UAL in Leeds
Last month, Archive and Library teams represented University of the Arts London at the Comics Forum 2023: Reboots and Remediations, held at Leeds Central Library, on the 9th and 10th November.
The event was coordinated by academics from UAL and Kingston University, including Ian Horton and Ian Hague (Readers in Graphic Communication/Narrative at Design School, London College of Communication) and Maggie Gray (Senior Lecturer in Critical and Historical Studies (Illustration Animation), Kingston School of Art).
The event is held to coincide with the city-wide Thought Bubble festival in Leeds and made use of the beautiful setting in Leeds Central Library.
Understanding our researcher needs
It was a great opportunity for our staff, who both look after our graphics narratives and zine collections and make them accessible to researchers and students. They were able to gain greater insight into the kaleidoscopic spectrum of contemporary comics book research, which will help them to better serve our communities at UAL and beyond.
The theme presented a wide range of approaches to remediation from film adaptation, cosplay, adapting novels to graphic narratives, to the cross over between comics, zines and game cultures, to new digital innovations in the comic book medium.
Sharing our collections
Staff also had an opportunity to showcase highlights from our collections on the Saturday morning, which offered the opportunity to network not only with researchers but other collections professionals who work with graphic narratives and zines.
This included Rebellion Publishing, SOAS, University of Liverpool, the V&A, The British Library, The Cartoon Museum, The Feminist Library, Liverpool John Moores and LSE.
The staff representing UAL were Eleanor Parker, from LCC Library and Special Collections and Lucy Parker, from the UAL Archives and Special Collections Centre (ASCC). (The Parkers are no relation.. except perhaps to Peter Parker!)
El brought a selection of comix zines from the LCC Zine Collection including narrative comix; silent comix; per-zine comics; anarchist comic zines; and illustration based comix.
Particular titles included Art Fag #1 from the library’s superb Sina Sparrow donation; the wonderful I am the Corner by Akiko Tamura; seminal second-wave feminist work Dynamite Damsels by Roberta Gregory; Morgenmuffel by Isy; two works from the excellent Gareth Brookes (Sherlock Holmes vs Skeletor, and The land of my heart chokes on its abundance); and how could we forget Ivor the Anarchist by John Green and Mick Bladder.
Lucy brought selections from ASCC's Comic Book collections, including rare finds from mainstream titles such as Conan the Barbarian, Dr Strange. Also included was Ally Sloper, a short running re-interpretation by Dennis Gifford, illustrated by Frank Bellamy, of the 19th century character of the same name.
We shared limited editions from alternative comics held as part of the Les Coleman Collection, including examples of minicomics by a range of artists, RAW magazine where Maus by Art Spiegelman was first published. The Les Coleman collection also holds and a range of feminist titles such as Wimmins Comix from the 1970s and works from the 1990s and 2000s by Julie Doucet.
Sparking new ideas
Several discussion with other members of the forum focused on the shared and distinct qualities of comix zines, comics and other graphic novel forms and highlighted the potential for a new distinct Small Press Comics collection at LCC library. Such a collection would allow for better placement of comic material which at present has to sit either in the Zine or Book Arts collections (not ideal when the title is neither!).
There were plenty of new purchase suggestions that arose from presentations and El was busily taking notes on titles to buy once she returned to LCC (note: orders have been placed!). Watch out for new additions from Gareth Brookes, Zu Dominiak, and Damon Herd in the library catalogue. Hailey Austins’ presentation on fanzines in the games industry also brought on a frantic scribbling of titles and zine makers from El who saw the potential for an area of collection development within the zine collection.
As is always the case, the chance to glimpse one another’s collections initiated thoughts on future ideas for student academic engagement activities using our collections. Student wellbeing was also under discussion after hearing about the Graphic Novel Reading Room organised and run by Gabi Putnoki.
The opportunity to see collections of material from the other libraries and archives present at the showcase fuelled some interesting thoughts for professional learning exchange, including with University of Liverpool's Science Fiction collection, and The Feminist Library.
For any other questions about Archives and Special Collections more generally, please email archive-enquiries@arts.ac.uk