Venue: Birmingham City University Book here

£35 Students  /  £75 Standard Ticket  /  £50 VaroomLab Members (Limited availability)

Illustrators, students and academics are all welcome.

This two day VaroomLab illustration research symposium in November will be held in Birmingham with talks presented by practitioners and academics on the illustrated map as a mode of communication, tracing the link between visionary J.G. Ballard and the cultural and virtual fabric of 2015, drawing and the digital networks of the contemporary urban landscape, revisiting the vision of the original Association of Illustrators committee, and imagining an alternative future for arts education. A film on the manifestations of vision in contemporary illustration practice will also be presented.

This event will investigate the way visionary approaches are able to expand the way we perceive the world, and also how influences from the past continue to resonate today.

Speakers include Matthew Richardson, Gareth Proskourine-Barnett, Richard Miles, Andrew Kulman, Rachel Gannon, Darryl Clifton and Andy Davies. Petcha Kutcha presentations from Alice Moloney, Christian Lloyd, Jo Berry, Jo Hassel, Chloe Regan, Gary Powell and Aiden Winterburn.

Guest speakers will be announced soon.

Presentations will include the following:

• Myths of the near Future: Ballard, Crusoe and Google

• Field Notes From The Future

• Illustration; Education; Revolution

• 40 Years On: revisiting the vision of the original Association of Illustrators committee

• Visualising Spaces: The Illustrated Map as a mode of communicating Fact, Fiction and Feeling

Plus Petcha Kutcha presentations on a variety of topics:

‘The in-betweener’ – Jo Berry

Performing in a do-It-yourself nudie suit – Christian Lloyd

Off her hostess-trolley: Telling it a different way – Jo Hassel

A new breed: How should we champion the mavericks and pioneers of the illustration industry? – Alice Moloney

Illustrator as Detective: Discovery through Drawing’ – Chloe Regan

What’s inside the Outsiders? – Gary Powell

Self-Reflexivity and Contemporary Illustrated Children’s Books – Aiden Winterburn

Visionaries image by Josh Patterson