteration (elements of the text are whited out) by Thai students Erin, Misha, PingPing, Tanya and PunPun to form English words and sentences.


3. Results for V for Vendetta (excerpt 1)

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Fig 7. Page from the 1988 American color collected edition of V for Vendetta by DC Comics/Vertigo (original text). V for Vendetta, co-created by Alan Moore (script) and David Lloyd (art) with colors by Steve Whitaker, Siobhan Doods and David Lloyd. Compilation ©2005 DC Comics.

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Fig 8. Same page but from the 2003 German collected edition of V for Vendetta (V wie Vendetta) by Speed Comics, with black and white pages as serialized in the 1982 original British edition. V for Vendetta, co-created by Alan Moore (script) and David Lloyd (artist), DC Comics/Vertigo.

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Fig 9. Same page of the German edition of V for Vendetta but with partial alteration (elements of the text are whited out) by Thai student Mon (and his teammates Tap, Ik, Golf and X) to form English words and sentences.

V MON DEF
Fig 10. Same altered V for Vendetta page from the German edition but with Mon’s selected letters and words reassembled for ease of reading. Based on V for Vendetta, co-created by Alan Moore (script) and David Lloyd (artist), DC Comics/Vertigo.

V NYMPH DEF
Fig 11. Same V for Vendetta page from the German edition, altered by Thai student Nymph (and her teammate Pat). With selected letters and words reassembled for ease of reading. Based on V for Vendetta, co-created by Alan Moore (script) and David Lloyd (artist), DC Comics/Vertigo.

V VICKY DEF
Fig 12. Same V for Vendetta page from the German edition, altered by Thai student Vicky (with exchange student Marin). With selected letters and words reassembled for ease of reading. Based on V for Vendetta, co-created by Alan Moore (script) and David Lloyd (artist), DC Comics/Vertigo.

V TONG DEF
Fig 13. Same V for Vendetta page from the German edition, altered by Thai students Tong, French Fries, Grace and Pim. With selected letters and words reassembled for ease of reading. Based on V for Vendetta, co-created by Alan Moore (script) and David Lloyd (artist), DC Comics/Vertigo.

V NOINAE DEF
Fig 14. Same V for Vendetta page from the German edition, altered by Thai students Noinae, Paan and Boss. With selected letters and words reassembled for ease of reading. Based on V for Vendetta, co-created by Alan Moore (script) and David Lloyd (artist), DC Comics/Vertigo.

NOTE: more resulting altered pages of this first excerpt are displayed at the end of this post.


4. Results for V for Vendetta (excerpt 2)

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Fig 15. Page from the 1988 American color collected edition of V for Vendetta by DC Comics/Vertigo (original text). V for Vendetta, co-created by Alan Moore (script) and David Lloyd (art) with colors by Steve Whitaker, Siobhan Doods and David Lloyd. Compilation ©2005 DC Comics.

V10
Fig 16. Same page but from the 2003 German collected edition of V for Vendetta (V wie Vendetta) by Speed Comics, with black and white pages as serialized in the 1982 original British edition. V for Vendetta, co-created by Alan Moore (script) and David Lloyd (artist), DC Comics/Vertigo.

V2 NYMPH DEF
fig 18. Same V for Vendetta page from the German edition, altered by Thai student Nymph (and her teammate Pat). With selected letters and words reassembled for ease of reading. Based on V for Vendetta, co-created by Alan Moore (script) and David Lloyd (artist), DC Comics/Vertigo.

V2 POON DEF
Fig 19. Same V for Vendetta page from the German edition, altered by Thai students Poon (P), Poon (K) and Win. With selected letters and words reassembled for ease of reading. Based on V for Vendetta, co-created by Alan Moore (script) and David Lloyd (artist), DC Comics/Vertigo.

V2 FRENCH FRIES DEF
Fig 20. Same V for Vendetta page from the German edition, altered by Thai student French Fries (and her teammates Tong, Grace and Pim). With selected letters and words reassembled for ease of reading. Based on V for Vendetta, co-created by Alan Moore (script) and David Lloyd (artist), DC Comics/Vertigo.

“[V trying to get tickets for] an AC/DC concert: believable. Convincing scenario is essential in any storytelling…”

David Lloyd, V for Vendetta co-creator and artist, commenting on the previous page altered by student French Fries.

V2 MON DEF
Fig 21. Same V for Vendetta page from the German edition, altered by Thai student Mon (and his teammates Tap, Ik, Golf and X). With selected letters and words reassembled for ease of reading. Based on V for Vendetta, co-created by Alan Moore (script) and David Lloyd (artist), DC Comics/Vertigo.

