Komikazen
International reality comic festival
V edition
Organised by the Mirada Association
Teatreo Rasi (Via di Roma, 39)
Spazio Politiche Giovanili (via D’Azeglio 2)
MAR (City Art Museum of Ravenna – Via di Roma, 13)
Libreria Mirada (Via Mazzini, 83)
Friday 9 and Saturday 10 October 2009 Ravenna will host the fifth edition of Komikazen – the International Reality Comic Festival, organised by the Mirada Cultural Association.
The Festival is produced in the ambit of the initiatives of the GAER Emilia Romagna (regional networks of the GAI – Giovani Artisti Italiani (Young Italian Artists)) and ‘Italia Creativa’.
The tendency to autobiographical, memorialist, historical and journalistic reporting of reality has always been present in many of the great masters of arte sequential art. It is precisely this aspect of the comic that the Komikazen Festival is occupied with. In this edition in particular it is mainly stories that originate with individual tension, research and experimentation that are presented.
Six of the authors, guests of the fifth edition of Komikazen, will be the protagonists of workshops and meetings together with authoritative representatives of the national cultural panorama and present in Ravenna with the original artworks or some of their most important works which will be exhibited for one month (until 8 November 2009) in various locations in the city.
The guest of honour the English artist Dave McKean will be exhibiting his Comic tragedy or tragic comedy of Mr. Punch at the MAR (the city Art Museum). Mr. Punch is the anti-hero from the Comedy of Art whose story is interwoven with childhood memories of the protagonist and narrator of the story. McKean, an illustrator, designer, photographer and even musician has been defined “a volcano” for his visionary creativity which characterises all of his work in comics, full length films and illustrated books.
The reality comic in the most classic sense however is the work of the American Peter Kuper, another important guest at the Festival who will exhibit the artworks of two of his works in Ravenna: The Jungle, and his latest creation Diary of Oaxaca.
Comics however are not just drawings but also text and a story that works only with the close cooperation of the duple pens of the artist and the writer.
The other aspect of the graphic novel is well represented by the irony and expertise of the Argentine writer Carlos Trillo, who for years has edited the texts for the stories of personages of others. Artworks drawn by some of the most important names in international comics for which the texts were produced by Trillo will be on display in Ravenna. There will be original artworks including those by Alberto and Enrique Breccia and Risso.
The reality of the national comic of the latest generation of artists is represented by Paolo Bacilieri, with the artworks of the story of the murderer Pietro Maso, an event that has stuck in the memory of those who are old enough to remember the nineteen eighties; Gianluca Costantini, an artist from Ravenna who has distinguished himself in recent years with a comic on subjects of national and international political interest and who will present two exhibitions, one on the tragic story of the Algerian war of liberation, and the other entitled Opus quotidianum showing his artworks on political themes broken down and reconstructed in mosaic by Koko Mosaico; and Davide Toffolo who challenges the most eclectic writer of our contemporary culture: Pier Paolo Pasolini.
Friday 9 October (10.00 am – 1.00 pm and 2.00 pm - 5.30 pm) at the Teatro Rasi (Via di Roma, 39) the Festival opens with the workshop for artists and lovers of the intellectual and with the American artist Peter Kuper. A Newyorker by adoption, Kuper was born in 1958 and is known mainly for the political nature of his publications. Illustrations by Kuper have appeared in numerous magazines and daily newspapers of the United States including «The New Yorker», «Time», «The Washington Post» and «The Progressive». His most famous graphic novels include an adaptation of The Jungle by Upton Sinclair (a work exhibited in Ravenna) and Comics-Strips, a news story of his eight month journey Africa and southeast Asia (enrolment obligatory at
info@mirada.it).
The first two exhibitions of the Festival will be opened at 6.00 pm at the Spazio Politiche Giovanili (via D’Azeglio, 2): the artworks Selected for Komikazen of the young authors selected by the competition that the Festival organised in 2009 and which will result in the publication of the winner’s book in the 2010 edition: the regional selection has already produced the book by Leonardo Guardigli Mecnavi (winner in 2007) and will present the book by the winner of the 2008 edition, Marina Girardi published by Comma 22.
