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Angoulême On Saturday – A Quick Peek

Published Sat, 30 Jan 2010 12:37:58 -0600

Last updated Sun, 31 Jan 2010 02:33:22 -0600

Traditionally Saturday is the busiest day of any comic convention. And it's no different for the world's biggest comic convention, Angoulême. As Cameron Stewart just put it, reporting from the floor, "There are so many people at Angouleme it's crazy. Makes the San Diego Comic Con feel empty."

The murals on the sides of walls in the town have been causing much comment. We ran one yesterday, here's another;

CB Cebulski and Guiseppe Camuncoli have been signing French versions of X-Infernus, Kevin O'Neill signing up a storm, Peter Kuper selling and the French cover of Robert Crumb's Genesis has been causing some comment. But not from the French.

For the firts time there are six female comic book creators competeing for the Angoulême Grand Prix, more than ever before. One one woman has ever won the prize, Florence Cestac back in 2000.But, with forty-eight competitors, it's still remarkably small, considering more women read comics then men in France. Women only make up 11% of comic authors in the French market, which is causing some hand wrangling.

Though it's nice to see that they're not overcompensating to try and win favour as a result. Pénélope Bagieu, creator of Joséphine had an instructive sign at her table.

That lets people know that Pénélopewon't be signing on Sunday because it's mass all day and she hates her readers. Fantastic.

Apparently at Angoulême , politicians find it necessary to show their faces. Well, there are local elections in the offing. So Dominique Bussereau, French transport secretary arrived with the festival's founder.Other spots include the Socialist Party's presidential candidate Marie-Ségolène Royal and Socialist member Jack Lang French as well as Frédéric Mitterrand, French Minister of Culture and Communication.

And when one just comic stall looks like this…

You know you're going to find something you like…

For the show, Le Musée De La Bande Dessinée which we featured a few months past has asked a hundred comic artists to recreate, faithfully or with license, one hundred classic comic book illustrations by the likes of Hergé, Franquin or Hugo Pratt, as well as characters such as Andy Capp, Snoopy, Fritz The Cat and Tarzan.

The exhibition "Cent pour cent" – meaning both 100 percent and a hundred for a hundred will also appear in Paris and Bilbao in the months to come. It includes the reinterpretation of Lucky Luke below by Ruppert and Murlot, combining comics and glass to create a new kind of juxtaposed comic strip that combines past and future panels. Scott McCloud should see this. Has he already? I know he's around somewhere.