There are a number of new faces around the Billy Ireland Cartoon Library & Museum! In the late 2024, we were able to expand our staff to create three new positions thanks in part to contributions from generous donors to support our mission. We’re thrilled to welcome Museum Project Registrar Andie Near, Museum Educator Rebecca Richardson, and Accessions and Acquisitions Archivist Michelle Maguire! Learn more about these wonderful additions to the BICLM team below:
Andie Near, Museum Project Registrar
Hello! My name is Andie and in June of 2024, I joined the Billy Ireland team to serve as Museum Project Registrar, where I oversee the coordination of logistics for our traveling exhibitions and exhibits program. I come from that state up north, where I earned a Bachelor of Fine Arts in ceramics and jewelry from Grand Valley State University and began my career in museums. I hold a Master of Arts in historical administration from Eastern Illinois University, and served most recently as Collections Manager at the Kruizenga Art Museum at Hope College—until I joined this team of amazing humans!
What I love most about my work is that there is so much to love! My role brings me up close and personal to the abundance of technically breathtaking work at the Billy. While I enjoy the diversity of my day-to-day activities, I would say that receiving and sending out shipments are major exclamation points in my work-life.
Raised during a generation of incredible print newspaper comics, I related to Calvin and Hobbes and Luann, cried with Cathy (AACK!) and wished I understood Doonesbury. As an adult, poignant and rich graphic memoirs such as George Takei’s They Called us Enemy, and Beth Trembly’s Look Again helped inform my understanding of the world we live in. Since moving to Columbus, I frequently find myself at the library in search of any graphic story that peaks my interest.
Outside of work, you will probably find me out in the woods, cooking and spending time with friends and family, or in my sewing room. …Or on the couch with a comic book.
Rebecca Richardson, Museum Educator
My name is Rebecca and I’m the museum educator at the Billy Ireland. Prior to this position, I worked at the Wexner Center for the Arts where I supported educational programming. My roots are in K-12 education where I taught K-12 art and high school English. I have a A.A in English from Hudson County Community College and a B.A in English Secondary Education from New Jersey City University.
A few of my favorite graphic novels right now are One Hundred Demons by Lynda Barry, Ay, Mija! by Christine Suggs, Hot Comb by Ebony Flowers, and Huda F Cares by Huda Fahmy. Outside of work I make comics and zines. I also run when it’s above 30 degrees with a reasonable wind chill. To all you dedicated winter runners, kudos!
What most excites me most about working here? Well today, Andie called me over to look at some original art by Raina Telgemeier on her table sooo that’s a pretty cool thing to happen in the middle of your workday. But I’m also excited about getting more audiences here for museum programs. I like hearing sporadic laughter in the galleries when a punchline lands and showing folks how complex and versatile comics are. I also love that our upcoming programs could be the very first time someone makes a comic and that’s pretty cool 🙂
Michelle Maguire, Accessions and Acquisitions Archivist
Hey! I’m Michelle Maguire, the new Accessions and Acquisitions Archivist here at the Billy Ireland. My time is spent working with donors (sometimes the donor is creator of the work itself, sometimes they’re a friend or family member, sometimes they’re a collector and enthusiast) on the review of their materials; the logistics of getting their materials into our space—everything from books, to original cartoons, to personal items which include things like sketchbooks, fan mail, hate mail, correspondence between friends, receipts of the trade…anything that helps to paint a picture of the day-to-day life of a cartoonist; and then ultimately processing those materials to make them accessible to scholars, researchers and fans from around the world to study and enjoy. My job is great because I get to see and handle everything that comes in, while establishing relationships with donors and stewarding artists’ legacies.
As a kid in Canton, Ohio in the 80s I was excited by images and printed matter. Newspapers around the house meant I grew up reading the Sunday comics section. A magical corner of my grandparents’ basement held a constant flow of boxes containing unclaimed possessions of people who’d stored them in my family’s moving and storage business, introducing me to things like Life and Playboy and the wonderfully absurd National Enquirer. Discovering MAD on the racks at the drugstore, and National Lampoon by visiting friends whose older siblings had subscriptions. I equally loved flipping through pages of things that seemed “undesigned”—catalogs for Sears and JCPenney and whatever other mail-order offers showed up. Even getting my hands on the TV Guide felt exciting. All of these things certainly played a role in shaping my future love for layered meaning, deadpan humor, parody, and wordplay. Today my desire for looking at material from the past continues to deepen as the world around me becomes increasingly slick and sanitized.
I studied photography and graphic design at Pratt Institute before making the switch to library science, thanks to overhearing a conversation about a librarian whose job was to manage a collection of vintage postcards of “boring motels across America.” (Sign me UP.) Since earning my MLIS in 2004, my career has allowed me to weave together my artistic, curatorial and organizational sensibilities, which includes 14 years in the History of Art department’s Visual Resources Library here at OSU, followed by a five-year freelance gig as a prop and set stylist on commercial and editorial photoshoots.
Outside of work, I like to spend my time digging through special collections at various libraries and making books. (Prior to joining the Billy Ireland I finished a nine-month fellowship at the most terrific New York Public Library Picture Collection, where I discovered a fondness for quick-witted gag cartoonists like Otto Soglow, Gardner Rea and Ed Koren.) I’m inspired by the endless possibilities of an archive—how the materials provide insight into artists’ concerns, and a glimpse into their brilliant minds, personalities and senses of humor. Spaces of contemplation, archives help to spark new ideas for a researcher, and have the remarkable power to motivate, invigorate, and activate.
I’m constantly losing my mind over what the Billy Ireland collection comprises. The scope of what we hold—everything from 19th-century manga to historical newspaper printing objects like flongs to Wacky Packages trading cards—is an astounding wealth of wild treasure. I’m a big fan of promo swag, collectible memorabilia, and souvenirs and ephemera, so I’ve been slowly making my way through our boxes of items amassed by underground comix cartoonist Jay Lynch, which contain everything from food wrappers, can labels and product packaging to decals, business cards and rubber stamp company catalogs.
I’m always sniffing around for things that I respond to visually, and working here I’m surrounded. I love studying sketches and drafts of a work (marked up with editors’ notes for revision), comparing the original art to the way it appeared in the finished, published piece; admiring the skilled hand in the lettering; getting lost in a brushstroke, a printmaking mis-registration, the flourishes within a title panel, the dynamic expression of emotion and movement in a static medium. I feel enormously lucky to have joined a team whose mission is to celebrate, preserve, and share printed cartoon history. Every day’s a new thrill!
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