2024 Festival Review
A packed two-day festival with 3000+ attendees, 109 Market Hall vendors, 10 talks & workshops and more than 200 new works created, all at the State Library of Western Australia.
The 2024 Perth Comic Arts Festival was our busiest yet, and our first year running the entire festival within the State Library. Attendees, exhibitors and guests came from all over to take part, with some even travelling internationally to enjoy the Festival. As always, the entire festival was completely FREE to attend!
The year’s poster was designed by the incredible Reimena Yee, who interpreted the year’s theme with this beautiful illustration inspired by the Japanese concept of kintsugi. These adorable characters coming together to repair something broken and make it beautiful were the perfect scene to set the tone for the festival!
Saturday the 27th of July was Academy Day, a full day of programming encouraging artists, educators, readers and publishers to listen and learn as comic artists take the stage. Sunday the 28th of July saw the return of Market Day, showcasing the incredible growth of the WA comics community. More than 100 exhibitors sold their wares at the Market Hall, while a stacked program of artist-led workshops ran all day in the State Library Theatre.
Guests
PCAF was thrilled to officially invite five guests to the 2024 festival:
Rosemary Valero-O'Connell
Artist of Laura Dean Keeps Breaking Up With Me (2019),
Creator of Don’t Go Without Me (2020)
Academy Day
Saturday, 27th of July - State Library of Western Australia
2024’s Academy Day was fit to bursting, with every session fully booked and excited for the day’s talks. For the first time, PCAF featured international guests, with Rosemary Valero-O’Connell and Thi Bui travelling to Perth from the US. The line-up was also packed with Australian comics talent, with the festival inviting Trace Balla and Reimena Yee from Melbourne, and Molly Hunt travelling from Derby.
Photos: Sam Culbertson
The day’s talks featured:
- The Page and the Panel: Rosemary Valero-O’Connell (Laura Dean Keeps Breaking Up With Me) takes us on a guided journey through her creative process of creating compelling comic layouts.
- So-Called Australia: Campbell Whyte moderated a discussion with Lola Baldsing, Scott Higginbotham (Solid State), Molly Hunt (Spinifex Valley), & Andrei Buters (Dead by 30) about how they have re-imagined Australia as a land of fantasy, science fiction and the supernatural.
- Desk Yoga: A short workshop ran during the break with (name) from (yoga studio) to show us how artists can stretch and keep their bodies healthy, right at their desks!
- Story Hatching Story Catching: Trace Balla (Rockhopping, Rivertime, Shine) took us through how she transforms real experiences into compelling narratives that gently guide readers through geographical and emotional spaces.
- The Broken Nest: Thi Bui (The Best We Could Do) and Elizabeth Marruffo (Pup Pup is the Boss of the Stars) discussed their motivations for making autobiographical comics and the discoveries they’ve made along the way.
- My Biggest Mistakes: Ariel Ries, Aśka, Rosemary Valero-O’Connell, Thi Bui, Andrei Buters, David Blumenstein & Reimena Yee got together in this quick-fire session to reveal their biggest comics mistakes in the hopes that you don’t make them too!
Market Hall
Sunday, 28th of July - State Library of Western Australia
Sunday saw PCAF taking over two floors of the State Library of WA to make room for the Market Hall. Crowds came in droves to check out the comics on offer and meet their creators, keeping the building full and busy for the entire day. Book signings were held for Molly Hunt, Trace Balla, Thi Bui and Rosemary Valero-O’Connell.
The Market Hall broke our records yet again and was our largest yet, with 109 exhibitors. We also had a number of partner organisations tabling for the first time, including the Centre for Stories, Westerly, and the Japanese Consulate.
Creating new work to show off and sell at the Market Hall has become something of an unofficial community tradition, with 2024’s Market Hall seeing the creation of more than 200 new comics debuting at the Festival. We love to see it!
Exhibitors
The Market Hall featured an incredible collection of 109 exhibitors selling their works to the public.
Workshops
Sunday, 28th of July - State Library of Western Australia
In addition to the bustling Market Hall, Sunday’s programming also featured a full timetable of free workshops led by comic artists, including:
Mixing It Up: Trace Balla shared tips and tricks of her storytelling process, and attendees contributed to a collaborative comic strip as well as making their own.
Comics Battle Royale: Five outstanding comic makers (Ariel Ries, Rosemary Valero-O’Connell, Reimena Yee, Lola Baldsing & Campbell Whyte) battled it out to decide who had the mightiest pen in town, overcoming ridiculous challenges, unimaginable quests and unwinnable obstacles on their path to victory.
Squishface!: David Blumenstein of Melbourne’s Squishface Comic Studio ran this family-friendly comics workshop, running some activities from Squishbook, a comic anthology by 13 local artists focused on nurturing children’s voices in comics.
Flipbooks: Brisbane animator and cartoonist Ash Djokic ran a collaborative “ani-jam”, where participants made an exquisite corpse flip-book animation using index cards.
Tale town
Tales from Pandora's Box
TALE TOWN is an annual publication that commissions comic artists to contribute work engaging with the festival’s theme. A new issue is released and distributed for free over the PCAF weekend each year.
2024’s issue came in the form of a newspaper filled with comics, all responding to the Festival’s theme of “Mistakes”; or more specifically, the mistake of generative AI. 18 artists were invited to come together and share their thoughts, griefs, and frustrations as artists on the topic.
collaborations
Centre for Stories Hotdesk Fellowship
Perth Comic Arts Festival partnered with Centre For Stories to create the Comic Creator Fellowship for one artist to produce a comic or graphic novel to debut at PCAF. The fellowship provided a hotdesk space for one day a week at the Centre for Stories, a stipend of $1500, a $200 printing allowance, a free exhibitor table in the PCAF Market Hall, and support from a comics mentor to finish the project.
The fellow for 2024 was Katie Zhang (instagram: @gentlecoda), who produced a short manga The Girl I Left Behind.
Artists Frankie Stevo (@cyberfrankie_) and Ali Marbeck (@ali.illustrations) were also highly commended for their applications.
Westerly - Graphic Narratives Edition
Since 1956, Westerly has been publishing lively fiction and poetry as well as intelligent articles. For the first time in the magazine’s history, they have curated an all-comics issue that celebrates and explores this unique literary form.
This special edition of Westerly was guest edited by Per Henningsgaard and featured a wide range of Western Australian comics-makers, including Brenton E. McKenna, Campbell Whyte, Sarah Winifred Searle, Soolagna Majumdar and many more.
The Perth Comic Arts Festival partnered with Westerly to release a limited, free print edition of the magazine for people to pick up during the festival weekend.
Sponsors
The 2024 Perth Comic Arts Festival was made possible thanks to our sponsors:
