Comic Book Festival Dublin
Issue #9: 16-18 May 2024
Fête de l'Illustration & de la Bande Dessinée
About
9ème édition du festival célébrant le 9ème art
Alliance Française Dublin , Illustrators Ireland and the French Embassy in Ireland are proud to celebrate the 8th Anniversary of their partnership in presenting the Fête de l ’illustration & de la Bande Dessinée running from 16th to 18th May 2024
We will kick off the festival with our ever-popular Live Reading featuring 10 of the most innovative and entertaining artists working in the Bande Dessinée tradition. New for 2024, we will engage our fans audience by offering a selection creative workshops: comic-making, drawing, and visual storytelling. These will be facilitated by professional illustrators and writers, and will be suitable for all ages from children to adults. We will also have the pleasure of welcoming Claire Prouvost, French artist and muralist, who will run a very special participatory mural workshop on the 3rd floor of the Alliance Française building. Make your mark!
As every year, there will be book sales and signings, discussions, an exhibition, and a special screening of Ernest and Celestine. We also invite you to our Library to enjoy our own collection of comics and graphic novels and to the our Members' Room for the Zine and Comics fair.
We aim to present a festival that celebrates the traditions of both the French and Irish comics’ scene. We look forward to welcoming you and we guarantee you will come away inspired and entertained.
Events
All events are free of charge. Please note early booking is essential (except for the Exhibition)
- Performance
Live Readings
& Book Fair- Illustrators Ireland has selected the most promising indie comic makers from Ireland and France to bring their comics to life. The experience is a fully immersive storytelling event that combines illustration, sound, and live performance in what feels like a cross between theatre and animation. After the performance by the artists, a live talk and Q& A will be moderated by illustrator Karn Harte.
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Thursday 16 May – 6.30pm
Admission Free
Alliance Française Dublin
- Screening
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Screening:
Ernest & Célestine - We are delighted to screen this year Ernest & Célestine (2012) the French-Belgian-Luxembourg animated family film directed by Stéphane Aubier, Vincent Patar and Benjamin Renner (Le Grand Méchant Renard), adapted from the beloved classic children's book series by Gabrielle Vincent. A film about inclusion, friendship, solidarity and openness, in French with English subtitles. From 6 years old.
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Friday 17 May – 4.30pm
€5 / Free for AF Members
Alliance Française Dublin
- Teenagers' Workshop
'Pages & Perspectives'
with Karen Harte- This workshop is designed to introduce teenagers to the world of zine-making, empowering them to express themselves creatively through a hands-on, DIY approach. Participants will learn about the history and significance of zines, explore various zine-making techniques, and create their own unique zines during the session. All materials provided.
- Workshop in English designed for teenagers
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Friday 17 May - 6pm
€20 / €10 AF Members
Alliance Française Dublin -
Friday 17 May - 7pm
€20 / €10 AF Members
Alliance Française Dublin
- Children's Workshop
'Islands of Imagination'
with Melanie Whelan- Join comic book maker Melanie Whelan as we set sail for the Islands of Imagination.
Inspired by the Islands of Clew Bay, we will design our own magical Islands. Through making comics, and storytelling we will explore what kind of characters and creatures might live there.
All materials provided. - Workshop in English designed for children
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Saturday 18 May – 11.30am
€15 / €7.50 AF Members
Alliance Française Dublin -
Saturday 18 May – 12.30pm
€15 / €7.50 AF Members
Alliance Française Dublin
- Adults' Workshop
'Lucky Dip'
with Fiona Dowling- Participants will be invited to create a 6 panel comic using only the materials they find in the lucky bag they will randomly pick at the start of the session! Additional “creative provocations” will occur throughout the course of the workshop.
- Workshop in English designed for adults
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Saturday 18 May – 12.30pm
€20 / €10 for AF Members
Alliance Française Dublin -
Saturday 18 May – 2pm
€20 / €10 for AF Members
Alliance Française Dublin
- Children's Workshop
Participatory Mural Workshop
with Claire Prouvost- Come down to make your mark and get creative in our mural workshop led by French visual artist Claire Prouvost! She painted our lobby, now she is back to add more colours to our walls inside the Alliance ith the workshop participants. Working on a simple outline composition designed by the artist, the participants will learn about the process of painting on a large scale, trying different tools and make compositional and colour choices to best fit the design. We will then be using water-based paint and brushes and get stuck in, the painting session will take place during 2 hours with the participants. Claire will then respond to the work made during the workshop to finalise the murals, while keeping the art done!
- Materials provided - Make sure to dress accordingly!
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Saturday 18 May – 2.30pm
€40 / €20 AF Members
Alliance Française Dublin
- Collective Exhibition
Collective Exhibition:
Interlaced Space- Offering a unique blend of storytelling visual styles, Illustrators Ireland and friends are delighted to present an exhibition of recent work entitled Interlaced space.
These large-scale works weave visual narratives connecting us to the city and people around us. -
From May to June
Admission Free
Alliance Française Dublin
2nd Floor
- Resources
Curated Collections at
The French Library- What does "ligne claire" mean? What is the Franco-Belgian school of Bande Dessinée? Come and find out! We invite you to spend a relaxing hour or two at The French Library and browse through a special selection of French-speaking comic strips and graphic novels for all ages.
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All month of May
Admission Free
Alliance Française Dublin
1st Floor
Artists
We are honoured to welcome this year 13 graphic artists and comic book authors of French and English languages. Many thanks to all of them.
