As the topic of this post is lengthier than normal I shall be spreading the content over two posts. The second part is scheduled for November this year. The content refers to my research and conference attendance on comics art, cartoon and animation related trips to America. I first visited the Walt Disney Studio in Los Angeles when researching animation. Later I began my research and study of comics art. I had been an avid reader of comics from childhood. I also loved watching cartoons. I found a crossover current linking these two forms of comics and cartoons which deepened my interest. The Disney Studio straddled these fields producing both comics and animation. My fascination grew and led to my resolution to become involved professionally. That took some time but I eventually succeeded, first through my studies and later my research. I became an academic with practical and theoretical expertise in both media. I designed and developed new tertiary level subjects and courses in both fields. I began researching, presenting papers at conferences and publishing scholarly articles based on that research in scholarly journals.

When I visited the Disney Studio in Burbank on a study trip it was a joyful experience. I went to America as an academic at the new Sydney College of the Arts. I had applied to visit the Disney Studios for a research project examining historic storyboards for their Silly Symphonies cartoons. I also planned to visit the film and animation program at U.C.L.A. that was located nearby. I was researching animated music videos at the time. Those Disney cartoons offered an artistic base for animation set to musical soundtracks. Happily, I got to visit both places. The Disney staff were most welcoming and helpful. Just sitting in the commissary at lunch time with Disney animators, actors and directors was a joyful experience. I also spotted the odd actor at the studio to do voice-overs for cartoons. U.C.L.A. academics were excellent and used to original research. This study tour led to my development of new subjects back in Sydney.

The animated music video medium was breaking out at the time in the popular music industry. It was the age of MTV with many musicians in need of video promotion of their image and music. I wrote and designed a Music Video subject for the General Studies curriculum of the Design School. I was warned that it would not run unless it received a minimum of 20 enrolments. No worries! It had to be staged in the main lecture room as it attracted over 100 students! They came from right across the Faculty. In addition to enrolments from the Visual Communication course it attracted to students from across the Faculty. Students of Fashion, Interior Design, Industrial Design, even the Art School enrolled. It was the age of music videos. Some of these students eventually became professional music video directors for class-mates who were musicians in local bands. And the noise! Complaints from teaching staff affected by the loud music led to my subject being rescheduled to the evening timetable. That turned out to be better. We could run longer than the required 90 minutes and pump up the volume. What was that Alice Cooper song?..No More Mr Nice Guy…that was the feeling I had at the time and I tried to play it every week. Despite the huge amount of assessment due to the high enrollment numbers it remains for me a joyous educational memory.

On a subsequent U.S.A. trip, I excitedly entered the elevator on the ground floor to attend my first conference on comics. Located in Bethesda, Maryland it was ICAF 99 (Fifth Annual International Comic Arts Festival: “Culture, Industry, Discourse”). It was nearly filled with businessmen coming up from the basement car park. I was surprised when we all started to alight on the same floor…the one where the comics conference was being held! Was there another conference on? No, just the one venue…? The penny soon dropped! These guys were not business men. These were American academics. They followed a more formal dress code! Suit, shirt, tie and brief case compared to what I was used to back home. These academics seemed serious about their research into comics. Their conference attendance, dress code and presentation of their scholarly papers reflected this. By comparison I felt a little casual in a T-shirt and jeans. I had come up from the “…Land Down Under” with a shoulder bag containing a note book, sketch pad and pencils. I presented my research paper titled “Overseas Influence/Local Colour: The Australian Small Press”. And I met my first American academics researching comics art! They included Gene Kannenberg, Jr., Charles Hatfield, Jeff Miller, Ana Merino, Mark Nevins, Michael Rhode, Marc Singer, Guy Spielmann, Jeff Williams, and Joseph “Rusty” Witek, plus Pascal Lefevre from Belgium. These became my new comics art colleagues at that research gathering in Maryland. Meeting other comics academics was both wonderful and reassuring. Then Professor John A. Lent arrived with copies of his brand new 1999 publication, the International Journal of Comic Art. This was an academic journal about research of comics art. “Fan-bloody-tastic!” This was getting both serious and satisfying. It was also a reassuring kick-start of my resolve to research comics art formally as an academic.

The publication of the International Journal Of Comic Art provided the perfect platform to record and promote comics art research. Above is a photo of the first issue of the journal from 1999. It has since reached the milestone of 50 published issues, chalking up 25 years of continuous publication. I purchased the first issue of IJOCA, (pictured above) at that conference and took out a subscription. And along the way I became the Australian representative of the journal’s International Editorial Board. Later, Professor John A. Lent was one of the examiners of my PhD thesis on Australian alternative small-press comics. The journal seemed to progressively grow in size into a solid block of pages that I affectionately nick-named the “BRICK”. I even created a couple of cartoons about its postal delivery problems due to its bulky size. It had started out as a rather slim volume before blossoming into its bulging “brick” shape and weight. A thousand cheers to you, John!

At that comics art conference I also met Mexican cartoonists Yis and Trino who were guest artists. We had an hilarious and somewhat chaotic conversation. In the end I bought a copy of their comic and asked them to sign it…not expecting their amusing graphic response. They drew a cartoon of me with them playfully trying to embarrass me…but now I have their original sketches which I treasure. What a hoot!

Next morning Neil Gaiman entered the elevator, and commenced chatting to a contact in his dulcet English tones! He was making a presentation at the conference…which turned out to be most impressive. When the conference concluded we all went down to the ground floor to THE EXPO(Small Press Expo). It followed on from the conference and ran over the weekend. It was Small Press heaven!…stalls manned by comics creators selling their comics. This conference and expo set the bar high for me on my return to Sydney. It had given me more confidence about researching comics. To have participated in such events that brought me new academic and artistic colleagues with whom to communicate, was joyous! Now I was determined. I would do my PhD research in the field of comics! Five years later, in 2004, I completed my doctoral thesis and was awarded my PhD.

^{A year later I went to the “big one!” I was a professional attendee at the San Diego Comic Con. That’s the Gahan Wilson designed pass(above). The convention was H-U-G-E!!! …in both size and events and number of attendees. Even just to walk around all the aisles with its exhausting range of comics art exhibits was an awesome experience. It also incorporated an academic comic arts themed conference at which I presented a paper on Australian comics…“Australian Gothic” conference paper, 8th Annual Comic Arts Conference, Comic Con, San Diego, USA, July 2000}

Part 2 of this post on my comics related travels will follow in approximately three months time.

_{(All text, photos and artwork-©2024 Dr. Michael Hill a.k.a. Doctor Comics).}