In the same space the artworks, for which Carlos Trillo wrote the texts, will be on display in the exhibition entitled Arai buona dall’Argentina: 100 original artworks on sceneggiatura by Carlos Trillo.
As the writer of Alberto and Enrique Breccia, he has worked with many authors, including Risso. Trillo is one of the most important writers of Latin American comics and one of the internationally recognised authors of historic texts. He is a part of that marvellous season of Argentine comics in which artists such as Breccia became major figures and which also launched Hugo Pratt.
At 7.00 pm the presentation of the book Kurden People, published by Comma 22, by the young comic artist and writer Marina Girardi, (winner of the 2008 edition) on the story of the Kurds: in the port of Patrasso, under a torrid summer sun, Sonia, alone with her rucksack and returning home from a holiday in Crete, runs across some young Kurds fleeing the persecutions suffered in their countries.
Marina Girardi, originally from Belluno, attended the course of Illustration and Fumetto at the Academy of Bologna and decided to devote her work to comics after taking part in the seminar organised by the Mirada Association with Marjane Satrapi in 2003.
The evening ends at 9.00 pm at the Teatro Rasi with the opening of the exhibition Intervista a Pasolini by Davide Toffolo, Pasolini a Ravenna, which will be presented by Toffolo himself and the theatre director Marco Martinelli stage and artistic director of Ravenna Teatro. The origins of Pasolini will be remembered: his father was from Ravenna, of the noble family Pasolini Dall’Onda, a biographical fact that the city of Ravenna seems to have forgotten or eliminated.
Toffolo was born in Pordenone in 1965 and is an author of comics in addition to being an Italian singer and guitarist, a member of the well-known group “Tre allegri ragazzi morti”. He graduated in Disegno Anatomico at the University of Bologna where he attended the Zio Feininger comic school of Andrea Pazienza and Lorenzo Mattotti. One of his favourite themes is adolescence with its difficulties and conflicts. His inspiration is drawn from Pasolini, Ettore Petrolini, Federico Fellini and Tim Burton.
The original artworks for his book Pasolini will be on display in Ravenna. The endured, painful and at the same time rich and profound relationship with a cultural icon of the twentieth century, Pasolini re-interpreted by Toffolo in an impossible dialogue between authors of different generations. A graphic novel, somewhere between news and travelogue, on the writings and statements of an inconvenient who refuses to adhere to predetermined categories even today, thirty years after his death.
Saturday 10 October from 9.30 at the Teatro Rasi, a meeting entitled Supermaso attitude e gli eredi: storie dal vero with the artist Paolo Bacilieri and the writer and essayist from Veneto Gianfranco Bettin, who in ’92 published L’erede. Pietro Maso, una storia dal vero for Feltrinelli.
Also from Veneto is Bacilieri who was born in Verona in 1965, graduated at the Academy of Fine Arts of Bologna and who has been working in the world of comics since 1982. An eclectic author, he synthesises in his personal language the baggage of images of serial comics and the riskiest solutions of underground comics.
His works include: Barokko (1988-1995, Black Velvet), Durasagra (1994, Black Velvet), The Supermaso Attitude (Phoenix, 1996), some of the albums of the series Napoleone and Jan Dix (Sergio Bonelli Publishers, 1999-2008), Zeno Porno (Kappa publishers, 2005) and La magnifica desolazione (Kappa publishers, 2007).
At 11.30 a meeting with the artist Peter Kuper who will speak about Oaxaca: raccontare il Messico. In 2006 Kuper moved for a period from New York to Oaxaca in Mexico with his family in order to get away from the chaotic metropolis in search of an oasis of peace but, as he writes, Diario di Oaxaca was the result of being in the right place at the wrong time. Oaxaca, which is usually a quiet town, was in fact the scene of violent conflict between the forces of the State Police and the strikers, especially teachers, who were demanding greater security and pay rises.
