Luke Williams reports on goings on at the Lakes International Comic Festival in Kendal, Cumbria, earlier this month…

Every other year for the past few years I go to the Lakes International Comic Art Festival, aka LICAF. In the years in between, I go to Thought Bubble, the other large comic convention in the north of England. I alternate, as attending comic conventions is an expensive (never mind travelling and accommodation, you will always buy something at a con’ or festival) and time-consuming affair, particularly in travel, me being South Walian.

Tbubs and LICAF are very different in tone and feel, but both welcoming, inclusive, passionate events. LICAF is more about the talks, the discussion, the panels and the debate, with a marketplace. Whereas Thought Bubble switches the emphasis; it has panels and interviews, but is more of a showcase for creators and artists in its impressive marketplace. There is space for both, particularly as they celebrate comics, not necessarily the IP created in the medium of comics. Importantly, they complement each other.

So, just for the love of comics, your intrepid reporter travelled from the relative safety of the South Wales coast, (if anywhere is safe these days), up the through the marches, into that there England and onto the Lake District, approximately a 7.5 hour train journey.

Possibly the biggest obstacle to navigate is the UK’s fabulously integrated rail network. As it happened the trip up was uneventful, enjoyable even. But as is traditional on the morning of departure I was greeted with a text message informing me that there was disruption to my journey. Damn the torpedoes, tally ho, sally forth etc.

I’m not really one for detail or paying that much attention when I’m planning my travelling, so I was pleasantly surprised to find that the hotel I was staying at was just across the road from the railway station. Pleasant enough, and any (completely irritational) doubt whether I was in the right place were soon dispelled when I recognised an artist from previous cons booking in just before me. I supressed the urge to say hello (not that difficult, as I’m actually quite shy), checked in, dumped my stuff and checked out the town, which was about a 15-minute walk away.

Events were due to kick off at 8.00pm at the Brewery Arts Centre. I checked in, my weekend ticket (a bargain) did not cover the Friday night event (more on which later) so I had to buy that as an extra. I had time and daylight to have a wander around the town, I bought my ticket online for that evening’s event and set about exploring.

This is the first year of LICAF’s return to Kendal, the festival having been in the picturesque town of Bowness-on-Windermere on the shores of Lake Windemere for the past three years. Kendal is a lovely town: sadly, like most towns these days, it has its share of dodgy vape shops but fulfils the requirements for LICAF of being very picturesque. Lots of stone in construction, alleyways, courtyards, nooks and crannies, lots and lots of dogs – never a bad thing – and lots of history. Every other building or open space seems to have an explanatory notice attached to it outlining its past, the origins of its names and previous uses. For example, this vegan was interested to hear that “Shambles” was the old word for slaughterhouse. Everyday is a school day.

My first (but not last) purchase that weekend, was in a small second-hand shop. Like a lot of shops around the town, it had got into the spirit of things by emphasising its stock of comics or comic related products. Participating shops may also have had biographies of famous comic creators in the window, such as Charles Schulz, Al Cap, Dik Browne, Mort Drucker, Walt Kelly etc. These were in addition to the banners that festooned the streets, it’s good to see the traders of the town and local authority supporting the festival.

In the gardens of the main hub of the Festival, the Brewery Arts Centre, was an exhibition by French artist Serge Bloch and curator Mathieu Diez, with quotes and facts relating to the comics on display on large eye-catching banners emphasising how much comics are actually a part and an influence on everyday modern life.

Onto the evening’s event. With an introduction and welcome by local MP and former Lib Dem Leader Tim Farron, a VIZ fan and fervent supporter of LICAF, the Friday night event was billed as “Asterix v Tin Tin : The Rematch”, with the presentation of the Sergio Aragonés international Award for Excellence In Comic Art at the end. The rematch refers to the event in 2016, where two teams of comic creators put forward the argument for who was better, Asterix, or Tintin. Asterix won that bout, would the evening’s rematch see a different result?

No. (Quite rightly, as if there could be any other outcome!) If anything, this year’s result put it beyond doubt. However, compered by Keli Lark, there was lots of fun to be had as the two teams [Team Asterix comprising Jason Chatfield, Karen Evans and Hugleikur Dagsson, Team Tintin Bill Morrison, Nicholas Pitz and a flipflopping Dagsson, to make up numbers) argued back and fore the strengths of “their” character while questioning the iconic status and moral integrity of the focus of the opposing teams efforts. All this on a stage draped with paraphernalia from both characters, while Luke McGarry, Gemma Correll artistically interpreted what was being discussed in front of them. Great fun. 

