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Get Animated
A new festival will launch at the Sydney Opera House which celebrates an exciting wave of artists, including, um, Kevin Smith
For those who think that comics, animators and graphic storytellers don't receive their due will be excited to hear about a brand new festival set to kick off in Sydney which celebrates these artists and their contribution to popular culture today.
GRAPHIC will take over the Sydney Opera House on August 7 and 8 and will feature a diverse collection of productions, musical responses to graphic art, interviews and panel discussions with renowned local and international figures.
Co-curator Jordan Verzar of Top Shelf Productions says this festival truly provides a unique platform for these often overlooked artists. "Sydney Opera House embracing and presenting this event is a godsend for the fans," she says. "GRAPHIC will present artists you had always hoped, but would never have expected to appear in Australia and in formats you wouldn't anticipate.
"Moreover, it will provide a place for Australian artists to meet, workshop, create, educate and find inspiration," Verzar enthuses. "For devotees of these mediums there will now be a proper festival environment to indulge their passions."
GRAPHIC's keynote event will feature celebrated graphic novelist Neil Gaiman reading his new as-yet unpublished story The Truth is a Cave in the Black Mountains in the Concert Hall. Eddie Campbell (From Hell) is set to illustrate the story and Australian string quartet FourPlay will play a live underscore to the reading.
The festival will also include an evening with independent filmmaker and comic writer Kevin Smith (Clerks, Dogma), the legendary Japanese anime epic Akira rescored live by Regurgitator, and Ben Walsh and the Orkestra of the Underground creating a live score to Shaun Tan's The Arrival, a magical story about an immigrant entering a new world.
A series of talks, film screenings and free workshops will also take place across the weekend.
In partnership with Screen NSW and Hackett Films, Sydney Opera House has also launched a world-wide online competition open to illustrators, animators and storytellers of all levels with a cash prize of $20,000.
For more information about the GRAPHIC festival and online animation competition, click here.