Genghis Con Pop Up at CNJ Comics – Saturday 11th

Hey everyone! You haven’t heard from us in awhile but we’ve got a great event coming up this Saturday September 11th at the shop!

Genghis Con is a really great independent comic convention that was put on hiatus due to the pandemic, having to cancel both of their yearly events in 2020 and 2021. To get back to where they need to be they’ve been hosting pop up events at different shops in the area and it’s our turn to host one!

We’ll have eight visiting creators setting up tables in the shop and selling their stuff, as well as three of the leaders from the con itself. For the first time in our history we’ll break down the new comic table for a day to make extra room, as well as using the foyer and some tables outside. (Don’t worry, we’ll have all the new comic table stuff in one place off to the side for easy browsing.)

Genghis Con is really important to alot of local creators, and to help with the fund raising we had local artist Tim Switalski  design an 11×17 cardstock print for us featuring a Guardians of the Galaxy / Cleveland Guardians mashup.

When the name of our new baseball team was announced alot of people mentioned we should do something like this, so we did! Rocket and Groot catching a ballgame in Cleveland!

We will be giving this print away for free BUT we strongly encourage making a five dollar donation to Genghis Con. Please do your part to help this awesome convention continue next year and throw them a few bucks. Tim will even be at the event to sign them! (We have lots, so even if you don’t make it in on Saturday you’ll be able to come in and get one later and help them out.)

Genghis Con assembled some new leadership recently, in the form of Sequoia, Amalia and Quill! We’ve wanted to do something fun with cats, plants and comics, so we commisioned all three to create a mini postcard print set we’ll also be giving away for free that day. All three of these fine individuals will be staffing the Genghis Con table outside the foyer so you can get your prints signed there if you like, as well as learn about what’s coming up for the Con.

From Sequoia:

From Amalia:

From Quill:

Other artists who will be setting up include Erin Caruso <from Super Group Hugs>. Erin helps us with a lot of our projects and will have a full set up in our shop for the first time! She is one of my daughter Zoe’s favorite artists so we’re pretty excited to have her be a part of this.

We will also have the legendary Gary Dumm in the shop, who worked with Harvey Pekar on American Splendor back in the day. Gary is a local treasure and has recently completed an original graphic novel with writer Scott MacGregory, who will also be joining us. Gary is a local treasure so be sure to say hi! Here is the book, about a true life disaster in the tunnels under Lake Erie in 1916.

Ashley Ribblett will also be there, and she’s always a welcome addition to any of our events.

 (I’m looking at a piece of Captain America artwork by her on my shelf right now!)

Brian Gliene is a shop regular and his sense of humor permeates all of his artwork nicely.

New to our shop events is Gabby Zemaitis and Leo Covault! We’re always happy to see new faces in the shop and we’re excited to dig through their tables!

All in all this looks to be a great day where you get to meet some amazing local creators, get some cool artwork and help a group of people who add style and culture to our fair city. We need to actively help the things we love to survive and still be around after the pandemic has cleared. We recently purchased two amazing comic collections, and I promise to have some new back issues going up that day, so you have even more cool stuff to look at and another reason to stop by!

Thanks Cleveland, you’re the best!