Billy Ireland Cartoon Library & Museum Blog

The Ohio State University’s Sullivant Hall, home to the Billy Ireland Cartoon Library & Museum (BICLM), is in the process of undergoing necessary renovations of the building’s HVAC system. As a result, the BICLM exhibition space will be closed from November 10, 2025 through May 22, 2026. Only the museum galleries will be impacted. Researchers will still be able to access our materials in our reading room, which will be open throughout the museum closure.
When the galleries reopen in 2026, visitors will experience The Story of Comics, an expanded redesign of the museum’s permanent collection gallery. This exciting new installation will include rooms dedicated to the language of comics, making comics, the history of comics, new acquisitions, a special display of Bill Watterson’s Calvin & Hobbes, and an interactive area and lounge. The exhibition will feature comic strips, political cartoons, superhero comics, animation, and more– as well as hands-on experiences for all ages.

BICLM’s galleries will also reopen with an exhibit on the work of artist and writer, Chris Ware, entitled Life is Complicated. After three years of touring European museums (including the Pompidou Center in Paris and the Centre de Cultura Contemporània de Barcelona) Ware’s work makes its final and only American appearance at the Billy Ireland Cartoon Library & Museum on the campus of Ohio State. Designed and lightly annotated by the artist, the exhibit includes original drawings, notes and sketches as well as sculptures, paintings and auxiliary objects too fragile to ship internationally – some which will be exhibited for the first time. Life is Complicated will be on display from May 22 through November 29, 2026.

Please note that the library reading room and offices will remain open throughout the winter and spring gallery closure. Our current exhibits, Motion Lines: How Cartoonists Draw Movement and Write it Down, Draw it Out: The Comics Art of Carol Tyler will be on display until November 9, 2025.

For more information, contact cartoons@osu.edu.

See us on CBS Sunday Morning this weekend!

We are thrilled to share that CBS Sunday Morning will air a story this Sunday, May 25 at 9am ET on the cartoonist Barbara Shermund, featuring an interview with Caitlin McGurk, our Curator of Comics and Cartoon Art, and her Eisner-nominated book and exhibit on Shermund’s work!

The exhibit, Tell Me a Story Where the Bad Girl Wins: The Life and Art of Barbara Shermund which originated at the Billy Ireland Cartoon Library & Museum in 2018 is currently on display at the Brandywine Museum of Art in Chadds Ford, Pennsylvania, and will be featured in the segment.

If you are unable to tune in to the broadcast, be sure to check out the clip on the CBS Sunday Morning YouTube channel after it airs!