Cartoonists have always known it is worth traveling to The Ohio State University just to see The Billy Ireland Cartoon Library and Museum. But now that the long-time Columbus, OH, mecca is closed to the public for the foreseeable future, what are fans of the cartoon arts to do?
Luckily, the CLAM has been slowly building their digital presence over the years, and The Columbus Dispatch is reporting a vast part of the Billy Ireland’s collection is now online.
“Our collection as a whole has over 3 million pieces,” said Caitlin McGurk, associate curator and OSU assistant professor. “Almost everything that we have other than materials in our backlog has some kind of visual representation or a digitized version.”
During the COVID-19 era, when museums and galleries are closed to the public, McGurk said the museum is dedicated to sharing its digital resources, online and through social media. Late in March, for example, McGurk posted a Spotify playlist of comic-themed or comic inspired music, such as “Spiderman” by the Ramones and “Batdance” by Prince.
So if you’ve run out of things to watch on Netflix, check it out: https://cartoons.osu.edu/
