POWER & MAGIC: A Queer Witch Comics Anthology…
…About Women of Color, By Women of Color!
Accepting submissions between February 15th - March 15th 2016.
Who Are You? And Why Queer Witches?
I’m Joamette Gil, a contributing cartoonist for EverydayFeminism.com as well as an all-around comics maker and social justice pusher. My heart belongs to speculative fiction and watching badass women of color get ahead.
In addition to being the title for the anthology, “POWER & MAGIC” is also the imprint name I’ve been sitting on for years for my non-autobio/educational comics work. I want POWER & MAGIC PRESS’s premiere anthology to encapsulate its mission: putting forth stories by myself and others that capture the relationships between us, the powers that be, and the magic of “we.”
Witches are icons of female power. They represent rebellion, transcendence, healing, feminine monstrosity, so-called “deviance,” and interconnectedness (with the earth, with their bodies, with each other).
And I’m a queer witch, of course.
Because we exist and we matter!
Because our spirits soared for the Japanese magical girls on television. Because an avatar from the Southern Water Tribe captured our hearts. Because a Black female protagonist is not “unbelievable” in a world where sorcery reigns and mythical beasts run amok.
Because queer women of color are on the front lines of fighting for change and justice in real life. Because the fierceness it takes to survive as both a queer person, a person of color, and a woman is worthy of legend. Because comics need women like us, and women like us need to get paid.
And because someone is going to ask this as well: yes, this anthology is open to all women of color, not just cisgender or single-gender women. Women are women!
Submission Period: Submissions will open at 12:00 am Pacific Standard Time on February 15th, 2016, and close at 11:59 pm on March 15th, 2016.
Acceptance and rejection letters will go out on March 31st, 2016.
Specs: All comics will be 6″ x 9″ (trim size) and in black & white (grayscale and tones okay). Stories will range between 3 - 13 pages long. More details will be provided to those accepted!
Instructions: Send an email to [email protected] with the subject line “Power & Magic Submission” including:
The name, pronouns, and role of everyone on your team. Solo submissions are fine, too!
A working title and page count for your comic (doesn’t have to be exact).
A synopsis of your story, including a beginning, middle, and end. Spoil everything relevant - I need to know! - but try to keep it under 500 words. Well under.
A list of any relevant publishing credits (whether you’re writing the comic, drawing it, lettering it, or doing everything yourself) plus links. Try to choose examples that best reflect the style you’re going for with the anthology comic. Self-published work/webcomics count! You can simply include a link to your art portfolio if you have no pre-existing credits, but please note that folks with examples of sequential storytelling will receive preference.
Tell me about yourself, your cultural and artistic background, and why you want to be in POWER & MAGIC. Short and sweet is best!
Rights: By accepting payment, you are ceding exclusive first worldwide rights to your story for a full calendar year from the date of publication, and non-exclusive worldwide reprint and digital rights in perpetuity. That means you are granting me permission to print, reprint, and sell the anthology with your work included in it (in both physical and digital format) indefinitely. It also means you are promising not to print or post your POWER & MAGIC submission until after the print copies of the anthology have been on sale for one calendar year. The *second* they have been, you can do literally anything you want with the comic pages you made - post them all on your Tumblr, reprint it as its own mini, sell that mini, submit it to other anthologies that except pre-existing work, etc - because they are YOUR sole intellectual property!
Compensation: $100 per page, per team, pending Kickstarter success.
If the Kickstarter does not succeed, for whatever reason, you are free to self-publish your submissions as you see fit, and I will have zero rights to publish your work! If everything goes well, compensation will also include a minimum of 10 complementary copies of the anthology for each creative team as well as the right to purchase more copies at 50% off the cover price for as long as I have copies in stock. If everything goes very well (overfunding), excess funds will be used to raise creator pay!
What Should I NOT Submit?
No fan comics. No autobio. No prose. No one-off illustrations. No unexamined bigotry. No genitals (sex and sexuality are fine so long as they service the plot). No excessive gore. No torture porn. No steampunk.
Wait! I have another question!
Pop it in here so I can build up a FAQ! :)
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