The Angoulême international comics festival (a.k.a. FIBD Angoulême) opened yesterday with the announcement that French writer Emmanuel Guibert had been awarded this year’s Grand Prix. Guibert is a frequent collaborator of Joann Sfar; the two worked together on The Professor’s Daughter and the Sardine in Space series, and he is also the writer of The Photographer, Alan’s War, and the children’s series Ariol (this last is published in English by Papercutz, while all the others are published here by First Second).
The other two nominees for the award were American creator Chris Ware and French creator Catherine Meurisse. Meurisse, who was recently interviewed by Cynthia Rose at The Comics Journal, is the first comics artist to be named to the French Académie des Beaux-Arts.
Robert Kirkman, creator of The Walking Dead, received a special “Fauve d’honneur” award at the festival’s opening ceremonies (“fauve” is French for “wild beast,” and the festival’s awards are called “fauves” because they are based on a cartoon of a wildcat).
The festival released three posters in October, one each by Rumiko Takahashi, Catherine Meurisse, and Charles Burns. Takahashi, the creator of Ranma 1/2, Inu Yasha, and many other iconic manga, was the winner of last year’s Grand Prix d’Angoulême and therefore the curator of this year’s festival.
Tomorrow’s events include a drawing masterclass with Inio Asano, creator of Goodnight Punpun, solanin, and Dead Dead Demon’s Dededede Destruction.
We’ll be bringing you more news as the festival goes on, and you can stay up to date by following the official Angoulême Twitter, which is in both English and French.