Awards | Nick Sousanis' Unflattening is the winner of the 2016 Lynd Ward Prize for Graphic Novel of the Year. Two graphic novels were named honor books: Lucy Knisley's memoir Displacement and Kathryn and Stuart Immonen's Russian Olive to Red King. The award is named for Lynd Ward, who published six wordless graphic novels between 1929 and 1937, all based on woodcuts. Ward's daughters donated a collection of his original art to Penn State, which sponsors the award. [Penn State News]
Awards | The winner of Australia's Gold Ledger award is Neomad, a collaborative comic created by a group of Aboriginal children living in a remote area, under the guidance of artist Stu Campbell. Campbell did the line drawings for the book, which he describes as "'Mad Max' for kids," but the children brainstormed the stories in his comics workshops, used themselves as characters, and did the coloring. [The Guardian]
Creators | Simon Hanselmann talks about his work and his unlikely journey from a difficult childhood in Australia to comics stardom in the United States. His newest book, Megg & Mogg in Amsterdam, has just come out, and he says he's in talks to turn Megahex into a TV show. [The Stranger]
Creators | Artist Ian Richardson discusses his work for 2000AD, Image (Noble Causes) and Dark Horse (Halo), as well as his album cover for the Welsh band Tigertailz and his independent project, The Unthinkables: "In a nutshell, it’s a story about what happens when all of Earth’s superheroes suddenly drop dead and the United Nations has to draft a group of villains and other powered misfits to keep civilisation from falling apart and… maybe… figure out why all the heroes died. And if you think you know where that premise is headed, well… there’s a huge twist that’s just too good to spoil." [Down the Tubes]
Digital comics | The Egyptian startup Koschk Comics is a comics platform that allows artists across the Arab world to collaborate and self-publish their work, and the app is a digital comics store as well. Koshk has been a finalist in several startup contests, and the founders are heading to Silicon Valley to pitch it at the 2016 Global Entrepreneurship Summit in June. [StepFeed]
Museums | The Billy Ireland Cartoon Library and Museum has acquired first-year print runs of the Egyptian comics magazine Samir, founded in 1956, and the Lebanese magazine Dunia al-Ahdath, founded in 1954. "Both collections reflect early articulations of mass print culture for children in Egypt and Lebanon and reveal intriguing intersections between popular culture, nationalism, mass education, and gender in a period of early postcolonial nation building," writes Middle East and Islamic Studies Librarian Johanna Sellman. [Billy Ireland Cartoon Library & Museum Blog]
Libraries | The Duncan Public Library in Duncan, Oklahoma, uses the Comics Plus digital comics service to supplement its physical holdings. "Our eBook and eAudiobook services have been quite successful and our graphic novel checkouts and requests have been consistently high," said librarian Amy Ryker. "Why not combine the two?" Comics Plus for Libraries offers 16,000 titles and, unlike the library, is open 24/7. "Comics Plus is a solid supplement to our current graphic novel collection in that they carry a lot of the publishers that we don't often buy physical copies of, for example IDW, Dark Circle, Galaxy Press and lots more," Ryker said. [Duncan Banner]
Conventions | Alex Simmons, the creator of Blackjack and a writer for Archie Comics, talks about Kids Comic Con, which he organizes. The 10th KCC takes place this weekend in The Bronx. [BlackSci-Fi.Com]