Going Into The Woods in 2022 It’s important to have things to look forward to in January. Especially these days. So we’re especially delighted that 2022 is the Year of Stories in Scotland , and so hopefully, a whole year of events and adventure awaits. We’ve lots of story projects lined up over the next few months, which we’re looking forward to sharing. We’ll have more information and sneak peeks to share from all of them soon, but they include… Not one but TWO comics created as part of the ‘Rediscovering the Antonine Wall’ project, created by schools from the five local authorities the wa ..read more

Local heroes to the rescue Over the next few weeks, we'll be working with ALL TWENTY ONE Primary Schools in Inverclyde, to create a brand new comic story. The project has been developed with the Inverclyde Attainment Challenge Literacy CMOs, to encourage reading and creativity. We've created a team of new Inverclyde heroes, The Clyde Crew, and every school will develop a one page story which pitches these heroes against a series of environmental catastrophes! From droughts and volcanic eruptions to tornadoes and blizzards, it sounds like we will all have our work cut out for us. The finishe ..read more

Inverclyde Storytelling You can now watch our full Tales of the Oak comics / storytelling performance, presented in association with The Beacon Arts Centre as part of the Scottish International Storytelling Festival and funded by Traditional Arts and Culture Scotland. Inverclyde young people reinterpreted and reworked folk tales, urban myths and legends from the area, into a new collection of stories which we produced as comics You can also read or download the comic which collects all the stories ..read more

Black History Month Earlier this month, we were asked to produce some artwork for the Afrowegian Project , imagining an Afro-Futurist version of the story of real world cycling superhero, Marshall 'Major' Taylor. The comic display panels form part of an exhibition by the riverside in Glasgow throughout October. You can read more about the work of the project and how to get involved. We're looking forward to doing some more collaborative work with Afrowegian's Jim Muotone, down in Inverclyde over the next few months ..read more

Magic Torch Comics Director - Behind the Magic! Earlier this year, our director Paul Bristow spoke to Tall Tale films as part of CVS Inverclyde's Digital Open Studios project. Check out the short video below to hear Paul chat about storytelling, communities and his creative process for his own writing and his work with Magic Torch Comics CIC.  You can also see his fairly messy home office under the stairs ..read more

Refugee Week 2021 Back in 2019, artist Mhairi Robertson and myself, spent some time with a group of women in Glasgow, who told us about their experience of the asylum process, and the welcome they had found in Scotland. The project was pit together by the Poverty Truth Community, and the women all wanted to focus on the positive things that had happened to them since arriving, and the actions that other could take while in the process. A booklet of their stories, which also shares information on the support which is available for people, was launched during Refugee Week 2021 at an online ev ..read more

Magic Torch Comics CIC are asking local young people to get involved in creating a science fiction adventure comic online.  The comic, Starbound, is part of our ‘Outside The Box’ project, supported by National Lottery Community Fund. Over the last year, the project has delivered online workshops and involved young people in creating comics about life in lockdown and a collection of spooky stories for Galoshans. For this project, we wanted to do something a little different. It’s a choose your own adventure comic, where local people help create and shape the story on instagram. Every Mo ..read more

What scares us? In Inverclyde, Hallowe’en is celebrated with a programme of community arts events which takes it’s name from an old Scottish tradition, Going Galoshans . In 2020, the festival was mostly online, and as part of our Outside the Box project, we ran a number of comic sessions and courses. Throughout September and October we pulled together a collection of scary stories, including a comic adaptation of ‘ The Buried Alive ’ a Ghost Story from Greenock born writer John Galt, first published in 1822.  We also ran a number of competitions, asking people for their suggestions abo ..read more

Comics in Lockdown Before the year ends, we are sharing two publications created as part of our National Lottery Community Fund project, Outside The Box, working with marginalised young people in Inverclyde to create stories which reflect their lived experience. And obviously, in 2020, there was one lived experience it was hard to avoid. One that we all shared in different ways. So throughout spring and summer of 2020, we continued to work with as many young people in Inverclyde as we could, to create comics which explored their experiences of lockdown.  Sometimes that would mean worki ..read more

Scottish Parliament Comics Over the last year, we worked with eight schools across the eight parliamentary areas in Scotland, to create 'Our Words', comics which explore the work of the Scottish Parliament. It's been an amazing project to be involved with and we are delighted that the comics are now available to read online. There were four primary schools and four secondary schools involved in the project - each working with the Scottish Parliament Education and Outreach team to find out more about their chosen topic. The schools visited parliament, talked to MSPs, the returning officer, th ..read more