Posted in: Comics | Tagged: Angoulême, france
The Comic Con Formerly Known As Angoulême Is Back In January 2027
Angoulême Bande Dessinée, The New Name For Angoulême FIBD In 2027, and so much more besides
Article Summary
- Angoulême Bande Dessinée launches 28–31 January 2027, replacing FIBD after the 2026 cancellation and industry revolt.
- Morgane Group’s new team promises a more inclusive Angoulême Bande Dessinée with paid creators, safer spaces and no A.I.
- New Angoulême Bande Dessinée awards replace the Fauves, while Anouk Ricard, Ugo Bienvenu and more lead exhibitions.
- Angoulême Bande Dessinée 2027 reshapes the city layout, unites publishers on the Plateau and raises ticket prices slightly.
After a year in which the world’s most important comics festival simply did not happen, Angoulême Bande Dessinée is scheduled to open its French doors on 28th January 2027. It’s the third biggest comics convention in the world, bettered only by last week’s Lucca in Italy and the self-publishing Tokyo monolith that is Comiket. But this is the show where the publishers go, and so do the agents, licensors, translators, printers, distributors, retailers and more. The old Festival International de la Bande Dessinée d’Angoulême is dead. Long live the new one, run by people who organise music festivals.
This is the outcome of one of the ugliest and most public collapses in European comics. As we reported at the time, the 2026 edition was cancelled after a sustained revolt by authors and publishers against the long-standing organisers, 9eArt+, and its director, Franck Bondoux. Accusations of commercial drift, toxic management, and the dismissal of an employee who had reported a rape in 2024 proved terminal. The city’s mayor called for cancellation; major publishers walked away; the French Ministry of Culture cut subsidies. What remained was a free, author-driven “Grand Off” that filled the gap. I covered that substitute event and the surrounding crisis extensively.
The legal path was then cleared in October when the Angoulême court rejected 9eArt+’s attempt to block a new operator. The Association pour le développement de la bande dessinée à Angoulême (ADBDA) had already selected the Morgane Group, the company behind the Francofolies de La Rochelle and the Printemps de Bourges, to run the event for five years.
Yesterday, Morgane’s new subsidiary M:BD, co-directed by Marie Parisot and Céline Bagot, held a press conference and revealed the shape of the replacement. “This festival is a common good. We want to put ourselves at the service of the profession, but also of the public, to create an event that defends a popular, demanding and inclusive vision.” The 2025 cancellation announcement was described as a “requiem” in a cold room; this one was held in the ornate former ballroom of the château with a cognac cocktail afterwards. Céline Bagot asked for indulgence, saying they had “started from zero” and that this first edition would be refined over time: “We’re trying things and we’ll adjust later — be kind to us!”
The public open days from Thursday the 28th of January to Sunday the 31st January 2027, with a professional day on the Wednesday, match the former show’s dates and timing. The old “Fauves” Awards, the most prestigious in the comic world, whose statuettes were designed by Lewis Trondheim, are gone. In their place are nine prizes, each worth €2,500 and a bronze trophy. They include a Jury Prize, Complete Narrative, Heritage/Matrimoine, Revelation, Series, 8–10 years, 11–14 years, 15+ years, and Fanzine & Micro-edition. Youth prizes are now part of the main ceremony, on the Friday of the show at the Théâtre d’Angoulême, and the official selection of comics from which the winners will be chosen will be reduced to around forty titles rather than the broader lists of recent years, with the stated aim of greater visibility, and announced in early December in Paris. The equivalent of the old Grand Prix (lifetime achievement) will now be announced on Sunday afternoon rather than at the start of the festival. The winner is still chosen by the profession via a platform and will work with the festival throughout the following year. France Télévisions prize continues, now in partnership with the Villa Médicis where winners get a residency.
Artists are to be paid for signings, meetings, and official participation in the show, a point repeatedly emphasised by the new directors. Marie Parisot has said, “It is essential to put artists back at the centre of everything we develop, in terms of visibility and remuneration… and above all to listen to them.” Other content will include legal support and training on authors’ rights. A refuge space for authors and a dedicated group for the prevention of sexist and sexual violence have also been announced. A.I. is banned. Not “discouraged,” not “we will look into it.” Titles suspected of significant A.I. use will be ineligible for selection, and the ban extends to the festival’s own communication.
Exhibitions already announced include Grand Prix 2025 winner, one of the early voices of the boycott and 2027 festival poster designer Anouk Ricard: Éclatos at Vaisseau Moebius, Ugo Bienvenu: l’usage du Temps at Médiathèque de l’Alpha, Florence Dupré la Tour: pas gentille at Musée d’Angoulême, Xavier Dorison: le Maître des Univers at Espace Franquin, Matous, toutous, joujoux: bienvenue chez Yoon-Sun Park at Chais Magelis and Fanatic Female Frustration x Hairspray at CNAM/ENJMIN, and LGBTQomics and Thorgal, les vies d’un héros at Cité internationale de la BD. Artistic directors for the show have been named as Marguerite Demoëte, Raphaëlle Perret, and Mathieu Charrier (from the Cité).
An American exhibition has been announced, and a major manga exhibition is still to be named, but the new team has opened a Tokyo office, including employing translators linked to the largest Franco-Belgian bookstore in Japan, a clear signal of intent regarding the representation of Japanese comics. International rights markets and guest delegations from Taiwan, Ukraine, the United States, Poland, Brazil, Italy, Canada, Spain and the Czech Republic have been mentioned for 2027.
Marie Parisot described the logistics as “an enormous game of Tetris.” The goal is to “break down barriers between editorial genres and encourage discovery.” All publishers will be grouped together on the Plateau, the upper part of the city. The old separation between major groups and independents is being abolished. The old “bulles” or bubble tents are no longer called that, and new tent locations include the Champ-de-Mars, Place Saint-Martial, Place New-York, and the Halles. There will be no structure at L’Houmeau near Halle 57 anymore, and a new tent is planned on the parking des Frères-Lumière, near the cinema, where the international rights market used to be, which is moving to the Square des Villes Jumelées, opposite the Maison des Auteurs.
Ticket prices are a little higher than the last show: €25 for Thursday or Friday, €30 for Saturday, €23 for Sunday, with two-day passes available and free entry for under-12s, as well as further discounts
The old festival’s problems were not only managerial; they reflected deeper tensions over commercialisation, authors’ working conditions, and the balance between a major public event and the people who make the books. It is also, for now, a festival run by a music promoter. Angoulême’s economic importance to the town has never been in doubt; the question has always been whose festival it is. The answer, according to those now in charge, is that it belongs to both the profession and the public. The actual answers will come in January.
Enjoyed this? Please share on social media!
Stay up-to-date and support the site by following Bleeding Cool on Google News today!