V2 NOINAE DEF
Fig 22. Same V for Vendetta page from the German edition, altered by Thai students Noinae, Paan and Boss. With selected letters and words reassembled for ease of reading. Based on V for Vendetta, co-created by Alan Moore (script) and David Lloyd (artist), DC Comics/Vertigo.


 

5. Results for V for Vendetta (excerpt 3)

V12
Fig 23. Page from the 1988 American color collected edition of V for Vendetta by DC Comics/Vertigo (original text). V for Vendetta, co-created by Alan Moore (script) and David Lloyd (art) with colors by Steve Whitaker, Siobhan Doods and David Lloyd. Compilation ©2005 DC Comics.

V13 .jpg
Fig 24. Same page but from the 2003 German collected edition of V for Vendetta (V wie Vendetta) by Speed Comics, with black and white pages as serialized in the 1982 original British edition. V for Vendetta, co-created by Alan Moore (script) and David Lloyd (artist), DC Comics/Vertigo.

V3 DEF
Fig 25. Same V for Vendetta page from the German edition, altered by Thai students Poon (P), Poon (K) and Win. With selected letters and words reassembled for ease of reading. Based on V for Vendetta, co-created by Alan Moore (script) and David Lloyd (artist), DC Comics/Vertigo.

 

V3 MON DEF.jpg
Fig 26. Same V for Vendetta page from the German edition, altered by Thai student Mon (and his teammates Tap, Ik, Golf and X). With selected letters and words reassembled for ease of reading. Based on V for Vendetta, co-created by Alan Moore (script) and David Lloyd (artist), DC Comics/Vertigo.


6. Results for Sunny

Sun 01
Fig 27. Two successive pages excerpted from the manga series Sunny (volume 2) by Taiyō Matsumoto. ©2013 Matsumoto/Viz Media

Sun 05 POON
Fig 28. Same Sunny pages, with text alteration by Thai students Poon (P), Poon (K) and Win. Based onSunny (volume 2) by Taiyō Matsumoto. ©2013 Matsumoto/Viz Media

Sun 03 FAME
Fig 29. Same Sunny pages, with text alteration by Thai students Fame, Belle, Lukkaew and Prim. Based on Sunny (volume 2) by Taiyō Matsumoto. ©2013 Matsumoto/Viz Media

Sun 02 EERNG
Fig 30. Same Sunny pages, with text alteration by Thai students Misha, Erin, PingPing, Tanya and PunPun. Based on Sunny (volume 2) by Taiyō Matsumoto. ©2013 Matsumoto/Viz Media

Sun 04 GAM
Fig 31. Same Sunny pages, with text alteration by Thai students Gam, Mint (Si), Tip and Golf. Based on Sunny (volume 2) by Taiyō Matsumoto. ©2013 Matsumoto/Viz Media

“When Por told me her concept, I said: ‘Por, this is an idea to get us a F’.”

Student Jean about the following altered narrative; a bold move indeed…

Sun 04 POR
Fig 32. Same Sunny pages (here starting with left page), with (bold) text alteration by Thai students Por and Jean. Based on Sunny (volume 2) by Taiyō Matsumoto. ©2013 Matsumoto/Viz Media


7. More altered pages (“V”)

V ART 00 DEF
Fig 33. V for Vendetta page from the German edition (see original above), altered by Thai students Art, Mark, Junior and Book. With selected letters and words reassembled for ease of reading. Based on V for Vendetta, co-created by Alan Moore (script) and David Lloyd (artist), DC Comics/Vertigo.

V ERIN DEF
Fig 34. V for Vendetta page from the German edition (see original above), altered by Thai students Erin, Misha, PunPun, Earn, Tanya and PingPing. With selected letters and words reassembled for ease of reading. Based on V for Vendetta, co-created by Alan Moore (script) and David Lloyd (artist), DC Comics/Vertigo.

V GAM DEF
Fig 35. V for Vendetta page from the German edition (see original above), altered by Thai students Gam, Mint (Si), Tip and Golf. With selected letters and words reassembled for ease of reading. Based on V for Vendetta, co-created by Alan Moore (script) and David Lloyd (artist), DC Comics/Vertigo.

V PRIM DEF.jpg
Fig 36. V for Vendetta page from the German edition (see original above), altered by Thai students Lukkaew, Prim, Fame and Belle. With selected letters and words reassembled for ease of reading. Based on V for Vendetta, co-created by Alan Moore (script) and David Lloyd (artist), DC Comics/Vertigo.


“I’m gonna die. I’m gonna die. This is too complicated, Ajarn [teacher]. I’m gonna die.”

Student Noinae during the in-class assignment.