Before the result was announced there was a short introduction for the much-deserved presentation to Frank Quitely of the Sergio Aragonés award. Even paying for it as a an extra, the evening is a great introduction to the weekend.

As usual, I hadn’t planned on what I was going to do or who I was going to see, but made it up on the hoof. Luckily the programme has guest lists, a map, a breakdown of each event and an event scheduler, plus a signing scheduler to help even the most disorganised. Though tackling indecision and conflicts in scheduling / interests is still down to the attendee.

The hub, the aforementioned Brewery Arts Centre included the main theatre, studio theatre and malt room, most talks and presentation of films occurred here and was the location for registering, with lots of information and some boards on the wall pads so you can add your own cartoon. My Saturday was mainly spent in the Brewery Main Theatre, kicking off with the National Cartoonist Society’s 80th Anniversary bash. This was an excuse to get a load of artists, including Marc Jackson, Dagsson, Bill Morrison, Karen Evans, Simon Thorpe, Gemma Corell, Petteri Tikkanen, Bim Erkisson, Jason Chatfield, and Pieter De Poorte, in a room to draw topics picked by the audience, a spurious random movie generator or compere Steve McGarry. All the while, Colleen Doran was quietly completing an absolutely beautiful piece of work at the back of the stage, given away as a raffle prize at the end of the session. 

Queuing for the next event, in the main theatre an interview with Frank Quitely, I was overcome with complete fanboyness as I realised Grant Morrison was standing five feet away from me (attending “incognito”, if such thing was possible, not a guest). I composed myself and patiently waited for the doors to open, and also noticed Rian Hughes and Sean Phillips. This is part of what makes these kind of events so special: that the creators are there for the comics and the medium as much as the “regular” attendees are.

Frank was a great interview, retelling his origin story as it were, his early years, sketching at the end with the two completed sketches given away to the two youngest members of the audience.

The deciding factor as to why I had attended LICAF was up next in the same theatre. The Bill Sienkiewicz interview was probably the highlight of the weekend (though it was close). He was cheery, affable and very engaging, discussing his influences, how he broke into comics (we have a lot to thank Neal Adams for), and his interactions with notorious Marvel EIC Jim Shooter. He drew a Batman head, and ended by thanking the audience for attending. What a guy.

The next event was a 40 years in comics talk from Dinner Ladies from Hell creator David Leach. That was in the Westmorland Campus, which had a shopping centre adjacent and about a ten minute walk back into town. It was also the location for the comic marketplace and the comic workshops taking place over the weekend.

Just down the lane from the Brewery Arts Centre to the main road which led to the Westmorland Campus, was an exhibition entitled “The Tree Of Life”. This exhibited the work of Pieter De Poorte, creator of Dickie, and Dagsson, both demonstrating their very dark, though occasionally puerile, humour – an acquired taste, but if you like it (I do) it was definitely worth a visit and I’d recommend picking up their work.

I arrived at the David Leach talk a few minutes late, not helped by not being able to find it for the signing queue for Bill Sienkiecz and Frank Quitely. Mr. Leach can talk, a lot. He took us through his four decades in comics, from his early days working with Bob Godfrey, his work on the excellent “The Driver “with Jeremy Banx, and his experience with sadly departed classic UK weekly Toxic’s publishers, his time at Marvel UK, his time as an animator, his time working for Codemasters video game company, up to the present and his current role with Titan Comics. Complete motormouth, lots of energy and very funny, very entertaining. John McShane was ostensibly there as interviewer, but he and Mrs Leach basically nudged Mr Leach back on track occasionally as he regaled attendees with stories of his career, his meeting Frank Miller (which is wonderful, Frank sounds like a lovely chap) and meeting George Lazenby. There was no doubt at the end that Mr David Leach loves comics.

There was not enough time to explore the market, so I hoofed it back up to the Brewery Centre for the “Dylan Southern in Desert Island Comics” event. Dylan Southern is a music documentary maker who wrote and directed The Thing With Feathers the adaptation of the Max Porter book Grief is the Thing with Feathers. Southern’s adaptation changes things slightly by making the lead character a comic artist, rather than a writer. Comic illustration and guidance on drawing to lead Benedict Cumberbatch being supplied by event interviewer Lucy Sullivan. Dylan had some interesting choices for his desert island comics, and some that I would be chasing up. The film was shown immediately afterward, and it was a competent piece of work, but lacking something. Beautifully shot, dark, well-acted and written, but sadly not that affecting. David Thewlis, who had a voice acting role, stole the show.

