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    ARC Comics Panel: Art, Poetry, Music: Visualising Time And Performance

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    ARC Comics Panel: Art, Poetry, Music: Visualising Time And Performance

    Posted in: Comics | Tagged: arc, london, Peckham

    ARC Comics Panel: Art, Poetry, Music: Visualising Time And Performance

    The ARC Contemporary Comics Panel: Art, Poetry, Music: Visualising Time And Performance, with punks, DJs and poets in Peckham earlier today

    Published Fri, 10 Jul 2026 05:36:10 -0500
    by Rich Johnston
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    Last updated Fri, 10 Jul 2026 05:38:53 -0500
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    Article Summary

    • ARC Contemporary Comics Festival in Peckham opened with a panel on how art, poetry and music shape comics.
    • Josephine M. K. Edwards, Anaïs Sière, Miranda Smart and Anu Ambasna shared creative links between sound and page.
    • The discussion explored rhythm, world-building, humour, intimacy and performance in contemporary comics practice.
    • The post also rounds up ARC Peckham talks, Drink and Draw in Soho, and the full weekend small press festival events.

    The ARC Contemporary Comics Festival Talks today at The Hub in Peckham, London, ahead of this week’s small press festival began with a panel, Art, Poetry, Music: Visualising Time and Performance, with comic book creators Anaïs Sière, Anu Ambasna, Josephine M. K. Edwards, Miranda Smart, all chaired by Dr Maggie Gray. And all with their own relationships with music, comics and a way to express between the two

    /Rich Johnston

    Punk cartoonist Josephine M. K. Edwards talked about how it was all like the love of playing The Sims and burning the house down, as she is currently specialising in creating comics about evil women. She emphasised that there was very little pay in all of this, you have to enjoy the process, even if you love your own work far more than any commissions you are asked to do, and that its all about an excess energy, and that’s true of her music, she has no plan, it all just turns into the form of characters in her stories. She says there is a natural rhythm in comics that matches that in music, and editing her comics down with punchy beats and hooks match what she does in comics, “Stuff I sing about I put in my comics. Flies landing in my eyes, wristwatches in a thunder storm… I’m not a trained musician, I never learned perspective, I just have to do it myself, thank goodness I’m an artist, I can get away with it.’ She also talks about how she grew up on Tumblr, over sharing is her thing, but she can be much more obnoxious on stage than in her comics, as it’s something that people take home with them. What she writes is meant to make her laugh, she’s gathered a bunch of boys together to bring attention to her and her songs, so she has to write the words, and they might as well be put out as poems or comics as well. She listens to 80s ambient music on YouTube when drawing. Something that can wash over her, but she watched trash TV to be shocked by the things that other people say, and think, and then uses that.

    French cartoonist and musician Anaïs Sière sees music as world building, if she is blocked from a scenario that has to be solved, music allows her to be more free. So she can create a world you don’t have to understand, just feel it, accept it, and that it helps her to take that back to her comics works. She sees initimacy as very different between the two, she used her diary to create both, but comics are more revealing, and it’s a risk to expose yourself. She also talked how she has created an “illustration rock band’ with three other artists all working together on a project, aware that one person could destroy it all. She will be joining Josephine M. K. Edwards to perform at the ARC X Gob Nation party tomorrow night….

    Cartoonist Miranda Smart struggles to make any kind of world building, she creates an emotional place with image, shapes and abstract spaces. And that she borrows from music, in textural, abstract metaphorical way, in images. And notes that everyone has a level of synathesia and that classical musician will talk about imagery when talking about their music. She writes a lot more than anyone sees, the words she writes become the images she uses, and gets translated into abstract shapes. The words seem either too vague or specific for what she wants to get across. She will listen to ambient music, if anything when drawing.

    Anu Ambasnais a DJ and a radio host, and says that “all of the worlds I create inform each other. I use music in a way if I feel stuck’ That for her music has deep feeling or memories, to spark her imagination, she could take lyrics and create something, on a deeper level. When creating characters and a profile around them, the music that they listen to is a really big part of that for her and this comes from being a DJ and seeing the different kind of people who enjoy certain music, and what it says about them. She also finds it easier to get humour across in comics, and there;s nothing better than someone picking up a comic and laughing. It’s a lot harder in music to get that. She listens to ambient music when writing, but listens to trash TV when drawing… she will be doing a worldbuilding workshop tomorrow at ARC.

    The ARC Comics Taks are on all day today, with a Drink And Draw to follow in Soho, and the ARC Snall Press Comics festival all weekend long – and a party on the Saturday night!

    Friday, 10th of July

    ARC
    • Art, Poetry, Music: Visualising Time and Performance, 10:30-11:30am. Arc Festival Talks at The Hub at the UAL, Bonar Road, Peckham, with Anaïs Sière. Anu Ambasna. Josephine M. K. Edwards. Miranda Smart. chaired by Dr Maggie Gray
    • International Publishers: Opportunities and Pitfalls of Print Based Publishing in the 21st Century, 11:45am-12:45pm Arc Festival Talks at The Hub at the UAL, Bonar Road, Peckham with Cram Books, PageMasters, Peow2, SelfMadeHero chaired by Dr Andrea Aramburú
    • UK Small Press: History and Heritage, 1:30-2:45pm Arc Festival Talks at The Hub at the UAL, Bonar Road, Peckham with Blanca Garcia Paja. Ed Pinsent. Dr Ian Horton. Paul Gravett. Sarah Marhurter. Woodrow Phoenix chaired by Douglas Noble
    • Contemporary Fantasy, 3-4pm Arc Festival Talks at The Hub at the UAL, Bonar Road, Peckham With Hollow Press, Lando, Leomi Sadler, Linnea Sterte chaired by Matt Seneca
    • White Walls: Exhibiting Comics, 4:15-5:15pm Arc Festival Talks at The Hub at the UAL, Bonar Road, Peckham with Joe Kessler (Mote). Kat Chapman (Avery Hill). Olivia Ahmad and Paul Gravett (Queer as Comics, The Quentin Blake Centre for Illustration) Chaired by Dr Gareth Brookes
    • The Comic Book Musicals of A.T. PRATT.5:15-6:30pm Arc Festival Talks at The Hub at the UAL, Bonar Road, Peckham
    • MOTE Public View for Arc Festival, AMP Gallery, 1 Acorn Parade, Peckham 6am-6pm
      With Alex Treskman, Andres Magan, Anna Haifisch, Brie Moreno, Cameron Arthur, Emil Friis-Ernst, Erlend Peder Kvam, Fidelia Schlegl, Hugh Frost, Joe Kessler, John Molesworth, Kayla Lui, Leomi Sadler, Molly Colleen O’Connell, Richard Short, Wai Wai Pang, Zeel
    Gosh Comics

    Saturday, 11th of July

    ARC poster

    Sunday 12th July

    • ARC Contemporary Comics Festival at Unit 8, Copeland Park,Peckham. 11am-6pm
      A festival of contemporary comics in South East London, taking place over four days in July, showcasing some of the best independent comics, graphic novels, sequential art and form-altering visual narrative. The festival will launch with an exhibition and talks, before culminating in a comics fair over 2 days, featuring a curated line-up of over 100 UK-based and international artists and publishers
    • MOTE Public View, AMP Gallery. AMP Gallery, 1 Acorn Parade, Peckham 6am-6pm

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