INFO
| Name | Island to Island |
| Year | 2021 |
| Artform | Literature, Visual arts |
ABOUT
Island to Island: A Graphic Exchange Between Taiwan and New Zealand is a collaborative graphic novel between six Taiwanese and New Zealand cartoonists, published jointly by the Publishers Association of New Zealand, the Taipei Book Fair Foundation and the New Zealand Book Council. The publication acts as a “visual conversation” between the two cultures, sharing 18 interlocking, but ultimately separate, stories that capture personal reflections and musings from each of the artists.
Ranging from tales about kung-fu heroes to childhood memories, Island to Island is the product of a five-month cultural exchange whereby Taiwanese cartoonists Sean Chuang, 61Chi and Ahn Zhe travelled to New Zealand to meet and collaborate with local cartoonists Tim Gibson, Rachel Fenton and Ant Sang in October 2014. The following February 2015, Gibson, Fenton and Sang joined their collaborators in Taiwan to continue working on the project and attend the Taipei International Book Fair 2015, at which New Zealand was a Guest of Honour. According to Creative New Zealand, this was “the first residential exchange between Taiwan and New Zealand”.
The process of Island to Island took a slightly different approach than other texts featuring multiple artists — rather than combining the work into an anthology, or attempting to blend together different aesthetic styles into a single text, Island to Island was developed out of conversations between each artist: “Rather than forcing their styles together, the artists have instead ‘gifted’ a story to each other – sharing a memory or story as a response to their conversations and interactions during the exchange”. Sang comments that the artists became "good friends" throughout the exchange and spent time learning about each others' lives, cultures and backgrounds. Because of the personal nature of this collaboration, there is a clear sense of mutual respect and understanding between each of the stories that “[makes] the entire book flow like a dance or conversation”. The text leans into each artist’s distinct graphic style, highlighting the visual narrative form as a shared language. Earth’s End publisher, Adrian Kinnaird, describes Island to Island as “[representing] a new benchmark for cultural collaboration in the arts sector”.
During the Taipei International Book Fair in 2015, the six artists presented their work at several joint events, and it was agreed that the Taiwanese publisher, Dala, would collate their works into a large-format publication. The final text features both traditional Chinese and English and is distributed both locally and internationally.