The Sunday started with a trip to the Westmorland Campus for the comic market. I managed to catch up with a few people I’d met before, and creators whose work I had reviewed. There was a good range of comic creators present, lots of money spent, things signed etc., although as a venue, a creator had complained that it was a bit remote and not that easy to find. It wasn’t the smallest of venues and certainly better than the marketplace that was available at Bowness in 2022.

It also housed a Graphic Novel (aka fat comics © Kevin O’Neill) Reading Room with a catholic range of subjects and titles, everything from superhero to confessional and underground (fat) comics.

I legged back up to the Marcos Martin and Muntsa Vicente talk, hosted by comics journalist and podcaster Alex Fitch, whose work can be seen on Friday with Ed Brubaker and the classic Private Eye and Barriers with Brian K Vaughan. Martin is also behind the online comic publisher Panel Syndicate, and he gave some insight into its “pay what you want” business model and both artists explained what it was like to be a couple and working on the same comics together

I hightailed it out of there as soon as it had finished to head back down to the tail end of the Bill Sienkiewicz signing back at the Westmorland Campus, and I was amazed to find that their queue had only one person ahead of me. However, as usual, I hadn’t planned for any signings, and had forgotten to bring anything Bill had worked on. So, the LICAF programme had to do, plus he was gracious enough to have a selfie with this gushing ill-prepared fanboy.

The Abbot Hall, about a ten-minute walk away past the Brewery Centre, housed the very interesting exhibition of “Landscapes of Contemporary Belgian Comics”, and was probably the most remote of the venues. Even a sticky front door wouldn’t stop me getting in, I’m not a complete spanner, it felt locked – I still don’t know how the attendant didn’t hear me trying to open it. It was a fascinating insight into the status of Belgian comics.

Back to the Malt Room at the Brewery Centre for the Colleen Doran interview hosted by Alex Fitch. Colleen was candid, forthright, witty, self deprecating, extremely funny and not a little scary, a fantastic interviewee. 

Wrapping up the weekend was a live draw hosted by Keli Lark, with Michael Lark (looking well) Bill Sienkeiwicz, Gemma Cornell and Charlie Adlard. With Keli encouraging the audience to give suggestions for subjects for the artists to draw, and weird questions like what are the artists’ favourite comfort foods, and with which Muppet you would have a romantic liaison.

There was loads I missed. I didn’t visit the Little LICAF event in the Town Hall, set up for younger fans and aspiring creators, LICAF is very family friendly (for the most part, maybe not in some panels). I particularly wanted to catch the showing of the OINK documentary, the Kate Charlesworth interview and the female pioneers in comics, but there are always clashes in events, not to mention the guided tours for the public for the two exhibitions “Not That Into Comics” and “In The Last Passage”. There were also evening social events on the Friday and  Saturday, including bands, DJ sets and Karaoke, I’m grumpy, so didn’t attend.

Sadly, my trip home wasn’t quite as comfortable as the way up, my Monday morning train and the following two trains were cancelled from Kendal, so I shared a taxi with a fellow Welsh comic fan to Oxenholme (shout out to Simon, I hope you got home okay), where I caught a train to Crewe. Then stood, wedged alongside a luggage rack on an overstuffed three-carriage sprinter from Crewe to Cardiff. Kudos to Transport for Wales, who if nothing else, are consistent. The joys of the UK train system. Still, at least the trip up was okay!

Great weekend. If you haven’t been to LICAF, start planning your weekend in 2027 now.

Luke Williams

The Lakes International Comic Art Festival returns to Kendal, Cumbria 7th – 9th October 2027

• The Lakes International Comic Art Festival is online at: comicartfestival.com | BlueSky | Facebook | Instagram  | YouTube 

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Luke Williams

Brought up on a diet of Commando, British Boys Annuals and Asterix, Lucas Williams’s day job limits his reading time. Luckily for everyone else this also restricts his writing time.

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Categories: Comics, Creating Comics, downthetubes Comics News, downthetubes News, Events, Exhibitions, Features, Reviews

Tags: Bill Morrison, Bill Sienkiewicz, Charlie Adlard, Dagsson, David Leach, downthetubes News, Dylan Southern, Events Comics, Frank Quitely, Gemma Correll, Kendal, Lakes International Comic Art Festival, Luke McGarry, Luke Williams, Mathieu Diez, National Cartoonists Society, Pieter De Poorte, Review, Sean Philips, Serge Bloch, Sergio Aragonés International Award for Excellence in Comic Art, Steve McGarry, Tim Farron MP