CBK Comics

Call for submissions: CBA vols 52 + 53

Call for submissions: comics and text articles for

CBA vol 53: PLACEHOLDER (EXTENDED DEADLINE!)
and
CBA vol 52: BURNOUT (NO MORE SUBMISSIONS)

CBA vol 53: PLACEHOLDER
Main Editor: Leviathan
DEADLINE: ~~Mar 31~~ Apr 30 (EXTENDED DEADLINE!)
The pandemic paused the world for an indefinite time. What does that mean practically? What does it do to our consciousness and how we experience our existence? Some places see recovering wildlife and cleaner air. Which other phenomena appear to replace our old routines? We’re waiting, and in our wait, we imitate the “real” we hope will soon return. We are like placeholders in our own lives.

We’re looking for comic contributions and articles exploring these themes. Scroll down for submission guidelines!

CBA vol 52: BURNOUT
Main Editor: Mattias Elftorp
DEADLINE: Mar 15 (NOW CLOSED FOR SUBMISSIONS)
Burnout has become an increasingly normal part of everyday life for many of us since the term was getting widespread use in the late 1900s. From hospital staff to comic creators to basically any job in the gig economy. Anyone who doesn’t have a steady income, or who is expected to do more work in less time than is reasonable, can feel this. So who is to blame? Could we create a situation, a systemic change, to avoid the conditions that cause burnout?
What we’re looking for aren’t necessarily stories of depressing social realism, but artistic expressions of that feeling, suggestions for solutions, wishful thinking and visual abreactions. Expressions of rage rather than apathy, insurrection rather than complicity. Something to read for strength in times of austerity.

—SUBMISSION GUIDELINES—
Please read and follow these guidelines:

Number of pages: We prefer comics that are about 5-30 pages, but any number is welcome.
Format: 20x26cm
Color: Color / Black and white
Language: English
File format: .TIF
Resolution: 1200 dpi line art or 300 dpi CMYK
Length (texts): A good size for a text is ca 7500 characters (including spaces), but it can also be longer or shorter.
Bleed: 5mm. Think you know how to handle bleed? Read this to make sure you know what we mean.
Within this space, there are no limits.

Delivery: We prefer download links that do NOT require us to login anywhere (wetransfer usually works fine, for example).
Request: Please don’t use Comic Sans. We don’t like it and will ask you to change to another font.
And again; Please check our guidelines for bleed.

Please send us high-resolution files from the start.
Include a short presentation text* about yourself, with one URL (if you have a website or similar).
Please ask us if you are unsure about formats, resolution, bleed, etc. We prefer stupid questions to bad files. And there are no stupid questions!

*Your presentation text should be approximately 500-700 characters in length. It should read more as an entertaining and informative bio and less as a CV. What you want to say about yourself is up to you, but it’s generally more interesting for our readers to know about your interests, who you are and what else you’ve published rather than where you’ve studied. We may edit it if needed to fit our format.

Send comics, questions, etc to: submissions(a)cbkcomics(.)com

What we are looking for is comics which rely on artistic ambitions and a will to experiment rather than what has been done a thousand times before. We want to expand the boundaries of what is possible to achieve in the comics medium. We are looking for the same thing in texts; articles, essays, exploratory texts, etc.

Unfortunately we cannot guarantee you any payment for participating (although this year we have more financing so we might be able to pay something for once). If we publish your submission you will receive 10 free copies of the issue. That’s all we can promise at this date. Hopefully you will find being in CBA an enjoyable experience. Naturally, copyright for your material will stay in your hands.

Also note that we are constantly overworked and there’s a great risk that we won’t get in touch in case your submission doesn’t make it into the current volume. We are sorry for this and will try to catch up as soon as things clear up (optimistically in 2023)…

January 3, 2021

CBK

CBA, Submissions

Winter sale at Hybriden!

Right now: 20% off on books from CBK, Tusen Serier and Wormgod at the Hybriden webshop! Also 20% off on prints!

This includes CBA subscriptions, so it’s a good opportunity to get 4 issues/year of our international comics anthology sent to you.

And you can pre-order our jubilee 50th volume of CBA, our thickest volume so far, filled with great comics!

December 28, 2020

CBK

CBA, Hybriden, Shop

Pre-order CBA vol 50 for Black Friday

We’re doing a 50% sale on books from CBK, Tusen Serier and Wormgod at Hybriden this weekend (Nov 27-29).

Use the coupon code blackfriday2020 when you place your order.

CBA vol 50 will be released in January, but you can pre-order it now, and it is included in the sale.

