We're delighted to announce that The Simpsons co-creatorand cartoonist David Silverman will be joining the line-up at this year’s Lakes International Comic Art Festival weekend in Kendal (12th – 14th October 2018).

David will be on stage during the weekend chatting with cartoonist and fellow animator Steve McGarry about his amazing career – and there are some other special events planned. Which include playing the tuba!

David began an earnest interest in animation and cartooning at age nine, and making Super 8 movies, drawing, and tuba playing eventually led him to the UCLA Animation Workshop. After a variety of freelance art jobs David became an animator on The Tracy Ullman Show in 1987. There he, along with fellow animators Wes Acher and Bill Kopp, began animating and developing The Simpsons with Matt Groening.

In 1989 The Simpsons was made into a primetime series, and David became a director, and later supervising director and a producer. His credits include The Road To El Dorado, co-director on Monsters, Inc. in 1998 and, of course, the Simpsons Movie in 2007.

The longest-running animated show in the world, The Simpsons has spawned a hit line of comics, published in the US by Bongo and under licence in the UK by Titan Comics.

“Comics and animation have always has a lot of crossover,” notes Festival Director Julie Tait. “We’ve often featured guests who’ve worked in both media, including Luke and Steve McGarry, to name but two.

“You can imagine our delight when David accepted our invitation to this year’s event, and we’re looking forward to hearing from him… and his tuba!”

Guests announced so far for this year’s Festival weekend are Steven Appleby, Yomi Ayeni, Sayra Begum, Elizabeth Breitweiser, Corey Brotherson, Stanley Chow, Guy Delisle, Alan Grant, Ottilie Hainsworth, Rian Hughes, Kripa Joshi, Joe Kelly, Ian Kennedy, Kaisa Leka, Victoria Lomasko, Steve McGarry, Graeme McNee, Mikiko, Emmi Nieminen, Ken Niimura, Ian Rankin, Orijit Sen, Seth and John Wagner.

Many more guests will be announced in the coming months from the UK and abroad, with an increase in the number of comic creators exhibiting in the Comics Clock Tower and other venues around the Lake District market town of Kendal.

The Festival is the only one of its kind in the UK, taking place in one of the the country’s most beautiful areas – the English Lake District, in the market town of Kendal. Modelled on European-style festivals, such as Angoulême in France, it takes over the whole town for a weekend of comic art. Its aim is to celebrate the whole spectrum of comic art, inspiring existing comic art fans and creators and, it hopes, generating new audiences and creators too. It invests in creators through a commissioning programme and has an emphasis on developing international collaborations.

• The Lakes International Comic Art Festival will be back in Kendal 12th – 14th October 2018 | Check out details of our announced gustes here

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