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Award-winning comic creators join this year’s Lakes International Comic Art Festival lineup

By John Freeman on June 8, 2023

The Lakes International Comic Art Festival has announced another fine mix of guests for its annual Festival (29th September – 1st October 2022) in Bowness-on-Windermere, including Hunt Emerson, winner of the 2018 Sergio Aragonés International Award for Excellence in Comic Art, and caricaturist, cartoonist and humorous illustrator Tom Richmond.

Hunt, Tom and Jad (George Khoury), Fouad Mezher, Seif Eddine Nechi and Václav Šlajch join previously-announced guests at the event, with more to be revealed soon.

The so-far announced all-star lineup includes Mehdi Annassi, aka Machima, Charlie Adlard, Gigi Cavenago, Gustavo Duarte, Gerhard, Lina Ghaibeh, Peter Hogan, Comics Laureate Stephen L. Holland, Mai Koraiem, Michael Lark, Lucie Lomová, Dave McKean, Bill Morrison, Steve and Annie Parkhouse, Sean Phillips, Marek Rubec, Festival poster designer Mohamed Salah, Rachael Smith and “Awkward Yeti” creator Nick Sulek.

The event will open with a never-to-be repeated opening night of comedy with comedian and comic creator Frankie Boyle and comic Josie Long on Friday 29th September.

The event will also see the announcement of a new Comics Laureate, chosen following the recently-announced “Open Call” for applications for the honorary, unpaid, position.

“We always enjoy a laugh at the Lakes Festival, and Hunt and Tom regularly deliver,” says Festival Director Julie Tait. “Along with other humour comic creators, plus our opening night with Frankie Boyle and Josie Long, we think there’s plenty for all to enjoy in our lineup.”

The Festival’s efforts to boost its offering for younger comic readers, as well as established fans, continues, with a crowdfunding campaign to support the work of its “Little LICAF” team. The organisation is determined to help grow new audiences, echoing the work of many other comic events, representatives of several of them visiting the Festival this year for an event that will provide an opportunity for an exchange of ideas.

Early backers of the Little LICAF Crowdfundr can choose to buy a Festival 2023 Weekend Ticket for just £20, but only a limited number are available.

FESTIVAL DATES: The Lakes International Comic Art Festival returns to Bowness-on-Windermere 29th September to 1st October 2023

• Early backers of the Little LICAF Crowdfundr can choose to buy a Festival 2023 Weekend Ticket for just £20, but only a limited number are available

• Buy your “Frankie Boyle and Josie Long Talk Comics” Festival Opening Night tickets here

• Sign up for the Lakes International Comic Art Festival Newsletter

Latest Festival Guests

Hunt Emerson has been drawing comics since the mid-1970s, and has published over 30 comic books, mostly with Knockabout.com. One of Hunt’s specialities has been hilarious adaptations of classic literature – his versions of Dante’s Inferno and The Rime of the Ancient Mariner are highly regarded. He is a longtime contributor to Fortean Times magazine, and to The Beano, has worked with The Ruskin Foundation in Brantwood, Coniston, and with Dove Cottage in Grasmere, and he’s taught and run workshops all over Britain and overseas.

Hunt’s work is funny, lively, and usually highly improbable. His latest publications are Lives of the Great Occultists, Phenomenomix (a 240-page collection) and a children’s book called Moby Duck.

You can buy his books (the ones still in print) on his website, Largecow.com, along with original artwork pages and cartoons.

George Khoury (JAD) has been a journalist, comics artist and animator since the 1980s. He’s also a comics critic, independent lecturer, and researcher in the fields of comics and animation, and has had a long teaching career, at the Lebanese American University in digital media (1999-2017), and as head of the Animation Department at Future Television since its launch (1993-2019).

His artworks and movies have featured in many local events and international festivals, and his comic, Shahrazad, was acquired by The National Museum of Comics (France/Angoulême).

The co-founder of the Lebanese Syndicate of Professional Graphic Designers, Illustrators and Animators, he has earned several awards for his artwork and filmography.

JAD is also author of the History of Arabic Comics, in addition to several essays and articles related to art, comics, and animation.  

"Drowned World" by Fouad Mezher — *“Drowned World” by Fouad Mezher*

Fouad Mezher is a cartoonist and illustrator based in Lebanon whose comic work includes The Fifth Column, winning a Mahmoud Kahil Award in 2016; “The Mezzotint” from Ghost Stories of an Antiquary, an adaptation of a story by MR James; as well as various entries in the anthology magazine, Samandal.

He has also taught comics and illustration at the American University of Beirut, where he encouraged students to draw mutant chickens and murder, sometimes in the same drawing.

