The Asia-Europe Foundation (ASEF) has officially launched Lingua Comica, a complete series of colourful comic books, at the Singapore Writer’s Festival on Wednesday 7 November 2012.
ASEF introduced how the Lingua Comica programme connected artists from Asia and Europe through various communication channels. Two artists, Budi Wijaya (Indonesia/Singapore) and Hwei Lin Lim (Malaysia) were invited on stage to share their experience at the event, while Emma Rios (Spain) participated by answering questions via video recording projected on screen. The artists shared their experience about the process of creating comic books and their collaborations. They also mentioned the challenges, uniqueness of Lingua Comica as well as the impact of the project on their career development.
ASEF believes that a popular medium like comics is a powerful communication tool. It can act as a vehicle to share different perspectives and opinions, and reveal personal or universal stories. Graphic novels often present stories in a format that is very accessible to people regardless of their age, gender and cultural background.
Within the Lingua Comica programme, ASEF connected 64 artists from 22 countries comic artists and novel writers, commercial publishers and book designers of different backgrounds and generations. Fifty people attended the launch after which they received a free collection of Lingua Comica.