»AfriComics« Workshops in DR Kongo, Rwanda & Cameroon«
AFRICOMICS is a pan-African comics project by the Goethe-Institut. In 14 countries, artists developed stories on the theme »The World at its Best« during five-day workshops. The best contributions were selected, and later published in a joint publication.
Each workshop was led by a tandem of comics artists from Germany and the respective partner country. I led the workshops in Kinshasa, DR Congo (in collaboration with Jérémy Nsingi), Kigali, Rwanda (in collaboration with Dolph Banza), and Yaoundé, Cameroon (in collaboration with Hugues Bertrand Biboum).
All stories created during the project can be viewed on the project website.
»My Language & Me« Workshop in Kosovo
What does language reveal about the country I live in? What does it say about me? Over the course of a week, I developed comics with illustrators from Prishtina (Kosovo) around the theme »My Language and Me.« The resulting stories explored idioms and superstitions, the subtle differences between Kosovar Albanian and standard Albanian, and the fine art of Albanian cursing.
We also worked on techniques for presenting comics in an entertaining way to a live audience. At the end of the workshop, the participants presented their work on the stage of the wonderful Kino Armata in Prishtina.
By invitation of the German Federal Foreign Office, Kosovo.
Visualization Workshops
Everyone can draw! And visualization can be learned!
In these workshops, participants explore the basics of visualization through a variety of short and engaging exercises—covering lettering styles, structuring techniques, figures, facial expressions, the use of color, and composition.
With these tools at hand, participants visualize topics and processes that are currently relevant in their daily work and present them using newly acquired presentation techniques. This often results in wonderfully creative performances.
The workshops are designed for anyone who wants to integrate visualization as a skill into their work processes. They are not only fun, but also strengthen team cohesion and team spirit within companies and organizations.
»Les Dessins du Destin« School workshops in Haiti
For a period of three months I was holding drawing workshops for children and teenager of a school in a slum of Port-au-Prince. The pupils explored the streets of their neighborhood with self-made sketchbooks and captured its people and everyday life in numerous drawings. Furthermore we painted the walls of the school and presented our works in a final exhibition.
»There’s no place like Lagos!« The Lagos Graphic Novel
Lagos, Westafrica’s heartbeat. 25 million people and their daily hustle-bustle, blazing heat, nerve-wracking traffic, proud market-women, corrupt policemen, new-rich bankers, dodgy area boys, upcoming artists. Endless stories to tell.
For three months I was supervising a graphic novel project initiated by the Ake Festival and the Goethe Institute Lagos. Young Nigerian illustrators were telling their stories from the life in this breathtaking city. They were developed on the desk or directly in the chaotic crowd of the streets.
»KIBU!« Workshops in refugee camps
In the course of the big refugee crises in 2016 I was holding different creative workshops in various refugee camps in Berlin. Participants were refugees between 6 and 24 years who came from countries like Syria, Iraq, Afghanistan, Bosnia, Eritrea and Mali. Depending on the age, the workshop topics varied. We learned different illustration techniques, were drawing comics and hidden object pictures, created collages and waste robots, sprayed bags, and printed a linocut card game.
In collaboration with Irene Fernández Arcas.
»NextBengaluru« The Bangalore Sketch Cart
For one week I was organizing open sketching class in Bangalore (India). In collaboration with a group of permanent participants I designed a »Sketch Cart«, a wooden cart armed with paper, pencils and colours. Every day we went out with it to sketch in the streets and encouraged curious people to bind their own sketchbook and participate in the drawing sessions. People of all ages and social groups dared to grab a pen and in the end, the whole neighbourhood was sketching.
Initiated by MOD Institute and supported by the German Embassy Bangalore.
»Gade’N« Reportage drawings in Haiti
Reportage drawing is a largely unknown medium in Haiti. I taught it during a one-semester teaching assignment at ENARTS, the National Art School of Port-au-Prince. The participants chose themes from their everyday lives and explored them graphically in their neighborhoods. Amongst others, reports about people peeing on the street, the city’s old gingerbread houses, street vendors, homeless people and fried food were originated. They were shown in a large exhibition and brought back to the streets with posters that were put up all around the art school’s neighborhood.