He now spends most of his time working on Suraya, a graphic novel due for publication in 2025. Set in Beirut a year after the port explosion, the story revolves around the titular 16-year-old physics prodigy and YouTuber who hopes to leave the country to study rocket science, only for her plans to be interrupted when one of her experiments goes terribly and publicly wrong.

"Bombyx" by Seif Eddine Nechi — *“Bombyx” by Seif Eddine Nechi*

Born in Tunis in June 1974, Seif Eddine Nechi, who holds a Masters degree in psychology, worked for years in advertising as an art director.

He launched a satirical blog in 2009 that was censored in 2010, and was co-founder of the comics magazine Lab 619; then co-founded, with Aymen Mbarek, the blog, BD soubia.com.

In 2016, Seif made became a graphic comics journalist and was awarded the Best Electronic Comic Award at Cairocomix 2, and was finalist at the Mahmoud Kahil Award the same year, for Tawahoch. In 2017, he won the prize for Best Digital Graphic Novel at Cairocomix3, for Bombyx Mori, in collaboration with Aymen Mbarek, and won the best graphic novel in the Mahmoud Kahil Award. In 2018, he participated in the exhibition, “New Generation of Arab comics Artists at the Angoulême Festival in France. The same year, he founded Soubia, a publisher specialising in comics and illustrated content.

He held the position of Art Director at the Salon International de la Bande Dessinée de Tazarka in both 2018 and 2019.

Soubia co-published a comic book about fear and folklore in both Tunisia and Egypt, and, in 2020, a project created with Mazg, funded by Al Mawred thaqafi. He also worked on De plomb et de sang, a graphic novel, and an application about terrorism in 2020.

Last year saw publication of another graphic novel, Une révolte Tunisienne, la légende de Chbayah, published in both French and Arabic versions.

Caricaturist, cartoonist and humorous illustrator Tom Richmond began his career at age 18 as a caricaturist, at a theme park in 1985 while going to art school. He has spent the last nearly four decades as a freelance illustrator, doing art for comics, magazines, books, newspapers, advertising, products, animation, TV and film for a great variety of clients including Scholastic, Sports Illustrated for Kids, National Geographic World, Time Digital, Penthouse, GQ, Marvel Comics, NOW Comics, DC Entertainment, The Cartoon Network, CNN, Warner Bros Animation, Simon and Schuster Publishing, Jeff Dunham Enterprises, Quentin Tarantino’s “Magnum Opus Productions” and many more.

He’s best known as one of the “Usual Gang of Idiots” at MAD Magazine, where his caricatures and illustrations have been featured in MAD’s trademark film and TV parodies and other articles regularly since 2000. He is the author of the best-selling caricature instruction book The Mad Art of Caricature, which has become the standard in the industry.

Tom’s work has been recognised with many awards include being twice honoured as “Caricaturist of the Year” from the International Society of Caricature Artists, and with the Reuben award for “Outstanding Cartoonist of the Year” from the National Cartoonists Society.

He works from a studio in his home in Burnsville, in the United States.

Václav Šlajch is a comic book artist and illustrator. He graduated from the Faculty of Electrical Engineering at the University of West Bohemia in Pilsen, and subsequently studied illustration at the Institute of Art and Design in Pilsen (currently, the Ladislav Sutnar Faculty of Design and Art).

As an artist, he belongs to what has come to be called “Generation 0” of Czech comics, together with artists such as Jiří Grus, ToyBox and Vladimír 518). In 2010, and again in 2022, he received the prestigious Muriel comic book award in Czech Republic. Also in 2022, he received, along with some of his students, the Japan International Manga Award for the comic book IOGI which has been hugely successful and was published both in the Czech Republic and in Japan. The publisher Centrala is planning to produce an English version. He also collaborated with director Jan Svěrák on several projects: for example, he is the author of the graphic version of the film Three Brothers.

In addition to creating comics and book illustrations, Václav Šlajch also teaches illustration and is head of the Media and Didactic Illustration Atelier at the Ladislav Sutnar Faculty of Design and Art of the University of West Bohemia in Pilsen.

FESTIVAL DATES: The Lakes International Comic Art Festival returns to Bowness-on-Windermere 29th September to 1st October 2023

• Early backers of the Little LICAF Crowdfundr can choose to buy a Festival 2023 Weekend Ticket for just £20, but only a limited number are available

• Buy your “Frankie Boyle and Josie Long Talk Comics” Festival Opening Night tickets here

• Sign up for the Lakes International Comic Art Festival Newsletter

John Freeman

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.