I’m pleased to announce the online seminar “GRAPHIC NON-FICTION IN ASIA: THE ROAD AHEAD”, a roundtable with comics creators and editors from South and Southeast Asia to discuss their works and the challenges they face in their respective countries. Guest speakers: Bambi Eloriaga-Amago [Philippines], Charis Loke [Malaysia], Sreejita Biswas (Solo) [India], Tanis Werasakwong (Sa-ard) [Thailand] and Adoor Yeh [Taiwan], and moderated by yours truly. On Thursday November 25th, 2021, 4PM (GMT+7) [2:30PM Delhi; 4PM Bangkok; 5PM KUL, MLA & TPE]. Seminar duration: 2 hours. Organized by the National Research Council of Thailand and the Institute of Asian Studies, Chulalongkorn University.
Inscription to the Zoom session via this link: https://forms.gle/5Gzw3eqpMwqQ2qkMA
[Poster illustration from “taskun mudaan” by Adoor Yeh, 慢工出版 Slowork Publishing, 2021]
Category: Talks
“Comics” Field Trip and Lectures at the National University of Singapore (Dec. 2017)
It was an honor and a pleasure to visit the prestigious National University of Singapore with khun Cue and 15 junior students in the International Program of Communication Management (Faculty of Communication Arts, Chulalongkorn University), and to give a short lecture on the development of Thai Comics during the first half of the 20th century. Our warm thanks to our host Associate Professor Dr. Ian Gordon, Head of the Department of History (NUS), and to Associate Professor Dr. Titima Suthiwan, Director of the Centre for Language Studies (NUS). We also want to thank Singaporean comics scholar Lim Cheng Tju for his presentation on “Consumption of Manga and Anime in Singapore”! Glad we were able to share perspectives on South-East Asian Comics, Manga and… Superman (as Dr. Ian Gordon is the author of Superman: The Persistence of an American Icon)!
This faculty field trip also gave me the opportunity to prepare our CommArts students for next semester’s Creative/Graphic Writing for Printed Matter course! Comics Shopping Day in Singapore!
Guests at Filipino Canadian Cartoonist Lorina Mapa’s Comics Workshop
Filipino Canadian cartoonist Lorina Mapa, author of the graphic memoir Duran Duran, Imelda Marcos, and Me, was a guest at the Bangkok Edge Festival 2018, with the participation of the Embassy of Canada to Thailand. On Saturday 20, the artist gave an delightful and interesting public talk on her work, and held a comics workshop on Sunday 21. The Embassy of Canada to Thailand opened extra seats for my students (CommDe & CommArts, Chulalongkorn University) who wished to take part in the (fully booked) workshop (KhopKhunMakKhrap khun Noppawan!)
My warmest thanks to Lorina Mapa, the Bangkok Egde Festival, and the Embassy of Canada to Thailand!
“When Manga, Franco-Belgian and American Comics Collide; Or the Genesis of Thai Alternative Comics”; a lecture at Gakushuin University, Tokyo (Dec. 2016).
During our 5-day field trip in Tokyo with coordinator P’Pum and 17 students of the Faculty of Communication Arts (International Program, Chulalongkorn University), we were welcomed by the prestigious Gakushuin University (Tokyo, Japan) to hold a lecture on the History of Thai Comics.
The lecture at Gakushuin University (Tokyo) was titled “When Manga, Franco-Belgian and American Comics Collide; Or the Genesis of Thai Alternative Comics.” It focused on presenting why I consider that the composite style of Thai pioneering alternative cartoonist Suttichart Sarapaiwanich on the series “Joe the Sea-Cret agent” is concurrently at the crossroads of American, Japanese and Franco-Belgian comics traditions and yet a remarkable artistic expression of ‘Thainess’ (and of the globalized and eclectic modern Thai way-of-life in the aftermath of the Tom Yum Goong crisis).
