#Make, Trade and Read Zines!
The Main Library is proud to host the third annual Duval Comic and Zine Fest in downtown Jacksonville on Saturday, June 15, from 11 a.m. - 5 p.m. A celebration of local, independent publishers, the event will feature over 50 zine and comic creators, a risograph printing activity, a Writer's Lab workshop with Thony Aiuppy, and a Lit Chat with graphic novelist Nate Powell.
The event and all programs are free to attend!
What can I expect at DCAZ Fest?
This is an interactive event for beginners and seasoned zinesters alike to come together, create, and engage with the zine, DIY media, and printed matter community of the Southeast. You'll be able to make, trade, borrow, read, and buy zines and mini-comics from a variety of independent artists, underground creators, and small/alternative presses.
These local zine and comic makers are sure to bring a heavy dose of their eclectic, often bizarre, and infectiously colorful art! It's all located on the first floor of the Main Library, next to the Library's Zine Collection and first-floor gallery.
Reminder: Street parking downtown is FREE on Saturdays! If you prefer, parking will also be available in the Duval Street Parking Garage, next to the Main Library. Event parking fees apply.
#All-Day Activities
11 a.m. - 5 p.m. | Drop-In Activity: Make Your Own Riso Print
If you're interested in zine making, be sure to drop in for a quick risograph print activity with Professor Andrew Kozlowski and his students from the University of North Florida. Create a vibrant cover for your next zine or an awesome poster you can use to promote your work! Magazines, drawing utensils, and other zine-making materials will be provided. Find them in the Zine Zone.
If you've never seen one, a risograph printer looks like a photocopier (but it's way cooler than that!). Riso printing is similar to screen printing in that it allows you to create vibrant prints using rich spot colors. Riso also uses soy inks, so it has little impact on the environment.
11 a.m. - 5 p.m. | Drop-In Jam Comic
If you're feeling collaborative, stop by the Jam Comic station! Read what the other artists have contributed and then take the story one step further. Artists and amateurs alike are welcome! Find them on the tables in the Saturday Morning Cartooning area.
11 a.m. - 5 p.m. | Sticker Rally!
Get a zine recommendation, talk to a tabling zinester, tour the Memory Lab, attend a Library program, contribute to a fun Jam Comic, make your own button, and more. You'll collect an event sticker for each activity. Get enough stamps and snag our limited-edition Event Zine!
#Scheduled Programs
12- 1 p.m. | Writer's Lab: Formatting Your Work for Print with Thony Auippy
Formatting your passion project can be a daunting task. You spend all that time planning, making, and editing your work. You have all the parts and you’re ready to make your dream a reality. But how do you take all that work and convert it into something tangible, someone physical that can be held, flipped through, and read? Learn some of the tips, tricks, and formatting hacks Thony has learned over the last decade of making zines, comics, and graphic novels.
Register for the free workshop!
Whether you hand-make every book or create your work digitally, you will get information, tutorials, and resources that will help you organize and format your project.
Thony Aiuppy is a visual artist, cartoonist, zinester, and storyteller. For more than a decade, Thony has worked as an art educator with learners of all ages. This year, Thony was awarded the Wolfsburg Fellowship for Social Justice in Education and finished the Sequential Artist Workshop Yearlong Program in Gainesville, Florida. He lives and works in Jacksonville, Florida.
1-2 p.m. or 3-4 p.m. | Ama-ZINE Creations (for ages 12-17)
Teens: Make your first mini-zine! Using the book, Whatcha Mean What's a Zine? by Mark Todd and Esther Pearl Watson (as well as several zines from local creators), you'll explore what a zine is and how to create one of your own! These hour-long programs include an icebreaker, games and discussion to kickstart your creative thinking.
Zine-making supplies provided. When you're done, you can donate your zine to the Library, trade it with a fellow zinester at the festival, or take it home.
4-5 p.m. | Lit Chat Interview with Nate Powell
Nate Powell is a National Book Award-winning cartoonist who began self-publishing as an Arkansas teenager in 1992. His work includes the new graphic novel Fall Through and a new comics adaptation of James Loewen’s influential Lies My Teacher Told Me, as well as Save It For Later, civil rights icon John Lewis’s March trilogy, Come Again, Two Dead, and more. He has discussed his work at the UN, on MSNBC’s The Rachel Maddow Show, PBS, and CNN.
