We tweeted about this meeting last week but I wanted to share some more photographs
on the blog.

Frederic is doing great things here in Japan. As Chairman of Kaigai Manga Fest and owner of Euromanga. He works tirelessly to improve cross culture understanding of Japanese and western comics and graphic novels and the cultures that surround them.

Minori conducted the interview at the Liquid Room, Shibuya. Expect the English/Japanese interview she did later in the month.

If you are an manga artist/cartoonist then please consider signing up for a table in the artist alley, we'll be there and it's cool to meet new people..

KAIGAI International Manga Festival 3rd edition, November 23rd, 2014.

#bartkira #tokyo #timeout

On Thursday I took a bike ride out to Chigasaki to chat to Galaxy People about them and 
their kaiju making.

Below are some photographs of the day. 

Black Hook Press and Galaxy People (and some other people I can't mention at this time) will be working on some pretty awesome projects together. So great!

Thank you GALAXY PEOPLE !

COOKIES AND COFFEE WITH JULIE TAIT. TODAY I HAD A LOVELY 2 HOUR CHAT WITH JULIE TAIT, WE COULD HAVE TALKED FOR HOURS BUT SHE'S ON A WHISTLE STOP TOUR OF JAPAN SO HAD TO RUSH OFf TO ANOTHER MEETING.ANYWAY SHE'S FESTIVAL DIRECTOR FOR THE LAKES INTERNATIONAL COMIC ART FESTIVAL IN KENDAL IN THE U.K. WE HAVE A LOT OF SIMILAR VIEWS AND COMIC ARTIST FAVOURITES (INC. JACK TEAGLE ,DONYA TODD, AND JIM MEDWAY TO MENTION A FEW WHICH WAS ACE!) I REALLY LIKE THE WAY SHE'S TRYING TO GO WITH THE LAKES FESTIVAL. SHE TOLD ME SOME GREAT THINGS THAT ARE HAPPENING AT LAKES THIS YEAR BUT SWORE ME TO SECRECY (GAAAAA!!!!!) ANYWAY WHAT A LOVELY LADY AND A GREAT CHAT AND THANKS FOR THE COMICS JULIE! 

A great night at the Pink Cow. Thank you Akiko and Sean for the manga talks and thank you  Seán Michael Wilson and Mitsuhiro Asakawa.. We had about 40-50 people come which was great! Thanks Asakawa-san for a great DJ set and for bringing all the 45s to play. I ditched my laptop set and played an extended selection of Prince, Sly and Sly & The Family Stone , and James Brown on vinyl and it was wonderful! If you are in Roppongi over this next month please pop in and check out Akiko Shim's artwork for the manga book Ronin 47. I think we'll be having another 'do' in October or November! Thanks all who came!

Andy Poyiadgi, Cristian Ortiz and James Harvey showcase at Orbital Comics Gallery space, Soho, London.

There is a really good write-up about this event written by Andy Oliver over on Broken Frontier so there is no point me cutting and pasting bits here and cobbling together an inferior write up when you can go and read it at the source >>>HERE<<<.. 

This is a great show at a great comic store. Go see it.

From Tonight (preview party August 8th) through to September 7th.

We mentioned this exhibition about 2 weeks ago. 

3 great gekiga artists, all with ties to Asagaya, shown over the course of 6 weeks
at Gallery Hakusen, Asagaya.

Up until the 11th August Gallery Hakusen is showing original works by Takashi Fukutani.
YOU SHOULD GO.

Takashi's graphic novel series 'Residence Dokudami' tells comic tragedies of the underclass, the losers. the hustlers. If you want to draw similarities to western stories of poverty and alcoholism, or general down and out life, then think Bukowski's, 'Post Office', or Yates, 'Eleven Kinds of Lonliness', or Orwell's, 'Down and Out in Paris and London' as reference points for Takashi's semi autobiograhical stories of near destitute living in Tokyo as told by the protaganist Yoshio Hori.

The series spanned 14 years and 663 episodes before Takashi Fukutani stopped.
Takashi Fukutani died in 2000 at the age of 48. He died due to pulmonary edema.

Takashi's 'The Vagabond of Tokyo' (a selection) has been translated into French by the wonderful publishers Le Lizard Noir. 

Takashi Fukutani has not been translated into english yet but he should be, somebody please!

James Harvey originally wrote this interview for the Bartkira website but we've spoken to Ronald a bit more and added some extras for your enjoyment so please check it out ! 
The Japanese translation is sure to follow in the next couple of weeks.

Our new inkan stamp arrived !

We had a fun time at Enoshima Comic-con at the weekend. See you next year!

Check them out at-
http://twitter.com/EnoshimaComicon and http://comic-con.jp/ .

We also met the wonderful Brian Bunting from Galaxy People, check out his vinyl models here-
www.galaxypeople.wordpress.com