The Alternative Press Festival is a festival of events over five days celebrating the small press, self publishing and being creative in the print media. It all kicks off with the anthology book launch on 29th July, followed by a Zine event of Thursday 30th where you’re invited to come along and sample some of the finest the small press has to offer. Friday is spoken word night – are you brave enough to get up on stage and share your words?
Saturday and Sunday are two very special days: Saturday sees Collaborama! taking place where everyone gets together; zinesters, creators, readers, artists, DJs and more for a full day of collaboration. Whilst Sunday features the Alternative Press Fair with space for 80+ exhibitors.
Sounds very good. Details at their website or blog. Gareth Brookes was good enough to send me a few nice promo pieces and news that there’s an interview with Jimi Gherkin here that sets out some of the principles of the APF:
What we’re about is pretty simple, and that is, promoting creativity through self publishing. It’s something that we know a bit about ourselves, and something which satisfies our creative needs, makes us happy. We want others to experience that. We’re constantly bombarded by stuff in the mainstream media, entertainment and arts. Don’t get me wrong, some of it’s really good but the institutions that run it and their motives are bogus. It encourages mediocrity and passivity. Never do they say “give it a go” only “buy, buy, buy”. We want to show people what is possible, and encourage them to try for themselves. The festival is our way of trying to reach out to many different groups of people, we’re trying out different venues, different approaches to the idea of small press events. We’re all pretty sick and tired of events that reflect the old “comic con” format. We’re experimenting.
Sun, Jul 26, 2009
Comics and cartoons, Conventions and events