On my travels to comics art and animation events, galleries, museums and stores, I have endeavoured to study other creators’ works. Sometimes I have even managed to meet and chat with them. I met legendary Australian cartoonist Jim Russell at a comics event in Sydney in February 1994. What a comics art hero and really nice guy! We had a very good chat. There is also some mention of my role in education carrying the comics flag in Australia. This includes the staging of the first comics conference to be held in Australia,. This was the 2002 Sequential Art Studies Conference . It took place on April 19, 2002 in Sydney at the University of Technology. To begin this post, a brief mention of another legendary creator and things anime and manga… when they started to impact on the local comics and animation scene in Australia.
There was a lot of interest in anime and manga amongst my students at the University of Technology, Sydney. When Ghost In The Shell director Mamoru Oshii visited Sydney, he met with fans. He also attended a screening of his film at the Glebe Art Cinema in Sydney’s Inner West. (Photo-©1999 Michael Hill a.k.a. Doctor Comics) I took a group of my students to see the exhibition, TEZUKA: The Marvel Of Manga . It was at the Art Gallery of New South Wales. It covered a selection of Osamu Tezuka’s massive amount of manga work plus references to his anime work. Based in Sydney, the bookshop HONDARAKE full of books was a good source of manga material. I made good use of this when teaching at the University of Technology, Sydney(UTS). The store obtained regular new additions from travellers returning from visits to Japan… also from Japanese coming to stay in Sydney and wanting to offload some of their collections. (Photo by Louise Graber) OZCON, Sydney comics convention program promoted superhero comics, local Australian work and the burgeoning manga boom. The cover design has Spiderman swinging from the Sydney Harbour Bridge with the Sydney Opera House in the background.Cosplayers rehearsing on the roof of a building at the back of the Sydney Town Hall for a manga convention. They were preparing for a parade on the stage downstairs. (Photo-©1999 Dr. Michael Hill a.k.a. Doctor Comics) I met major Australian cartoonist Jim Russell at a comics convention in Sydney in 1994…where he was launching his instructional video on cartooning! We had a good conversation about cartooning and his career in that field. (See first paragraph of this post, above.)
I am a member of the International Journal of Comic Art’s International Editorial Board as Australian representative…I first met up with the Journal’s editor John A. Lent at a comics conference in Washington, D.C. in 1999 to which he had brought along the first issue of the journal. (Photo-©2018 Dr. Michael Hill a.k.a. Doctor Comics) NOTE: TO BE ADDED -Call For Papers notice for first conference on comics in Australia…organised by myself and staged at UTS.
I have received invitations to diplomatic meetings and events for representing the study of the comics medium…(this is from a page from my own comic BLOTTING PAPER: The Recollected Graphical Impressions of Doctor Comics. ) (Photo-© 2002 Dr. Michael Hill a.k.a. Doctor Comics) I also participated in a comics based group show at a gallery in Sydney as a comics artist. (Photo-©2003 Dr. Michael Hill a.k.a. Doctor Comics) A post University career promotional sheet as Doctor Comics , written and designed by my excellent agent Andrew Hawkins. For my academic career details see the CRITIQUING page…and for my creative profile see the CREATING page on this website. MY TRAVELS posts form part of my graphic based material that includes painting, printmaking and cartooning.
(All text, photos and artwork-©2022 Dr. Michael Hill a.k.a. Doctor Comics).
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