The Angoulême comic festival cancels the exhibition of Bastien Vivès, the controversial cartoonist who treats pedophilia, incest and pornography in his work

The Angouleme festival has announced this Wednesday the cancellation of the exhibition dedicated to the work of Bastien Vivès, after requests for its cancellation followed one another on networks and the author and the organizers received various threats.

Despite enjoying some recognition in the world of Franco-Belgian comics (his graphic novel

received the Angoulême Revelation Prize in 2008), several of his works such as

or

have been the subject of controversy, since they are accused of glorifying pedophilia, pedophilia, incest and rape.

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Angouleme festival is Charlie

Although an online petition against the exhibition had been launched in recent days (garnering more than 100,000 signatures), the festival had initially felt that this was not a reason to change its programming.

However, new threats towards the author and intimidation of the contest team members have led them to cancel it.

The management of the festival —which will be held from January 26 to 29, 2023— has issued a statement in which it clarifies: “Physical threats have been made against Bastien Vivès.

Therefore, it is not possible for the contest to consider that its programming could endanger an author and, potentially, within a few weeks, his assistants”.

The exhibition

(

) was to be inaugurated at the end of January in the city of Charente on the occasion of this event, the most important in the world of comics.

French cartoonist Bastien Vivès. JOEL SAGET (AFP)

Bastien Vivès, a 38-year-old Parisian author with a successful artistic career (he studied at the prestigious Les Gobelins animation school and is edited by Casterman, which belongs to the giant Gallimard), has also received the support of the contest.

"The festival considers that the work of Bastien Vivès, as a whole, falls within the scope of freedom of expression and that it corresponds to the law to draw the limits in this area and to justice to ensure its respect", the organization has indicated in a statement.

Vivès has achieved success with a varied body of work, including pornographic comics with underage characters (

), but also sophisticated graphic novels (

,

), a “French manga” ( the

) or the recovery of the Corto Maltese character (

, 2021).