For any of the 8 people that waste their time reading my drivel, you’d know that a major goal of mine is to help grow the “nerd” community here. Comics, cosplays, toys, art, gaming, movies, collectibles of any sorts. People involved in those fields are typically fairly active on social media. They just aren’t here on Steemit...yet.
Between normal life and work, I'm juggling several initiatives all at the same time to try to bring folks from all of these branches over the the chain. One of these that I have yet to speak about is the comic book art community. It’s a fairly large group of folks that collect original comic book art. They get commissions done by artists, purchase and collect original pages or cover art. It’s a pretty big deal and can be a rewarding and expensive hobby.
So I started thinking...how can we bring those folks over here?!? What will incentivize these people to give this place a look?!? Well, how about I give away some original art!!! I’m still working out he details of how it’ll all work and it will be quite some time before I officially launch this initiative, but I figured I might as well talk about it now a bit. This post can also help me recruit pieces. Here’s what I’m doing...
Collecting original art from established artists. It could be whatever the artist wants to donate towards this initiative. A page, a quick sketch. A detailed piece. It’s all up to the artist. Free reign to do whatever.
I will collect 52 pieces in total. Once the initiative starts, each piece will be assigned a number and one will randomly be chosen each week to be given away.
Entry is simple. Blog a bit and tell the community about a piece of original art you have. It can be detailed, short, tons of backstory and pics. It’s up to the individual.
Picking a winner...this part is undecided at the moment. Not sure if I will be charging the winner shipping or not. Possibly as it will get expensive mailing out 52 pieces of art around the globe. That has time to be worked on though.
Once I get some more pieces, I will be blasting this to that community through the various groups I’m in on other platforms. Once word gets out I think we will have a nice chunk of folks joining us here in the hopes of winning one of these pieces. The hope is that a decent portion actually like what they experience and become more involved.
I’ll also be speaking and communicating with all of the artists themselves to keep them updated on what’s going on. The other hope is that some of these talented bastards hop on board as well. Currently I only have 4 pieces but the Convention season has just started. I’ll be bothering artists throughout all the conventions I’ll be attending in the hopes to get them to contribute to the bounty.
Let’s take a look at what we’ve got so far...
- Walter Simonson was awesome to chat with. Genuinely one of the nicest comic guys I ever had the pleasure of speaking with. The dude has worked on X-Factor, Thor, Fantastic Four and a ton of others. A true pioneer in the industry and he contributed this awesome Thor Ragnarok piece!
- Yanick Paquette donated a beautiful watercolor Batman piece just the other day. Simply stunning piece. Yanick’s works include Swamp Thing, Batman Incorporated, and Wonder Woman Earth One amongst other things.
- Toby Cypress created this awesome Spider-Man piece specifically for this initiative. Toby has worked for pretty much all the major publishers on various titles throughout the years. He currently is working on Gravediggers Union for Image Comics.
- Lastly for the moment is Jeff Zapata. Jeff has been working for Topps for decades conjuring up awesome images for Garbage Pail Kids, Wacky Packages, and more. He was kind enough to donate this Topps Blank Card with Art promoting the line Weird Wheels.
I will be updating along the way on when I add more pieces to the initiative. If you are one of the artists that has contributed...I can’t thank you enough. You are all rock stars and I hope you do check out the platform and see the amazing potential this place holds...especially for established artists such as yourselves.
If you are an artist that I’m currently bothering and pestering for a piece, please consider contributing something to the initiative. It could be a fun way to grow this specific community here which would have a ton of benefits.
If you are a collector seeing this, sign up for an account and start showing off your collection...but save some stuff for the year long contest! There might even be some big names added!!!
Thx for looking!
Blewitt