No theme, no limits, only members of the current and former editorial crew of CBA celebrating this anniversary issue by doing whichever comics they want!

Illustrated haiku poems! Vampires! Cyberpunk! Abstract patterns and ruminations on death! Working with the elderly and trying to find your husband in the realm of the dead! There’s also a seal.

Comics by: Sajan Rai [SE/UK], Gonzalo de las Heras [SE/ES], Allan Haverholm [DK/SE], Mattias Elftorp [SE], Susanne Johansson [SE], Leviathan [SE], Stefan Petrini [SE], Henrik Rogowski [SE]. Text: Mattias Elftorp [SE]. Illustration: Mattias Elftorp [SE], Gonzalo de las Heras [ES/SE]. Cover artist: Kinga Dukaj [SE].

November 27, 2020

CBK

CBA, Hybriden, Shop

NEDJEM & ORIGIN OF LIFE

CBK presents:
NEDJEM & ORIGIN OF LIFE
Two new digital exhibitions to keep social distancing while still being able to enjoy art!

Go here to find the exhibitrions:
NEDJEM | ORIGIN OF LIFE

Both exhibitions are open from Wednesday Nov 25 at 15:00
and will stay active for the foreseeable future.

As we’ve said before:
To celebrate the latest volumes of CBA, we invite you to see these two exhibitions of comics pages from the books. As we all know, the COVID-19 pandemic makes it difficult to show exhibitions in the usual way, so this time we’re making the exhibitions in digital form. Instead of meeting up at Hybriden to enjoy the art on the walls and mingle with wine and artists and other visitors, now you don’t even need to leave your home. Instead you can just visit the website and see them comfortably from your chair or couch or whatever you want to sit in. You can even drink your own wine and chat with friends on the internet at the same time, so it’s ALMOST like normal.

CBA and other books can be ordered from the Hybriden webshop.

Further information can be found when you go to the exhibitions, which are presented with support from Malmö Kulturnämnd.

November 25, 2020

CBK

CBA, Events, Exhibitions

Two digital exhibitions: Nedjem & Origin of Life

CBK presents:
NEDJEM & ORIGIN OF LIFE
Two new digital exhibitions to keep social distancing while still being able to enjoy art!

Where: hybriden.se (direct links will be available on this site for the opening)
When: Both exhibitions open Wednesday Nov 25 at 15:00
and will stay active for the foreseeable future

To celebrate the latest volumes of CBA, we invite you to see these two exhibitions of comics pages from the books. As we all know, the COVID-19 pandemic makes it difficult to show exhibitions in the usual way, so this time we’re making the exhibitions in digital form. Instead of meeting up at Hybriden to enjoy the art on the walls and mingle with wine and artists and other visitors, now you don’t even need to leave your home. Instead you can just visit the website and see them comfortably from your chair or couch or whatever you want to sit in. You can even drink your own wine and chat with friends on the internet at the same time, so it’s ALMOST like normal.

CBA and other books can be ordered from the Hybriden webshop.

Nedjem (CBA vol 48)
CBA vol 48 is about cats. Cats and the lifelong friendships we form with our furry friends. Bonds so strong and endearment so deep and ancient, it permeates our lives through time. You find cats in scary stories, in cute stories, they’re a sign of bad luck in some cultures and good luck in others, worshipped as deities or shunned like pests. Remnants of our relationships with the floofy furs are found not just all over the world, but all over the internet as well. Here’s our contribution to the Cat Library of Time.

Artists: Jonatan Rosén [SE], Henrik Rogowski [SE], Aiden Kvarnström [SE], Filip Kelava [HR], Alexandra Duma-Dancai [RO/SE], Ivana Filipović [RS/CA], Helena Menanda [SE], Ivana Armanini [HR], Mattias Elftorp [SE], Kinga Dukaj [SE].

Origin of Life (CBA vol 49)
Where were you born? Where are you from? When these questions are asked really what the person means often is, who are you?
In the new volume of CBA we want you to ask yourselves some questions. Who are humanity as a collective consciousness? Where do we come from? All these little specks of life in this big dark space of nothing, and for what?

Artists: Ana Biscaia [PT], Ivana Geček [HR], Mattias Elftorp [SE], Ivana Filipović [RS/CA], Henrik Rogowsk [SE], Leviathan [SE], Lisa Örtlund [SE].

The exhibitions are presented with support from Malmö Kulturnämnd.

November 18, 2020

CBK

CBA, Exhibitions

Later deadline for vol 51!

We moved the deadline a bit for submissions to CBA vol 51: Underworld!