Powell has received multiple Eisner and Ignatz awards, the Comic-Con International Inkpot Award, multiple ALA and YALSA distinctions, and is a two-time finalist for the Los Angeles Times Book Prize. A book signing will follow the interview with books available for purchase on-site.
#Check out the Zine Collection & More
Borrow Zines from the Library for FREE
Jacksonville Public Library has an expansive Zine Collection—one of the first housed in a public library in the Southeast! Pronounced "zeens," they are self-published pamphlets of all sizes and shapes, often covering subjects overlooked in larger-scale publications. The scope of the collection is broad, including the arts, music, comics, politics, gender issues, and advocacy. Housed on the first floor of the Main Library, zines are fully searchable in our catalog.
Books About Zine and Comic-Making
#You May Also Like
Writer's Lab: Zine Making 101 with Lindsay Anderson
Get ready for DCAZ Fest! Local zinester and self-publisher, Lindsay Anderson, joins us to present a free introductory workshop on zine making on Saturday, June 8, at 1 p.m. at South Mandarin Library - one week before the big event! Learn how to let your natural passions rise and different ways to capture them using a zine medium. This workshop will focus on using non-digital methods and all resources will be provided.
Register for the free workshop!
Lindsay Anderson is a prolific zine maker and self-publisher based in Jacksonville, FL. Since 2013, Lindsay has developed a long-running zine project, she has helped to organize the annual Duval Comic and Zine Fest (DCAZ) and recently launched a new quarterly zine Mischief on the River. She's passionate about creating from existing resources and making space for others to develop and showcase their own works.
Zinester Meetup
Come by the Main Library the first Wednesday of every month from 6 - 8:30 p.m. (during Art Walk) to talk, create, and hang with folks who are passionate about independent publishing. If you’ve never made a zine/comic but have an interest, we want to meet you too! Your voice is important and we would love to show you how to self-publish.
If you're looking for a community of fellow creators, you can also join us at the Main Library for Saturday Morning Cartooning on select Saturdays from 9:30 a.m. - noon.
Call for Zines
We accept zines of different shapes, sizes, and formats. The Library's collection is primarily focused on regionally-based zines - an effort to better reflect the voices in our community. However, we do collect zines from creators outside of Northeast Florida. Whether hand-drawn or hand-written, photocopied and stapled, or professionally printed: we want to see it all! There’s no deadline to submit. We are always accepting new zines.
Selections are made by a committee from available donations and through vendor catalogs and reviews, using the Library policies regarding collection development.
Criteria for selection will include literary merit, artistic merit, subject specialty, scarcity of material on the subject, quality, format, and local and regional authorship. Efforts will also be made to replace zines that have been heavily used and worn.
You can donate anytime in person or by mail to:
Main Library c/o Zine Collection
303 N. Laura St.
Jacksonville, FL 32202
Be sure to include:
- Name of Author(s)/Artist(s)
- Volume number(s), if any
- Year of publication
- Your email address
#Event Partner & Vendor Information
Our event partner, Duval Comics and Zine Festival, is a local non-profit organization striving to empower and boost resources for self-publishers by providing free workshops, organizing an annual celebration, and showcasing regional zine/comic artists.
Table applications were accepted March 15 - April 15 at dcazfest.com/tabling. Notification of acceptance was sent out no later than May 1. For questions or to ask about a waitlist, please reach out to dcazfest@gmail.com. If you are tabling: Creators are asked to contribute their work to the Library's Zine Collection, so be sure to save one for the Library before you sell out!
About the Poster Artist
Cam Lopez is an illustrator and comic artist based out of Jacksonville, FL. Their work revolves heavily around DIY and punk/alternative culture, especially in the realms of comics and music. They love zines and self-published comics of all kinds, and local/DIY bands are their bread & butter. These days, they spend a lot of their time doing merch and tour flyers for DIY bands, and physical media like CDs, cassettes, and indie comics take up a majority of their bookshelf space. What draws them to DIY is the natural imperfection of handmade work. Whether in comics, zines, or music, it’s the most earnest form of storytelling there is.
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