In the afternoon at 3.30 appointment with Dave McKean. McKean was born in England in 1963. His works are characterised by the mixing of various techniques such as traditional drawing, photography, collage, sculpting and computer graphics. His career started with a failure: in 1986 he went to New York for a job interview as an illustrator of comics, which did not turn out well; nevertheless, at that time he met Neil Gaiman, another Englishman and writer of texts, with whom he established a long-standing professional relationship. Gaiman involved him in the production of a short graphic novel, Violent Cases published in 1987. In 1988 they published jointly the masterpiece Black Orchid. Between 1990 and 1996 Dave McKean wrote and illustrated his masterpiece: Cages (published in Italy by Macchia Nera in 1999), a graphic novel on the subject of artistic inspiration and artistic creativity, illustrated in a very lean style that reminds one of the works of José Muñoz and Lorenzo Mattotti.
The cooperation with Neil Gaiman also resulted in the graphic novels Signal to Noise in 1992, the story of a dying director and his hypothetical last film, Mr Punch and the illustrated children’s books The day I swapped my dad for two goldfish (1997 - In Italy: "Il giorno che scambiai mio padre per 2 pesci rossi" published by Macchia nera, 2000) and Wolves in the wall (2003 - In Italy: "I lupi nei muri" published by Mondadori, 2003). He also illustrated, still in collaboration with Gaiman, the book Coraline (2002 - In Italia: "Coraline" – published by Mondadori, 2003).
During his career, McKean has also produced numerous CD covers for international artists, book covers, illustrations for The New Yorker and contributed to the production of advertising and short promotional clips. He has also published two books of photographs.
In 2005 he produced his first feature film, MirrorMask. The script, written once again with the collaboration of Gaiman, comes to life on the screen with the help of mixed techniques, a cross between live shots, digital animation and stop-motion.
At 5.30 pm meeting with Carlos Trillo. Carlos Trillo was born in Buenos Aires in 1943, in 1975 he began writing comic texts for the drawings of Alberto Breccia and his son Enrique Breccia; together with Horacio Altuna he is the creator of the popular comic strip Loco Chávez which appeared every day for more than ten years in the daily newspaper Clarín. Trillo, who is still one of the most prolific Argentine writers of comics, is a writer who does not think in phrases or sentences but in actions and sequences, adapting his solid narrative structure to the illustrator with whom he is working, thus demonstrating his great capacity for working with others.
At 7 pm at the MAR (City Art Museum - Via di Roma, 13), in the ambit of the events scheduled for the Notte d’oro of Ravenna, opening of the exhibition L’ombra di Peter Pan with the original artworks by Dave McKean, Peter Kuper, Paolo Bacilieri and Gianluca Costantini.
The exhibition of McKean consists mainly of artworks of the work with Gaiman on Mr Punch, in which the closely associated artists exhibit a summa of their respective styles and ways of dealing with graphic art. Gaiman introduces the public to the characters of Mr. Punch, the noisy and popular Anglo-Saxon puppet derived from Pulcinella, and Judy, his girlfriend, and creates a refined story within a story, an obscure fable that mixes childlike innocence with the obscurity of adults. In perfect harmony with dialogues and captions, McKean accompanies every one of Gaiman’s thoughts with sophisticated images that go beyond the established concept of comic strip and comic and which merge photographic ability, a taste for experimentation and pure drawing. Numerous original artworks from the kaleidoscopic production of the English artist will also be in on display. The exhibition of Kuper (50 artworks) brings together Diario di Oaxaca and La giungla, the most important and successful novel of Upton Sinclair; a denunciation of the miserable conditions of life of immigrants, forced to work in dangerous unhygienic conditions in food packaging plants. The pictorial power of Kuper’s illustrations captures the intensity of the novel by Sinclair, in an audacious counterpoint between text and illustration.
Paolo Bacilieri exhibits 20 artworks from his production of 1996 The Supermaso Attitude, on the terrible events of Pietro Maso, who in ’91 at the age of 19 organised the assassination of his parents with the help of two friends in order to lay his hands on the inheritance. It is a work which, at the time it came out, certainly did not pass unnoticed on account of the “hot” subject, handled with tones bordering on grotesque and the fact that it goes against the flow considering the tsunami of manga and super heroes in those years. Bacilieri spent a lot of time gathering the documentation of the court case with the help of the psychiatrist Vittorino Andreoli, who is also a character in the comic, but the artistic result is not at all realistic and the subtle irony of the artist can be seen on every page in spite of the dramatic nature of the story.
