Three new destinations to promote the trade in editorial rights and invest in the audio-visual sector: New York, Beijing and Annecy
Following the completion of the Fair in Bologna, the Bologna Children’s Book Fair (BCBF) has embarked on the Grand Tour 2025/26. A veritable “world tour”, each year the event sees BCBF feature at the major international book fairs and other events.
Launched in 2021 thanks to the support and collaboration of the Italian Trade Agency and the Ministry of Foreign Affairs and International Cooperation, the tour also features BCBF extensions BolognaBookPlus (BBPlus), the general publishing event organised in partnership with the Italian Publishers Association (AIE), and Bologna Licensing Trade Fair/KidsB (BLTF/Kids), the event focused on licensing and brands for children and young people. The World Tour represents an important opportunity not only to expand and consolidate BCBF’s network of contacts through meetings with stakeholders, strategic partners and key industry players, but also to gather new ideas and perspectives to transform into new proposals and activities for BCBF’s visiting public of professionals.
Following stops in Frankfurt, Nuremberg, Guadalajara, Cologne, Toulouse, Shanghai and New York, three final events will conclude the project before the summer break: a return to New York, Beijing and Annecy.
NEW YORK
In recent years, the trade in publishing rights between Italy and the United States has seen significant growth, in step with the strengthening of the bond that has always linked BCBF to this city. A bond built on hard work and a focus on children’s publishing and illustration, fields in which Bologna and New York have achieved a level of excellence. But, above all, it is a bond that continues to take shape in new projects: not least, the collaboration with UN Publications and UN Women, which led to the creation of an exhibition of young readers’ books curated by BCBF at the United Nations headquarters, and the collaboration with the Society of Illustrators (SOI), a true cornerstone institution for the world of illustration, which has brought previews of its outstanding exhibitions to Bologna. The SOI also organises the MoCCA Festival, a two-day event dedicated to comics in which BCBF took part just a few months ago.
To further strengthen this fruitful partnership, this year the Fair is organising “Bridging Markets: Women in Children’s Publishing from Italy and North America”, a day dedicated to rights trading among Italian and US publishers and agents. Scheduled to take place at the Society of Illustrators in New York on 9 June – as part of the Zig Zag Festival, an illustration festival organised by the Italian Cultural Institute in New York and curated by Hamelin with Steven Guarnaccia, in collaboration with BCBF – the initiative will include matchmaking sessions, networking opportunities and a panel discussion open to the public, “Picture Books in Transition: A Decade of Creative Exchange Between North America and Italy”: Tara Walker (Tundra Books), Kirsten Hall (Catbird Agency), Giulia Rizzo (Terre di Mezzo Editore) and Debbie Bibo (Debbie Bibo Agency), moderated by Maria Russo (Union Square Kids), will explore how business relationships between the American and Italian children’s publishing markets have evolved over time.
Participating Italian publishers include: Il Castoro, Orecchio Acerbo, Corraini Edizioni, FATATRAC, Terre di Mezzo, Quinto Quarto, Minibombo, Topipittori.
US publishers and publishing professionals include: Elsewhere Editions, Archipelago; Phaidon Kids; Christy Ottaviano Books (Little, Brown & Co); Chronicle Books; Eerdmans Books for Young Readers; Enchanted Lion Books; FSG Books for Young Readers – Macmillan Children’s Publishing Group; Hippo Park (Astra Books for Young Readers); Kin & Co. Literary Scouting; Alfred A. Knopf Books for Young Readers; Tundra Book Group; Union Square Kids.
This initiative, in collaboration with the Debbie Bibo Agency, not only creates significant opportunities for exchange and collaboration between Italian and North American publishers specialised in children’s literature, but also further bolsters BCBF’s roles as an international reference point and a bridge between different publishing communities, professions and cultures, fostering dialogue and the growth of the sector worldwide.
BEIJING
From 17 to 21 June 2026, the fair will be stopping off in Beijing for the Beijing International Book Fair, one of the most important and interesting book fairs in the Asian region. BCBF will be participating for the first time with its own stand, which will welcome visitors and introduce them to the latest developments, projects and the many opportunities offered by the fair, not only in Bologna but through the entirety of its international activities. This is a further opportunity to cultivate ties with the publishing industry in the Asia-Pacific region, a market characterised by immense potential and one in which the Fair has been investing for years through a constant presence at local festivals and fairs – veritable hotbeds of emerging talent and creativity – and through the co-organisation of the China Shanghai International Children’s Book Fair. Through this initiative, BCBF aims to attract a growing number of publishers and industry professionals not only from China but from across Asia, thereby expanding opportunities for professional interactions and participation in future editions of the fair.
ANNECY
Finally, from Beijing to France: from 23 to 26 June, BCBF will be taking part for the first time in the MIFA – International Animation Film Market, as part of the Annecy International Animation Film Festival, one of the world’s most prestigious events dedicated to the animation industry. The aim is to strengthen BCBF’s growing ties with the cross-media sector, particularly in the fields of audio-visual and of gaming.
In recent years BCBF has developed innovative projects and extensions in these sectors, with the Bologna Licensing Trade Fair/Kids, offering an opportunity to explore a vast and largely untapped potential for the international publishing sector.
The Bologna Children’s Book Fair will participate with its own stand to showcase the event, meet new operators in the animation sector and expand the network of professionals interested in the opportunities offered by publishing. It will also be bringing one of its most universally appreciated and recognised initiatives, The Illustrators Survival Corner, with its now well-established programme of workshops, portfolio reviews and masterclasses curated by Mimaster Illustrazione and dedicated to illustrators.
Among the names in the Illustrators Survival Corner programme: Simone Albrigi (Sio), cartoonist and YouTuber and Francesca Presentini (Fraffrog) cartoonist, illustrator, and YouTuber, founders of the publishing house Gigaciao; Beatrice Fini, Director of the Children’s and Young Adult Division at Giunti Editore; Alida Pintus, illustrator and concept artist; Giacomo Manzotti, director, animator and motion designer.