Comics Lowdown: Satire comic gets Warsaw Comics Festival in trouble

Plus: profiles on ‘Black’ creator Kwanza Osajyefo and ‘Top Ten’ artist Gene Ha, the Ledger Awards shortlist, and Montreal’s AstroBooks turns to crowdfunding to pay its tax bills.

The Warsaw (Poland) Comics Festival will lose three years’ worth of city subsidies, totaling $44,500, because a comic ridiculing Polish nationalists was distributed at this year’s event. Tomasz Lesniak and Rafal Skarzycki’s Poland: The Champion of Poland, lampooned nationalists, racists and anti-Semites, and that didn’t sit well with the local nationalists, who complained to the city council. The council released a statement saying, “After reviewing the comic we explicitly declare that we do not accept its content,” and announced it would sanction the festival.

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National Cartoonists Society honors Lynda Barry, Ann Telnaes and more

Telnaes takes home the Reuben and Barry receives the Milton Caniff Lifetime Achievement Award at the annual award presentation.

The Reuben Awards ceremony took place this past weekend at the National Cartoonists Society’s annual get-together.

Lynda Barry was presented with the Milton Caniff Lifetime Achievement Award by her old friend, The Simpsons creator Matt Groening. Ann Telnaes received the Cartoonist of the Year award. Ngozi Ukazu took top honors in the Online Comic: Long Form category for OMG Check Please, and Ruben Bolling’s Donald & John won the prize for Best Online Comic: Short Form. John Allison, Max Sarin, and Liz Fleming’s Giant Days was named Best Comic, and Rick Geary’s Black Dahlia won the Best Graphic Novel award.

The complete list of winners can be found below.

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