With nearly 400 publishers in Europe alone, it is always complicated for a project leader to knock on the right doors. To facilitate this research work, Laurent Siefer, Benjamin Strickler and Thierry Mary receive project leaders each morning of the festival. At a glance, these professionals manage to see the strengths and weaknesses of the projects presented. For the most successful, appointments with publishers are organised… but not just anyhow.
The objective of the three friends is to direct the creator of comics to the right publisher, the one who is likely to hang on to the universe and the style of each artist: “Publishers have a multitude of requests, some illustrators struggle to meet them, put a lot of energy into publicizing their project. We are facilitators, with the objective of presenting the right project to the right publisher”, says Thierry Mary, founder of Iconograf, who arrived at this workshop four years ago. “Since the creation of the school, specializing in comics, 20 years ago, we have come to the festival every year. And then over time this idea of supporting the search for publishers appeared and everything happened quite naturally”.
– Dorian Bercheny
Every morning, dozens of them come to meet the professionals. The lucky ones leave with appointments to meet the publishers, the others benefit from at least valuable advice: “The idea is clearly to demonstrate pedagogy. We are not here to please and give an appointment if we know that the project is not completed. But we are not here to discourage those who come to meet us either. We give them some advice. launches Benjamin Strickler. Young graduates, students or self-taught, all project leaders benefit from the same attention.