“Female Voices in Comics Art: Sharing Perspectives from Thailand, Spain, Japan and the U.S.A.” Round Table
The round table “Female Voices in Comics Art: Sharing Perspectives from Thailand, Spain, Japan and the U.S.A.” was held on Friday, March 10, at the BACC (Bangkok Art and Culture Center) during the HeForShe Arts Week Bangkok (UN Women for Asia and the Pacific) in collaboration with the Embassy of Spain in Bangkok (Ministerio de Asuntos Exteriores y de Cooperación de España). It was a rich, meaningful and cheerful talk with an amazing panel composed of Thai artist Tunlaya Dunn, Thai-American artist Kathy MacLeod, Spanish artist Carla Berrocal (also curator of the PRESENTES exhibition, and my Thai colleague & Manga scholar Aj. Mashima Tojirakarn (PhD. candidate, University of Kyoto). I’ve been honoured to act as the moderator of this round table (thank you again Kathy for suggesting my name). The discussion focused on comics and women, and most interestingly, on gender equality in the industry, as well as on the rise of female voices in Thai Comics, and on the rich history of Spanish comics by female cartoonists (PRESENTES exhibition). I would like to extend my warmest thanks to HeForShe Arts Week Bangkok’s curators Alejandro Hita & David Fernández for the organization of this whole week, and specific event, as well as Embassy of Spain in Bangkok’s representatives Maria Salcedo Ortiz (Deputy Head of Mission) & Joan Vicens Mestre for their invaluable participation to the event, and partners Chulalongkorn University & BACC. Thank you Carla, Kathy, Tunlaya & Mashima for the great talk! ขอบคุณมากนะครับ Pathumporn Tik Thongking for the wonderful pics!
Aj. Nicolas Verstappen
“Managing Creativity for Communicative Innovation” course (Jan-Apr 2017)
For the first semester of 2017, the “Managing Creativity for Communicative Innovation” course (Communication Management, International Program, Faculty of Communication Arts, Chulalongkorn University, Bangkok, Thailand) had three main goals:
1) select, summarize and partly translate 9 Thai alternative comics, and contact a foreign publisher to get them signed abroad. This endeavor was highly successful as it resulted in the publication of 4 titles by Art Jeeno in French language from Éditions çà et là: see here.
2) Publish, promote and distribute our own zine gathering the constrained comics composed by former “Graphic Writing” CommArts students.
3) Organize an exhibition of the “Traumics” (Comics on Trauma) composed by CommArts & CommDe (Program in Communication Design, Department of Industrial Design, Faculty of Architecture, Chulalongkorn University) students.
David Lloyd & the Painted Smile: public talk, retrospective exhibition, masterclass, workshop, portfolio reviews and press day at Chulalongkorn University
V for Vendetta co-creator and artist David Lloyd, special guest of our Faculty (Faculty of Communication Arts), Chulalongkorn University, for a public talk, a retrospective exhibition, a masterclass, a workshop and portfolio reviews. The workshop and portfolio reviews have their own dedicated post over here. Press interviews (tv, radio, magazine, newspaper) conducted with David Lloyd during his visit in Thailand are gathered at the end of this article.
During the public talk held at the Faculty of Communication Arts on March 23, 2016, David Lloyd discussed the creation of the essential graphic novel V for Vendetta, its movie adaptation, the designing and popularity of the iconic Guy Fawkes/V/Anonymous mask, the historical launch of the “British Invasion”, the developing field of webcomics, and the composition of profound, engaged and sophisticated narratives in Comics Art.
In the early 80s, English artist David Lloyd created and designed the character of V and his now famous Guy Fawkes mask (known lately as the “Anonymous mask”). Inviting the promising writer Alan Moore to join his comics project, David Lloyd required from his collaborator to avoid any thought balloons or voice over emanating from the masked freedom fighter. The constraint, remarkable and innovative at the time in the field, strengthened the ambiguity and complexity of the inner motivations and turmoil of V as he spreads terror amongst the leaders of a corrupted and fascist government in a dystopian England evoking George Orwell’s 1984. First conceived with a stark and impressing black-and-white chiaroscuro and serialized between 1982 and 1985 in the English magazine Warrior, the sophisticated narrative drew the attention of major publishers on the other side of the Atlantic.
