Reykjavík Grapevine - ágú. 2020, Blaðsíða 28

The Summer Of
Comics
The Icelandic Comics Society stays busy in
the pandemic
Words: Andie Sophia Fontaine Photo: Art Bicnick
While the coronavirus pandemic
has shut down a lot of events in
Iceland this summer, the mem-
bers of the Icelandic Comics So-
ciety (TICS) have been keeping
themselves occupied nonetheless.
Atla Hrafney, chairman and co-
founder of the Icelandic Comics
Society, and a comics author in her
own right, tells us that this sum-
mer has given TICS plenty to do.
"We were very fortunate, up un-
til this month, to be able to get ev-
ery single event that we wanted to
do off the ground,” she says. “Covid
was never an exceptional issue for
us. It wasn't until August that we
had to cancel anything."
To the libraries
"We had a week-long workshop
with teenagers aged between 10
and 14 at the Reykjavík Art Muse-
um,” Atla says. “This was done as
a way to do more long-form work-
shops. We then got an offer from
Hitt Húsi! to apply for their sum-
mer work, and two of our comics
creators got in. This allowed us to
push a couple of comics creators
into a government-sponsored
summer jobs."
They have been seeing a lot of
success with more children-ori-
ented events, such as their partici-
pation in the Children's Cultural
Festival, but have also set their
sights on expanding the read-
ership of local comics creators
through Reykjavík area libraries.
"We've been trying to create
zines sections in government and
municipal libraries,” she says.
“There's already been a potential
success in Gar!abær, which we're
still finalising, but they've agreed
to have a zine section and we're
excited to see that come to frui-
tion. There have been talks with
a lot of municipalities about this,
to find a home for shorter-form
comics in library systems. That's
been our mission during the pan-
demic, when we don't really have a
lot of energy to do a lot of different
events. Experimenting with a lot
of different infrastructure-build-
ing like that."
Islands in the stream
While they have had to cancel a
couple of big events this month
due to the pandemic, they're focus-
ing more on "low-key events" while
also moving towards streaming
events.
In fact, they held a streaming
event last spring featuring comics
artists from all over the country
engaging in "a digital comics jam,
with the idea of our vice chairman
Vigdís would draw up things we
were talking about. We filled a
whole board with doodles based on
our comics conversation topics."
They hope to bring in more inter-
national artists for these stream-
ing sessions in the future.
For the new year, they're aim-
ing to create "a shared space for
comics creators and illustrators
outside the capital area. If that
comes to fruition, we would have a
place to hold workshops in more of
a wild setting, engaging both local
and international artists.”
But here in this year, they plan
on translating Scott McCloud’s
‘Understanding Comics’ into Ice-
landic, and will also release an an-
thology of the comics their mem-
bers have done.
If they had it all
The goals that TICS aims for are
within what they are able to do, but
even if there were no limit to their
available resources, their aims
would still be altruistic.
"If we had all the money and
resources in the world, we would
probably be trying to find ways
to help gently change structures
in ways that are positive beyond
comics,” Atla says. “We would
push for more festivals and more
comics societies in Iceland. We've
also run into a unique situation
where comics are at the forefront
of school literacy discussions, and
if we had our way, we'd be able to
help kids with reading disabilities
to access comics on a more aca-
demic level. Beyond that, to be able
to help every person to do comics,
so that their personal expression
could be heard."
As it is, TICS is doing every-
thing they can within the confines
of the pandemic.
"We're just trying to do as
much as we can with the limited
resources that are available to
everyone right now, seeing what
sticks and what doesn't, what ac-
tually engages people,” she says.
“And we've found surprisingly a lot
of success given the restrictions of
this year."
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Books
COMIC
Atla Hrafney getting inspiration
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