ComicsDC: PR: Announcing Additional Small Press Expo 2022 Special Guests

For Immediate Release

Small Press Expo Announces Maia Kobabe, Ronald Wimberly, Rumi Hara, Gabrielle Bell and Bianca Xunise as Special Guests for SPX 2022

Bethesda, Maryland -July 14, 2022

Media Release - Small Press Expo is proud to announce additional Special Guests for SPX 2022. Our first in-person show in three years takes place on Saturday September 17 and Sunday September 18 with programming and workshops about the amazing world of independent comics, along with over 500 creators on the exhibitor floor.

See the Special Guest page on the SPX 2022 web site for more information.

SPX 2022 is honored to have the following creators as Special Guests to this year's show:

Visit the SPX 2022 Website for More Info

Maia Kobabe

Maia Kobabe is the author of Gender Queer: A Memoir, winner of an Alex Award, Stonewall Honor, and the most banned book in the US in 2021. It is being released in a deluxe hardcover edition that features a brand-new cover, exclusive art and sketches, a forward by ND Stevenson (Lumberjanes, She-Ra and the Princesses of Power) and an afterward by creator Maia Kobabe. Started as a way to explain to eir family what it means to be nonbinary and asexual, Gender Queer is more than a personal story: it is a useful and touching guide on gender identity—what it means and how to think about it—for advocates, friends, and humans everywhere.

Ronald Wimberly

Ronald Wimberly (born 28 April 1979) is an American artist (a cartoonist and filmmaker). He has published several graphic novels, as well as shorter works for The New Yorker, DC/Vertigo, Nike, Marvel, Hill and Wang, and Dark Horse Comics. Wimberly was the 2016 Columbus Museum of Art comics resident, and was a two-time resident cartoonist at Angoulême's Maison des Auteurs. He is the recipient of the 2008 Glyph Comics Award, and has been nominated for two Will Eisner Comic Industry Awards.

Rumi Hara

Rumi Hara was born in Kyoto, Japan, and started printing her comics on a tiny home printer while working as a translator in Tokyo in 2010. After receiving an MFA in illustration from

Savannah College of Art and Design, Rumi moved to New York in 2014, where she now lives and works as an illustrator and comics artist. Her comics series Nori was first self-published as minicomics and was nominated for an Ignatz Award in 2018.

Gabrielle Bell

Gabrielle Bell's work has been selected several times for Best American Comics and the Yale Anthology of Graphic Fiction, and has been featured in The Believer, McSweeney's and Vice magazines. Her story, "Cecil and Jordan In New York," was turned into a film by Michel Gondry. The Voyeurs was named one of the best Graphic Novels of the year by Publishers Weekly. Inappropriate, her most recent collection of absurd short comics, garnered two Ignatz Award nominations and was named "One of the Best GNs of the Year" by The Library Journal. Gabrielle Bell lives in Brooklyn, NY.

Bianca Xunise

Bianca Xunise is a cartoonist based out of Chicago, Illinois and will debut at SPX a brand new zine, Midnite Crawling, which is a collection of short stories about music and the punk subculture. In 2017 Xunise earned an Ignatz for Promising New Talent for their comic Say Her Name, an autobiographical story of police brutality and social justice. In 2020 Xunise earned their second Ignatz for their contribution to Be Gay, Do Comics published by IDW. Xunise has collaborated with Vogue, The Washington Post, The Nib, and Believer Magazine. They are also a contributor to the book How We Fight Supremacy: A Field Guide to Black Resistance along with Ta-Nehisi Coates, Tarana Burk, and Harry Belafonte. Bianca became the first nationally syndicated non-binary cartoonist when they joined the comic strip Six Chix in 2020 as their first black creator.

Small Press Expo (SPX) is the preeminent showcase for the exhibition of independent comics, graphic novels, and alternative political cartoons. SPX is a registered 501(c)3 nonprofit that brings together more than 500 artists and publishers to meet their readers, booksellers, and distributors each year. Graphic novels, mini comics, and alternative comics will all be on display and for sale by their authors and illustrators. The expo includes a series of panel discussions and interviews with this year's guests.

The Ignatz Award is a festival prize held every year at SPX recognizing outstanding achievement in comics and cartooning, with the winners chosen by attendees at the show.

For more information on the Small Press Expo, please visit http://www.smallpressexpo.com.