Gianluca Costantini, a visual artist and comic illustrator, lives and works in Ravenna. As an illustrator and author of comics, she publishes in numerous magazines and daily newspapers in Italy such as "Il Nuovo Male", "Blue", "Il Manifesto", "Internazionale", and abroad in "Babel" (Greece), "Kuhinja" (Serbia) and "WarWorldIII" (U.S.A.). Since 2002 she has been the director of the Italian comic magazine "inguineMAH!gazine" and edits a number of publications by international graphic novelists. In the early nineties she started to exhibit in many collective exhibitions throughout Europe, in international comics festivals such as Lucca Comics, Stribburger and Angouleme, in artistic events such as the Biennial of Young European and Mediterranean Artists or in private Italian galleries. Some of the latest personal exhibitions include Political Comics (Athens, 2006), Banda desenhada politica (Lisbon, 2006), Sangue in Algeria (Perugia, 2008) and Channeldraw (Belgrade, 2008).
Twenty artworks of Sangue d’Algeria will be on display at Komikazen. This work concerns the Algerian War of liberation from French colonialism which took place from 1954 to ‘62. In just a few images, in which the text of the captions is an integral part of the drawing itself, Costantini ably demonstrates her desire to show all the aspects of the war without presuming to create a historical document but inciting the reader to interpret history differently, to become aware of the events covered up by the French and the Algerians themselves. The exhibition was produced by the Miomao Gallery of Perugia and was on display at the Salon du Dessin Contemporain di Parigi in March 2009.
At 10.30 at the Libreria Mirada (Via Mazzini, 83) the opening of the exhibition entitled Opus quotidianum by Gianluca Costantini in which some of its works of a political nature were broken down and reconstructed by the Koko Mosaice studio of Ravenna using mosaic techniques.
Opus quotidianum – using the term opus which is typical of some tradition mosaic techniques - alludes to the daily work or research on the betrayal of the images shown by the media, which Costantini has been involved in for a number of years. The artworks of the artist were then translated into mosaic in a contemporary “pop” form by the Koko studio of Ravenna. All the cartoons were in fact taken from images of “dailies” of various types, ably interpreted by the artist from Ravenna.
The exhibition is also part of the full calendar of Ravennamosaico, the first biennial of mosaic art of the city in Romagna and constitutes a junction between the ninth art and mosaic art. A rather fruitful encounter therefore since many of the works by artists that have accepted the challenges of this medium have a “pop” and comic-like character. On the other hand Costantini graduated from the Istituto D’Arte per il Mosaico Severini di Ravenna which celebrated its 50th anniversary this year.
At 12.00 pm the Festival closes with the musical performance of the group “Ponte Radio”.
The Mirada Association (Mirada means a “look” in Spanish and suggests the Latin root word miror, which means to be amazed) was formed in 1997 but over the years it has changed in form and substance from concentrating mainly on the creation of museum and exhibition layouts to activities concerned with curator services, especially in the ambit of comics and young artists.
Since 2000 Mirada has worked in the ambit of an agreement with the Municipality of Ravenna for which manages all the activities concerning the GAI (Giovani Artisti Italiani – Young Italian Artists) including the competition, exhibitions and promotion of young artists of the territory.
This agreement has made it possible to form a database of more than 100 names of artists of the Province of Ravenna, who have taken part in RAM competition over the years. Many galleries throughout Italy and also private companies such as Hera have made use in recent years of the material collected by the Association in order to produce exhibitions or to contact artists. The competition is also a moment to propose exhibition projects by young artists who have already received acclaim. In this context works by Chiara Dynys, Joe Sacco, Marjane Satrapi, Aleksandar Zograf and many others have been proposed. The resulting exhibitions were presented in Italy and abroad. The particular attention stimulated by the exhibitions of comic authors has led to the Association working in this sector with greater rigour and continuity which finally led to the creation of the Komikazen 1st International Reality Comic Festival in 2005. Mirada collaborates not only with public institutions but also with individuals or private concerns. “Looking” in this sense is understood as different ways of narrating a story: this is the basic objective of the planning of Mirada.