The new date is NOV 29

So if you hade something planned but there wasn’t enough time, you still have a chance to send us something!

November 16, 2020

CBK

CBA

Metelkova under attack!

We first met Stripburger when they visited Sweden in 2005, which gave us an entrance into the whole Balkan comics scene and it has been highly valuable for us as a cultural organisation and as publisher of an international comics anthology. Through this first meeting with Stripburger we made lots of important connections that last even today and has lead to us publishing several creators from the region in CBA over the years.

We always wanted to visit them at Metelkova to see everything that’s going on there, and we truly hope that will be possible also in the future.

But they are now under attack and are threatened with eviction.

Read more and sign their petition!

Non-governmental organizations in Slovenia are increasingly targeted by the government’s restrictive measures and hostile rhetoric. Leading the government, the radical right Slovenian Democratic Party and PM Janez Janša direct their hostility especially towards NGOs engaged in independent cultural production and defending human rights, media freedom and the environment. Legal and financial restrictions have been applied to them and the epidemic is used to justify such measures. The media, the judiciary and independent state bodies are also under attack.

The government has, for example, been blocking payments to film producers for a whole year, while the Ministry of Culture started changing the rules for the composition of commissions that decide on co-financing projects of non-governmental cultural organizations so that the Minister will have full control over the allocation of funds. Amid such developments, and in the circumstances of a dramatic second wave of the epidemic in the country, 18 non-government organizations were recently requested by the government (Ministry of Culture) to vacate their premises in the building at No. 6 Metelkova Street in Ljubljana, in which they have been operating since the mid-1990s.

November 4, 2020

CBK

News

Call for submissions: CBA vol 51

Call for submissions: comics and text articles for
CBA vol 51: Underworld

The Underworld exists in many forms: an invisible realm of all deceased, a torturous prison for sinners, whatever alien societies rule a ‘hollow earth’, as well as the non- mythological but equally weird organisms that really do scurry around below us. Less literally, it could imply unseen aspects of any organisation, or the darkest moments in an individual’s journey.

We’re looking for comic contributions, and articles exploring the theme of Underworld.

Main Editor: Sajan Rai
DEADLINE: Nov 15

—SUBMISSION GUIDELINES—
Please read and follow these guidelines:

Send comics, questions, etc to: submissions(a)cbkcomics(.)com

Unfortunately we cannot offer you any payment for participating. If we publish your submission you will receive 10 free copies of the issue. That’s all we can offer at this date. Hopefully you will find being in CBA an enjoyable experience. Naturally, copyright for your material will stay in your hands.

September 10, 2020

CBK

CBA, Submissions

CBA vol 48 + 49 coming soon

As you may have noticed, there’s a pandemic going on and everything is working a bit less smoothly than usual. One of the casualties is our publishing schedule, but soon now, we will finally be releasing two new issues: CBA vol 48: Nedjem and CBA vol 49: Origin of Life

CBA vol 48: Nedjem
60 pgs

CBA vol 48 is about cats. Cats and the lifelong friendships we form with our furry friends. Bonds so strong and endearment so deep and ancient, it permeates our lives through time. You find cats in scary stories, in cute stories, they’re a sign of bad luck in some cultures and good luck in others, worshipped as deities or shunned like pests. Remnants of our relationships with the floofy furs are found not just all over the world, but all over the internet as well.
Here’s our contribution to the Cat Library of Time.

Comics by: Jonatan Rosén [SE], Henrik Rogowski [SE], Aiden Kvarnström [SE], Filip Kelava [HR], Alexandra Duma-Dancai [RO/SE], Ivana Filipović [RS/CA], Helena Menanda [SE], Ivana Armanini [HR]. Texts: Joel Gordon [SE], Mattias Elftorp [SE]. Illustration: Mattias Elftorp [SE]. Cover artists & main editor: Kinga Dukaj [SE] (theme & original selection: Mattis Telin [SE]).

CBA vol 49: Origin of Life
80 pgs

Where were you born? Where are you from? When these questions are asked really what the person means often is, who are you?

In the new volume of CBA we want you to ask yourselves some questions. Who are humanity as a collective consciousness? Where do we come from? All these little specks of life in this big dark space of nothing, and for what?

Comics by: Ana Biscaia [PT], Ivana Geček [HR], Mattias Elftorp [SE], Ivana Filipović [RS/CA], Henrik Rogowsk [SE], Leviathan [SE]. Text & illustration: Lisa Örtlund [SE]. Cover artists & main editor: Lisa Örtlund [SE].

Check back here soon for release dates etc.

August 24, 2020

CBK

CBA