President Tsai Ing-wen (left) and Elizabeth Hsu; photo courtesy of CNA
Taipei, Sept. 12 (CNA) President Tsai Ing-wen attended the 8th Golden Comic Awards (CGA) Ceremony Tuesday at the Taipei New Horizon Building and addressed six major polices regarding comics and animation.
Tsai also thanked and praised the Special Contribution Award winner Hsu Mao-sung for his contributions in establishing a publishing house during the Taiwan comic industry's most difficult era, to help give local comic artists a space to show their creations.
The award was accepted on behalf of the winner by his daughter, Elizabeth Hsu.
The artist himself was indisposed due to poor health and unable to attend the ceremony in person.
Tsai laid out her administration's policies as follows:
1. To prepare an environment for creation; to cultivate talent in t he field and build an industry database to encourage more people to join the industry.
2. To provide a diverse channel for publications; to provide subsidies and promotions for digital platforms to allow readers more access to quality local work.
3. To strengthen cross-field integration in order to exhibit the cross-field integration of comics and virtual reality technology.
4. To establish a unique comic information portal to promote easier cooperation between manufactures and artists.
5. To broaden support for anime, comics and games and promote character merchandising.
6. To establish a national museum for comics to archive and collect historical data and exhibit digital collections of comics.
The policies were formulated after a year of soliciting opinions from many experts in the comics industry, she said.
"We only have one goal and that is to elicit more interest in and support for comics," the president said. "I believe children who like to read comics will not turn bad," she added.
She expressed hope that next time she meets a comic artist, she will see a happier, more optimistic and energetic person.
The GCA was founded in 2010 and is Taiwan's top award for comics.
