MY COMICS ART TRAVELS: France.

Blotting Paper, Comics August 19, 2020

On my travels, remaining in Europe and moving from Germany to France for this post.

This one was not in France. It was a prior stopover on the way from the U.K….and a visit to the National Gallery in London to see a painting by William Hogarth…who looms large in the history of comics art…that’s my Wedding ringed hand gesturing to, and acknowledging a work by this master. Hogarth’s Marriage A-la-Mode, Stage 3, The Inspection, circa 1745…one of a set of 6 sequential paintings, later engraved and printed as an early form of graphic storytelling. Next stop, Paris! (Photo by Louise Graber)
At the grave of Georges Méliès. June 2019 (Photo by Louise Graber)

On arrival in Paris, the first priority is the paying of respects. First, at the Pere Lachaise cemetery…where I make an historical link between film and comics art…of a playful nature, visiting the grave of the film pioneer, fantasy director Georges Méliès.

I had brought some strips of an experimental film that I made that was inspired by him. I unreeled it and spread it across his grave. (Photo-©2019 Dr. Michael Hill a.k.a. Doctor Comics)

Acknowledging and paying my respects to the French artist who inspired me in the fields of comics art and animation…Emile Cohl. (Photo-©2019 Dr. Michael Hill a.k.a. Doctor Comics)

A study of Cohl and the context in which he created…this excellent book by Donald Crafton provided lecture material on comics art and animation history for me…both when I was teaching in the Visual Communication course at Sydney College of the Arts…and later in the Master of Animation course in the Faculty of Design at the University of Technology, Sydney. (Photo-©2020 Dr. Michael Hill a.k.a. Doctor Comics)
Then Doctor Comics makes his obligatory visits to the comics shops of Paris. (Photo by Louise Graber)
There’s an area in Saint Germain des Prés populated with bookshops including comics shops. (Photo by Louise Graber)

This shop in Paris was a good source of second-hand books. (Photo by Louise Graber)
Waiting in the Metro for the next train and finding Tintin on a billboard…a moment of surprise and delight…quite wonderful! (Photo by Louise Graber)

On the outskirts of Paris the cartoonist and animator Emile Cohl has a park named after him. It is also named for Georges Méliès. The park includes a playground for children. The French are proud of their comics artists, animators and filmmakers. June 2019. (Photo by Louise Graber)
Adjacent to the park for Emile Cohl is the one for Georges Méliès…a nice connection for these two pioneers of cinema. (Photo by Louise Graber)

  (All text, photos and artwork-©2020 Dr. Michael Hill a.k.a. Doctor Comics).

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Co-creator and former Director of the Master of Animation, Master of Design, and Visual Communication Design courses at the University of Technology, Sydney, Dr. Michael Hill has a Master's degree in animation and a Ph.D. in comics studies, prompting his introduction on ABC Radio as “Doctor Comics”. A member of the editorial board of the International Journal of Comic Art, and former member of the Comics Grid Journal of Comics Scholarship and the Advisory Committee of the Q-Collection Comic Book Preservation Project, he has delivered public lectures on Comics, Anime and Manga and held academic directorships in Interdisciplinary Studies, Animation, Design and Visual Communication. Having retired from academia and completing the donation of his collection of research materials on Australian alternative comics to the National Library of Australia, he is now active in the artistic domain, writing, drawing and printmaking, creating art postcards and prints and his own graphic novel: Blotting Paper: The Recollected Graphical Impressions of Doctor Comics.

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