2024 guests:
Philip Barrett
Ireland
Philip Barrett is a comic artist, graphic recorder and comics educator originally from Co. Donegal. He illustrated the children's book series best-sellers Where’s Larry?, as well as graphic novel Savage Town written by Declan Shalvey. He recently illustrated A Little History of Dublin by Trevor White. Philip’s work has appeared in publications from The Irish Times to Rabble. He has been self-publishing his comic Matter in various forms for almost two decades.
Rayne Booth
Ireland
Rayne Booth is an Irish artist and curator. Since 2019 she has created and self-published three graphic novels, Dead Dogs (2021), Eileen (2023) and Love (2023), and several shorter pieces. One of these, Lillian was featured in Home – a comic anthology on belonging in Ireland, which was shortlisted for an Ignatz award in 2023.
Rayne tends to use found documents such as letters, texts and photographs as a basis for her stories, which aim to embody forgotten and imagined histories.
Fiona Dowling
France / Ireland
Fiona Dowling is a French-Irish visual artist and storyteller living in county Mayo. She finds inspiration in her childhood spent between Ireland and France and in her daily life. Fiona had a solo exhibition of her diary drawings in Ballina Art Centre in 2023. She gave live readings of her comics at the Alliance Française Comics Festival in 2022 and 2023 and at the Castlebar Comics Festival 2023. Fiona is currently working on a comic about her tastiest romantic disasters.
Kate Escolin
Ireland
Kate Escolin is a freelance illustrator, arts facilitator and comic artist based in Dublin. Her illustrations have a fun and playful style, paired with a bright colour palette and simple line art. Her previous clients include The Ark Dublin, Dublin Inquirer, Dublin Fringe Festival and much more. She is most notably known for her 4 panel comic style. She uses drawing as a tool to process through tough emotions and memories which is the main focus of her comics.
Katherine Foyle
Ireland
Katherine Foyle is a Dublin-based comics creator and illustrator also working in video. She has had work published in comics and writing anthologies from Stray Lines, the Comics Lab and Schism Press, and has been twice commissioned to create work for IrishComics.ie.
Katherine Foyle is the facilitator of the Dublin Comic Jam, a member of Stray Lines comics collective and an enthusiastic supporter of the Irish indie comics community.
Elisabeth Neveux
France
Elisabeth Neveux is a french illustrator living in Kilkenny. Self taught, she likes creating intricate linocuts, pen and ink illustrations and gouache paintings. Her work has been featured at The Court Métrange , in the play Casting of the Runes, Halftone Print Fair, Dublin Comic Arts, Dublin Comic Con, Dublin Megacon, and recently Wonderfell by Irish writer Luke O’Connell. She is currently working on Hazel and Batcat, and Eleanor Doomrisk.
Karen Harte
Ireland
Karen Harte is an illustrator, designer and comic creator from Dublin. She is currently working on illustrations for the third instalment in the Milly McCarthy series, written by Leona Forde and published by Gill Books. She has worked with a variety of clients such as Arnotts, Positive Period Ireland, Ogilvy, Fighting Words, Dublin Feminist Film Festival and her work has appeared in House & Home Magazine, Totally Dublin, The Irish Times and Buzzfeed.
Julien Laloy
France
While being a French teacher living in Ireland, Julien has been pursuing a secret comic drawer career . After many years of drawing just for himself, he took evening classes at the École des Arts d’ Ixelles comic strip section. There, he created his own characters and published short stories in various fanzines. He’s still doing it today with an unfailing pleasure and is delighted to have the opportunity to share his stories at the Alliance Française Comic Festival!
Claire Prouvost
Ireland
Claire Prouvost is a French visual artist based in Dublin. Her colourful, bold and minimal style is inspired by the cubist art movement. She loves to diversify her practice and work on a variety of mediums, from digital illustration, acrylic painting to large-scale murals and street art. She likes to explore the complexity of relationships and human interactions, telling stories through deconstructed figures, intuitive lines and expressive colourful shapes.
Mari Rolin
Brazil
Mari Rolin is a Brazilian illustrator, linguist, and occasional writer. She’s half of the team behind webcomic Chaotic Neutral and one of the organisers of OPArt, nominated for the Angoulême Alternative Comics Award in 2024. Mari is the artist in When Language Fails (2023) and featured in several other comic book anthologies, including Down Below (2022), Home (2022), and Failure to Launch (2023), having also self-published zines Buyoancy (2020) and Profile (2021).
Margaret Anne Suggs
Ireland
Margaret Anne Suggs is a Director for Illustrators Ireland and Administrator of the Silent Book Collection for IBBY Ireland. She served as the Chairperson for the International Jury at the 2023 Bratislava Illustration Biennial. Mags has two picture books releasing this spring – The Dandelion’s Tale (Graffeg) and The Moth and The Moon (Beehive). She also lectures part-time at Ballyfermot CFE, where she founded the illustration course. She can usually be found scribbling in a sketchbook.
Melanie Whelan
Ireland
Melanie Whelan is an illustrator, writer, and comic book maker, based in the West of Ireland. Her work explores the connections between humans and the natural world, and aims to strengthen these connections. Whelan is the author of several comics, and picture books. In 2024 Whelan received an Arts Council research and reflection award. Her research project will explore more accessible ways of making comics. Whelan is currently working on a comic inspired by the Islands of Clew Bay.
Eoin Whelehan
Ireland
Eoin is an illustrator and visual artist from Dublin. His work features themes such as local and popular culture, music, and folklore. His work has appeared in numerous publications and exhibitions both in Ireland and abroad. In 2019, alongside writer Dara T. Higgins, Eoin was awarded the runner’s up prize in the Irish Times inaugural Graphic Short Story Prize for their story Echoes. He has been a member of the Illustrators Guild and Visual Artists Ireland since 2019.
Organisers
Contact
Do you have any questions? Do you want to contribute? We'd love to hear from you! :)