120 Project Anthology features diverse America’s short stories and illustrations. The Anthology is comprised of comics made on the road with community members at 120 Project events around the country, original work by professional comic book creators, submissions from creators who harness the power of words and pictures to share social justice stories, and essays written about the most extant issues of our current political and cultural climate.

The Anthology is edited by Oliver Mertz (First Law of Mad Science, Science Club Mixtape, FUBAR) and Sarah Beth Oppenheim (Artistic Director of Heart Stück Bernie and Dance Place Artist in Residence).

All proceeds from this first print run are being donated to the ACLU.  120 Project is not affiliated with the ACLU. 120 Project is not a for-profit venture; it’s a way to promote social justice with arts activism. As we move forward, we will continue to donate proceeds to the following organizations: RAICES, The Trevor Project, DC Books to Prisons Project, and 826 National.

This book took a year to research, accumulate, and publish, and it’s just one branch of 120 Project. (We’re also making a documentary film and a dance theater work.)  As we enter Phase 2, we’re looking to collect more comics from artists and writers across the country. We’d love for you to submit your short stories about social justice so we can add them to our current collection, share them on our blog, and work to build an archive of art in 45’s America.

The Anthology will debut at Small Press Expo in Bethesda, Maryland on September 15 and 16! We look forward to sharing it first with our Kickstarter Backers and home base crowd in DC, then taking it on the road to Baltimore Comic Con and New York Comic Con in late September and early October. You can order your own copy here.

We are now accepting submissions around the theme of Social Justice. Submissions should address contemporary issues, conflicts, or dialogues about one of the following topics: race, gender, politics, diversity, discrimination, equality, activism, police brutality, incarceration, health care, free speech, family values, protest, climate change, immigration, bans, legislation, fear, hope, dreams, current American reality, or any other social justice story you can share. You don’t have to have solutions. You do need to ask questions, present a point of view, and be willing to reach out through your art. 120 Project is prefaced in diversity and inclusion. We do not support hate speech or discrimination.

How to Apply Send your submissions to Oliver Mertz at 120dancecomics@gmail.com. Include 120 Project Comic Submission in the Subject Line, a short bio of yourself in the body of the email, and your comic. We prefer pages in standard comic format size: 6.875” by 10.625” with a resolution of at least 400ppi. Questions about how to do this? Ask us!  120 Project welcomes collaborations, but please submit completed pages. You will retain rights to your comic, but give us permission to publish. Comics should be one to two pages in length. If your comic is longer, we will still consider it. If you are a writer but don’t have an artist, or vice versa, we may be able to pair you with one. Email us with any questions.

Eligibility 120 Project is a sanctuary platform. We accept submissions from any person willing to use arts activism for social justice or to shed light on an important American issues. While we hope for submissions that come from diverse America, we believe there are many places and ways to share an American experience.

 

 Sneak peeks of the 120 Project Comic Anthology:

Comic by Omar Mirza and Stan Chou

Comic by Kathleen Kralowec