The Arvon Foundation is putting on a five day creative writing residential course on the power of stories born out of combining images and text in October, run by three top British comic creators.
The Foundation has been offering people time and space to write, with an annual programme of residential courses and retreats at three rural writing houses across the UK since 1968, and Text & Image, their latest comics-related course is being run by graphic novelists and cartoonists Hannah Berry (author of Adamtine and Britten & Brülightly), Simone Lia (author of Please God Find me a Husband) and guest tutor, The Guardian cartoonist Stephen Collins.
How do you tell stories through images and words? In this fun and informal course, Hannah Berry and Simone Lia will help you explore the many ways in which text and images can be combined. From experimenting with form to looking at the nuts and bolts of creating strong characters and effective narratives, this course will help graphic novelists and cartoonists, illustrators and comics creators alike to work and develop an existing projects or to start afresh on a bold new concept.
London-based Simone Lia began painting and drawing in her Dad’s tool shed at the age of 13. After studying at the University of Brighton she went on to write and illustrate books for children. She became friends with Tom Gauld at the RCA and they began self-publishing comics as Cabanon Press. Since then Simone has set up an art studio in an old pub, written a couple of graphic novels, Fluffy (a story of a bunny in denial) Please God, Find Me A Husband! (Jonathan Cape) had sausages and other food related characters starring in their own strips in a number of publications including The Independent on Sunday and The Guardian and has had her artwork hanging on the walls of The Tate Britain.
Simone has a weekly comic strip ‘Things I’ve Learned’ in The Observer. She’s just written her first chapter book for children (title to be confirmed) that will be published by Walker Books in 2016 and she is also working on her third graphic novel, that will be a sequel to Fluffy. She is the voice of the central character Fluffy Pulcino, who is a teenager and regularly uploads ‘photographs’ onto his instagram account. She also regularly works and exhibits with Jealous Gallery.
Check out her web site here.
Stephen Collins is a British illustrator and cartoonist whose work has appeared in many publications worldwide, and he has a weekly comic in The Guardian’s Weekend magazine, as well as a monthly one in Prospect.
In 2013 Jonathan Cape published his debut graphic novel The Gigantic Beard That Was Evil, which won the Edinburgh Ninth Art Award and was shortlisted for the Waterstones Book Of The Year award. Some Comics by Stephen Collins, a collection of his shorter strips, was published by Jonathan Cape in autumn 2014.
Check out his official web site here

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The founder of downthetubes, which he established in 1998. John works as a comics and magazine editor, writer, and on promotional work for the Lakes International Comic Art Festival. He is currently editor of Star Trek Explorer, published by Titan – his third tour of duty on the title originally titled Star Trek Magazine.
Working in British comics publishing since the 1980s, his credits include editor of titles such as Doctor Who Magazine, Babylon 5 Magazine, and more. He also edited the comics anthology STRIP Magazine and edited several audio comics for ROK Comics. He has also edited several comic collections, including volumes of “Charley’s War” and “Dan Dare”.
He’s the writer of “Pilgrim: Secrets and Lies” for B7 Comics; “Crucible”, a creator-owned project with 2000AD artist Smuzz; and “Death Duty” and “Skow Dogs” with Dave Hailwood.
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