International Comic Expo
ICE, THE International Comics Expo that has taken place in Birmingham the last two years looked unlikely to make it a third time round this September until a sponsor stepped in at the last minute.
ICE had been funded The Arts Council of England but those monies have now been withdrawn. However, the British branch of Comic Book Certification Service (CBCS), a comics grading company, has brokered a deal that will ensure that this year’s event, along with its sister event Uncovered, can still take place over the weekend of September 11th-12th.
“When we at CBCS heard that funding for ICE 2016 was pulled, we were extremely disappointed." stated CBCS Chief Executive Officer Michael Bornstein, "This is such an amazing convention for the U.K; that CBCS President Steve Borock and I were happy to contribute in any way we could to help make this happen. Comics are such a great hobby with so many wonderful fans; we knew CBCS had to help out. We hope the collectors in the U.K. have a wonderful experience at ICE 2016!"
“It was like something straight out of a comic book… Like true heroes CBCS came out of nowhere and saved us,” expressed ICE organiser Shane Chebsey gratefully, “We have so much to thank Michael Bornstein, Steve Borock, Steve Paulus, Lee Kingsley and all of the CBCS team for.”
A press release issued stated that as ICE’s main sponsor those attending could “expect a big presence” by CBCS. So close to the event, that is presumed to infer CBCS’s actual attendance as a exhibtor at the show rather than affecting the actual running of it, with all previously announced guests still due to attend. This stated, the recent announcement of film producer Gary Kurtz (Star Wars, Empire Strikes Back) along with Richard Bazley (Iron Giant, Harry Potter) and Paul Goodenough (How to Train Your Dragon) may reflect a desire to expand and encompass other areas of pop culture to attain wider public interest.
However, comics remains at the heart of ICE’s operation this year with the likes of Guy Adams, Charlie Adlard, Laurence Campbell, Ian Churchill, Jamie Delano, Gary Erskine, Duncan Fegredo, Peter Hogan, Peter Milligan, Robbie Morrison, Sean Phillips, Carl Potts, Joe Pruett, Dylan Teague and John Wagner due to attend as guests.
There has been the suggestion by some UK comic fans that by Great Britain voting to no longer be part of the European Economic Community (EEC) one of the knock-on effects is the withdrawing of grant funding and price hikes for the actual products. While there may indeed be adverse repercussions that we as a nation could suffer financially, as far as the comics side of things go currently I would suggest this is superficial PR fluffing to cover standard price rises while in the case of ICE/Uncovered with its Arts Council funding a sadly inevitable situation that has risen from the fallout of revelations about gross misuse of public monies by UK charities, notably Kids Company; leading to greater scrutiny and questioning of where the public’s money is going. This not being helped by politicians - like former Secretary of Education Michael Gove - adding their own sound bite snipes by claiming the arts (high brow and low alike both lead like lambs to the slaughter in one foul-mouthed move) should be cut from the school curriculum.
We can easily argue that it is wrong for local councils to cut bin collections when their chief executives often make extra money hand-over-fist just staying up when an election’s on, but justifying where money is being best spent in the public’s interest for the cultural enrichment of our population becomes more diversive an issue. With substantial art grant deductions having taken place in the city annually since 2010, Birmingham City Council’s Arts Board sought to forewarn and offer advice to those seeking to establish charities and art and cultural programmes on how best to approach increasing measures of accountability and ways to seek fresh resources.
To this end they delivered a series of courses during the Autumn-Winter period of 2016 around the city that proved insightful, if not a little scary to some; certainly the implications of keeping sound financial records and undertaking practices not outlined in original proposals that gained various grants was heavily emphasised in light of the Kids Company fiasco. This may be in part why ICE had issued a mission statement to clarify its own agreed intent in 2016. Either way it is now a redundant discussion, Arts Council funding has been officially withdrawn, whereas the involvement of CBCS to ensure this year’s event take place will be heartening to fans, guests and exhibitors alike preparing to venture to the show in September, and of course the organisers themselves who have spent the last year putting the event together.
Those wanting to purchase tickets to the show should visit this link to the ICE website.
News sponsored by Target Media.
