The Lakes International Comic Art Festival, Sheffield Hallam University and The University of Manchester, the organisations behind Comics Up Close, are delighted to reveal the schedule for this year’s event, “Origin Stories”,  taking place at Sheffield Hallam University on Wednesday 21st February 2024. Tickets available via Eventbrite.

The Lakes International Comic Art Festival has partnered with the Oxford Comics Network, which was first devised and funded by LICAF Chair, Peter Kessler, for a new season of free online events from January 2024, delving once again into the mysteries of sequential art. 

LICAF and the OCN will be hosting four online talks from respected academics across the world of comics. The upcoming sessions (with UK times) are:

After running comics workshops in Qatar, supported by the British Council, the Arts Council England funded Lakes International Comic Art Festival are now launching the exciting From Ink to Action anthology, featuring comics creators from across the Middle East and North Africa, at COP 28 in Dubai.

The Lakes International Comic Art Festival, Sheffield Hallam University and The University of Manchester, the organisations behind Comics Up Close, have just issued their Call for Papers for their next academic conference taking place in February 2024. The deadline for proposals is 19th November.

The Lakes International Comic Art Festival has launched a series of “Comics in the Classroom” videos on its YouTube channel as part of its ongoing Comic Potential project. The videos offer teachers some really straightforward tips and techniques on how comics can be used in the classroom across all age ranges – not just for teaching English, but across the curriculum.

Michele Hutchison has been announced as the winner of the inaugural Sophie Castille Awards for Comics in Translation, for her translation of The Philosopher, The Dog and the Wedding by Barbara Stok, published in English by SelfMadeHero. More Awards for translation, inspired by the late Sophie Castille, are set to follow, across Europe.

Belgian cartoonist Pieter de Poortere is set to unveil the first British edition of his beloved character, Dickie, at the Lakes International Comic Art Festival (LICAF) this coming weekend.

Just part of the fun around the Lakes International Comic Art Festival 2023 is a geocache challenge, “The Quest for the Windermere Ghost”!

To play, start your challenge from Bowness-on-Windermere Tourist Information. Then, using your mobile device, head over to pyts.link and enter the game code KIXG to start!