V for Vendetta, and David Lloyd as an artist and a liaison representative, participated to the groundbreaking “British Invasion” of American comics which led to the creation of the high-quality Vertigo imprint by DC Comics and to the publication of major graphic novels such as Alan Moore and Dave Gibbons’ Watchmen. Working with Grant Morrison on John Constantine: Hellblazer, with Garth Ennis on War Stories or with Jamie Delano on the outstanding tales Nightraven and The Horrorist, David Lloyd never ceased to explore the complexity of the human psyche without ever compromising his own artistic and political integrity. Regarded by the critics as an essential graphic novel, V for Vendetta experienced a new wave of popularity through its 2006 movie adaptation produced by the Wachowski brothers (now sisters) and starring Natalie Portman and Hugo Weaving. The Guy Fawkes mask became an anti-establishment and anti-authoritarian symbol in protests around the world, from the Occupy Wall Street movement to the Arab Spring revolutionary wave. Through its appropriation and extended use by the ‘hacktivist’ group Anonymous, it is now one of the most important revolutionary icons in recent decades with more than 100,000 official copies of the masks being sold annually. Using the gained popularity of his creation to promote the works of other (and often debuting) cartoonists, David Lloyd launched in 2012 the online comics anthology Aces Weekly, one of the first attempts of the kind in the developing field of webcomics.
On March 28, 2016, David hold a masterclass with the students of the Creative Writing (28003216 – Graphic Writing) course. He discussed comics art and visual storytelling and provided individual comments on the graphic narratives produced by the students.
Press interviews (tv, radio, magazine, newspaper) done with David Lloyd during his visit in Thailand.
TELEVISION:
The first of the two-part interview with David Lloyd for Thai channel Voice TV is available (in Thai) over here. The second of the two-part TV interview (in Thai) with David Lloyd focuses on the comics artform, on the banning of sound effects in V for Vendetta and on digital comics (David Lloyd being the publisher of the Aces Weekly digital comics anthology). Report shot in front of the retrospective exhibition dedicated to David’s career, right after his public talk at the Faculty of Communication Arts, Chulalongkorn University.
MAGAZINE:
Interview with David Lloyd conducted by khun Pim-On for the magazine a day bulletin #407 (at the Faculty of Communication Arts, Chulalongkorn University). Available (in Thai) over here.
NEWSPAPER:
Interview with David Lloyd and four-page “cover story” by Richard S. Ehrlich for the Bangkok Post weekly cultural supplement Brunch (April 3-9, 2016). Available (in English) on this page.
RADIO:
Podcast of the interview (in English w/ Thai translation) with David Lloyd by three famous Thai cartoonists (Suttichart Sarapaiwanich, Eakasit Thairaat and Songsin Tiewsomboon) for RadioMANGA. Available over here!
Podcast of the interview (in English) with David Lloyd by Colin Cheney & Donald Quist for Poet in Bangkok. “In this eighth episode (Episode #8: A Very Small Irony), Colin and Donald speak with acclaimed comics artist David Lloyd, co-creator and illustrator of V for Vendetta. David discusses his working class upbringing and how American culture fed his development as an artist. He gives insight into some of his earlier collaborations with Alan Moore and other writers. David also shares his impressions of Bangkok and provides his perspective on the use of his V for Vendetta Guy Fawkes mask by Thai protesters”. Available over there!
I would like to extend my sincere thanks to David Lloyd for honoring our Faculty with his visit, to Assistant Professor Dr. Duang-Kamol Chartprasert, Dean of the Faculty of Communication Arts, Chulalongkorn University, Dr. Jirayudh Sinthuphan, Communication Management Program chairperson, and all the CommArts staff for their support. I would like to express my thanks to Bird, Look-in, Lookme, Looksorn, Narada, Big, Vi, Bomb, Nic Dunlop and Colin Cheney for their valuable assistance. Aj. Nicolas Verstappen