In its second year, Garfield County libraries are celebrating Free Comic Book Day (FCBD) with a comics festival, to be held on May 6 at the Glenwood Springs Library from 11am to 6pm.
Alex Garcia, education and events manager for the Garfield County Public Library District, has worked in libraries for about 17 years. While working at a library in Arizona, he helped create a comics festival which included handing out free comics in conjunction with FCBD, a national event which is celebrated on the first Saturday in May. He also facilitated games for the library’s teen groups and other comic-related activities. What started out as small later grew into a large annual event.
When Garcia moved to the Garfield County Public Library District, he brought the idea of the comics festival with him and helped create last May’s event.
Events like FCBD and comics conventions attract “geeks” who celebrate “geek culture.” Garcia defined geeks and geek culture as “anyone who is a fan of anything related to a fictional world of fantasy, science fiction, horror, video game culture and characters.”
For example, a fan of Harry Potter or any other kind of created universe, might delve into writing a fan fiction about their favorite fictional characters, or dress up as a character, known as cosplay, when attending a comics festival.
Garcia shared that last year’s inaugural event in Glenwood Springs had no local organizational partners, yet still garnered about 400 attendees throughout the day. Those numbers proved that there is a public eager to support a comics festival, so this year, Garfield County libraries have partnered with local organizations, including Raising A Reader, Bristlecone Arts Collaborative, Glenwood Arts Center and the Aspen Science Center.
“These are partners that we’ve already been working with for the last couple of years that help us in our regular programming, so it was a chance to invite partners and give them an opportunity to present and to share their programs and resources as well,” Garcia said.
It’s also an opportunity for the libraries to showcase their “pretty sizable comic book collection,” Garcia explained.
While FCBD is typically hosted by comic book stores, Garfield County’s one and only comic book store, Tesseract Comic and Games in Glenwood Springs closed its doors in August 2022. With the closing of Tesseract, “the library is the place for comic books now and this [event] is really just celebrating that,” Garcia shared.
One highlight this year is the art contest. At the end of Saturday’s activities, the Glenwood Art Center will be judging contest entries. Garcia said the contest is open to all ages and the artwork doesn’t have to be new art, but “we ask that the art is themed after superheroes, comic books, or any geek culture or fandom.” Artwork will be on display on the Glenwood Springs Library’s art wall for the remainder of May.
Art contest prizes are offered courtesy of the Glenwood Springs Chamber Resort Association, providing Glenwood Gold Community Currency, a year-round “buy local” program with participating Glenwood Springs businesses. The first place prize is a $75 Glenwood Gold gift card, and second and third place prizes are $50 and $25 respectively.
Comics festival activities include games and crafts like button-making, 3D printer demonstrations, drones and other tech toys. You can work with the library staff to design your own comics festival t-shirt, or come dressed as your favorite superhero (or supervillain) to enter the cosplay raffle. You can also learn how to become a superhero by volunteering in your community.
In 2022, the creative crafting activities were the most popular with attendees, so, Garcia said, “we’re giving people more of that.” He shared that the goal is to make the comics festival an annual event and to strive to make it “better if not bigger.”
For a complete schedule of the day’s events, go to www.bit.ly/GCPLDcomics