The Sunday Spotlight – The ‘I Have An Uncle In Medical School’ Edition
by Richard Bruton
The Sunday Spotlight, shining a light of my particular choosing on the comics news you might have missed last week …
Chris Ware’s print for the Billy Ireland Cartoon Library & Museum for Life Is Complicated …
Chris Ware‘s Life Is Complicated exhibition makes its only US stop at the Billy Ireland Cartoon Library & Museum in Columbus, Ohio. To mark the event, Ware has produced the rather lovely poster for the exhibition, with all proceeds from the sale of the poster going to the Billy Ireland Cartoon Museum & Library.
The Life Is Complicated exhibition runs from 23rd May 2026 to 3rd January 2027.
David Hockney — RIP — legendary artist and comics fan…
Sad news this week when word came that David Hockney passed on 11th June. A great artist, whose magnificent works will live on.
However, one interesting thing came across my socials this week, via The Mighty World Of British Comics Facebook group and Phillip Rushton, who posted this competition results announcement in The Eagle Comic in 1952. Way down in the 12 and over group, a certain young David Hockney of Bradford. As for the overall winner, a young Gerald Scarfe … The Eagle certainly had some very talented readers.
Dave Thorpe, writer, co-creator of the new Captain Britain, and the man who gave Marvel Earth 616 … 1954-2024 …
Like many of us in the comics news biz, the news of the death of Dave Thorpe in 2024 passed me by. And that’s a terrible shame, as his writing on the new Captain Britain back in 1981, whilst it may have been short-lived, was one of those instrumental moments in my personal comics history.
In addition to that co-creation with Alan Davis of the new Captain Britain, Thorpe’s Doc Chaos, drawn and co-created by Phil Elliot, I remember fondly from 1984-5. He wrote many more things outside comics — novels, film and TV scripts, with his self-published The Secret Origin of Earth 616 autobiography that detailed, amongst many other things, his game-changing naming of Marvel’s Earth as Earth 616, something that led to all the multiversal madness that runs throughout the Marvel comics and cinematic universe.
More to explore at his website – davidthorpe.info. And thank you to John Freeman and James Bacon at Down The Tubes, always an excellent source of Brit comics news, for putting up this tribute to Thorpe – Remembering David Thorpe, Creator of Marvel’s Earth 616.
The Comix Experience Graphic Novel Club entries for May and June … your essential reading for a couple of months …
Well, somehow I managed to miss telling about the Comix Experience comic shop picks for their Graphic Novel Club picks for May. What can I say, it was a busy time.
So, doing a double duty now, covering both May and June. As you should know, Comix Experience, owned and managed by Brian Hibbs is one of those great comic stores, the sort of place we really need more of. And their Graphic Novel clubs for kids and adults manages, month in and month out, to pick out two great, great books every month.
So, for June, their Adult Club Pick is Olivia Sullivan‘s Oracles, published by Avery Hill Publishing. It’s something gentle, thoughtful, and quite beautiful, where Sullivan tells a story of grief and loss, paired with a journey for the protagonist. As with so many of the books published by Avery Hill, Sullivan’s Oracles is a great, great book.
As for their Kids Club pick, it’s Anna-Laura Sullivan‘s The Marsh Fellows, where this second Sullivan (yeah, two Sullivans in a month, what are the odds?) makes her graphic novel debut, after many wonderful online comics, with a tale of misfits exploring the dark edges of their world.
As usual, Comix Experience will be interviewing both Olivia and Anna-Laura Sullivan, with the interviews posted to the Comix Experience socials and YouTube.
As for May’s picks from Comix Experience, we had the adult pick of Garresh‘s The Rabagoo Race, telling of a famous boat race, exciting, deadly, and mythical. The Rabagoo Race is the first graphic novel from Garresh, a young Scottish artist whose art is truly a thing that must be seen to be believed. Comix Experience describes his work here as putting him ‘square in the center of an international graphic tradition that stretches from Moebius to Cam Kennedy to contemporaries like Linnea Sterte, Taiyo Matsumoto, and beyond.’ And, having seen the art, I can only agree.
As for the Kids Club pick for May, that’s The Froggy Library by Julie Fiveash. Fun with frogs, with youngster Anura spending a summer working in their local library, The Froggy Library is described as ‘a love letter to Native communities, summers with friends and family, and libraries everywhere.’
Again, interviews with Garresh and Julie will be forthcoming on the Comix Experience socials and YouTube channels.
