Author: Ryan Claytor

Michigan State University Comics Forum is pleased to welcome Truman Smith as social media intern!

A senior from Holt, Michigan, Truman is a graphic design major who will support the Comics Forum and its social channels for the 2019 event held on February 22 and 23.

Truman became aware of the internship position through his involvement in MSU Comics Studio courses “Fundamentals of Comic Art and Graphic Novels” and “Advanced Comic Art and Graphic Novels.” Upon learning about the internship, Truman leapt at the opportunity.

“I’m excited to gain more professional social media experience, and conduct deeper research on comic creators and scholars,” said Truman.

Truman’s interest in comics stems from the medium’s ability to realize any idea, and is hard at work creating his own comic.

“I spent the last year and half writing more than 400 pages of a comic script, and I’m going to start drawing it next year,” said Truman. “Thank heavens it’s finally time for the fun part.”

As part of his comic creativity, Truman also created some original art inspired by the MSU Comics Forum.

 “I have become far more considerate of viewing comics through an academic lens since becoming affiliated with the MSU Comics Forum,” said Truman.

Through his MSU education, Truman has come to admire creators Meredith Gran, Gary Larson, KC Green, and Bryan Lee O’Malley. “I cannot wait for O’Malley’s Worst World!”

Please join the MSU Comics Forum in welcoming Truman!

We are proud to announce our 2019 Michigan State University Comics Forum (MSUCF) Artist Alley list of exhibitors (available on the Artist Alley page) and our schedule of Academic Panel Discussions (available on the Panel Discussions page).

I’d like to take a moment to thank all the applicants who submitted work to our 2019 event.  We had an overwhelming number of high caliber scholars and cartoonists interested in being a part of our event.  In fact, while we doubled the number of panel discussions offered in 2018 from 2017, in 2019 we are more than doubling our panel offerings again, expanding from 2 to 4 rooms and adding an extra 5th session to accommodate the increased demand.  We’re honored to showcase work from such a diverse and international group of scholars in the field of comics.

We also had a record number of artists apply, over two-and-a-half times the number of cartoonist applicants that we are currently able to host.  Due to present restructuring and renovation taking place in our venue, the MSU Main Library, we were unable to increase the number of artist exhibitors for 2019, which made our deliberation and acceptance process quite difficult.  However, we’re already in conversation with our venue to increase space for the MSU Comics Forum Artist Alley in 2020.  With that said, we’re excited about the group of cartoonists ready to assemble in 2019, which include a number of new, diverse, and established creators, from MSU Comics Minor students and alumni to established artists like mini-comics veteren, Matt Feazell, and National Book Award winner and former MSU Comics Forum Keynote Speaker, Nate Powell, in addition to our 2019 Keynote Speakers, Qiana Whitted and Seth, to highlight just a few.

I hope you’ll take a moment to familiarize yourself with the scholars and artists’ work.  Because of them, 2019 is shaping up to be another banner year for the Michigan State University Comics Forum.  The MSUCF committee and I look forward to seeing you in February.

Sincerely,
Ryan Claytor
MSU Comics Forum – Director

Due to popular demand, the Women Comics Professionals exhibit, housed in the MSU Main Library Special Collections exhibit cases on the first floor as well as the 4th floor exhibit cases near the Fine Arts Library, will be on display through June 2018 (contrary to their announced end date in March 2018).  Click here for MSU Main Library hours of operation to visit the exhibition.

Both of our 2018 Michigan State University Comics Forum keynote addresses have now been archived.  You can access them both below, or via the link on each presenter’s name.

Lucy Knisley:

Diana Schutz:

Saturday, Feb 24th, 2018, started with back-to-back behind-the-scenes tours of the Michigan State University Special Collections Library (the largest public collection of comic books in the world) guided by MSU Comics Bibliographer, Randy Scott, whose life’s work has grown the collection to over 300,000 copies:

Academic panel discussions and Artist Alley started promptly at 11am:

Diana Schutz delivered the 2018 MSU Comics Forum scholar keynote address at 12:30pm to a packed crowd:

A shot of her title slide:

MSU Comics Forum Director, Ryan Claytor, talks with local news stations about the event:

Artist Alley continues to draw a crowd throughout the day:

Two rooms of Academic Panel discussions ran concurrently all day Saturday, doubling the usual count of our panels:

Arie Koelewyn offered attendees the chance to personally print their own custom letterpressed bookmarks…

…which could then be taken to the next table to have Lucy Knisley and Diana Schutz sign them:

Many thanks to all the scholars, creators, and attendees who made the 2018 MSU Comics Forum such a successful year.

Stay tuned for an announcement about our 2019 event!

This evening, Lucy Knisley delivered a well-attended keynote address.

She gave insights into her past, present, and future work and showed a number of never before seen illustrations, including an animated, narrated comic created specifically for this presentation as well as a poignant and unreleased excerpt from her upcoming graphic novel, Kid Gloves.

Thanks to all who attended.

Both our keynote speakers, Lucy Knisley and Diana Schutz, will be available in our Artist Alley tomorrow from 11am-5pm on the MSU Main Library’s 3rd floor West, along with several dozen other comics artists.  Panel discussions will also be running throughout the day.  For more detailed information you can reference our Panel Discussions and Artist Alley pages.

All events associated with the MSU Comics Forum are free and open to the public.

Women Comics Professionals is the first exhibition in the newly installed MSU Special Collections Library exhibit cases.  It opened this past week as part of the 2018 MSU Comics Forum.

All of the selections from this exhibit are part of the MSU Special Collections Library, home of the world’s largest public collection of comic books. Women Comics Professionals was curated by MSU Special Collections Comics Bibliographer, Randy Scott, and runs through March 2nd, 2018.

 

The first event of our main weekend was Thursday’s co-sponsored lecutre and book discussion with Muslim Studies, and was well received last night.

This event was part of “Muslim Journeys” series of events on campus.

Thanks to Muslim Studies for their sponsorship, to Deborah Margolis for spearheading this event and to @ranti for her photography of the book discussion.

Events continue throughout this weekend.  See our Schedule page for more information.

All events are free and open to the public.

As our main events approach, we wanted to make a brief announcement that our Location Page has been updated with parking information that might prove helpful when visiting campus.

See you at the end of the month,
Ryan Claytor
MSU Comics Forum – Director

Our first presentation of the 2018 MSU Comics Forum took place on the first of the month and is now available for viewing online:

Audio improves around the 5:30 mark.  Thanks to Zack Kruse for an informed and engaging lecture.