For over 25 years, Joost Pollmann has been stepping up as an ambassador for the comic as a medium in the Netherlands and abroad. He has presented various lectures and exhibitions about visual culture, organised twelve comic festivals, published multiple essay bundles and written reviews for Dutch newspaper the Volkskrant.

Among his projects are his activities as creative director and fundraiser for Stripdagen (Comic Days) Haarlem, the largest comic festival in Northern Europe, and his work as curator of the Dutch Comic Strip Museum in Groningen. In 1999 he started Comedium, a foundation to promote the organising and financing of comic-related projects and visual culture.

Focusing on the ways visual art can represent culture, stories and social imagination, Pollmann’s expertise has influenced art funds and inspired the literary world to expand their views on comics and graphic novels. His education as a journalist and translator has provided Pollman with the skills necessary to discover fresh talents who experiment with the boundaries of creating graphic novels and bring them to the attention of the world.

In this year’s edition of Crossing Border, he will curate a Graphic Novels section and present three international visual artists. Each reinterprets the medium of comic books and graphic novels by inserting their own views, styles and messages.

One of Pollmann’s most recent books is ‘Schertsfiguur’ (Caricature). In fifteen tales, with illustrations by Paul van der Steen, he describes the boy he was and the man he became. From his crib in his devoutly Catholic home in Haarlem, he had a view of the Cathedral. Part of his family sympathised with the Germans, and he had brothers and sisters stepping through the living room to marching tunes. That kind of thing affects who you become – tragic, comical, and something in between. To be a hero is something many people wish for, but isn’t the role of antihero much a more human one?