Oz Comic-Con provides an Artist Alley at each of its events to allow (primarily local) artists an opportunity to showcase their artwork, gain exposure and sell their product to the public. The area is distinct from the rest of the commercial areas as Artist Alley is for handmade and self- designed and produced art. Artists who either commission others to design work or craft pieces must apply for a commercial exhibitor space and will not be allowed access to Artist Alley.

1. Stand Inclusions

a. An Artist Alley space consists of the following:

1. 2m x 2m space
2. One (1) trestle table (between 1.5m and 1.8m long but subject to supplier availability in each state)
3. Two (2) chairs
4. Two (2) exhibitor passes
5. Velcro compatible backing board – 2.4m tall, by 2m wide (some may include side walls subject to location)
6. Listing on the Oz Comic-Con website

b. Packages are limited to one table and two chairs only per artist unless additional space is made available.

c. Artists may swap the furniture in the package by bringing their own or paying the contractor for alterations, but they may not exceed the 2 metre by 2 metre space allocated to them or extend above the 2.4 metre height of the wall.

d. Artists may not create structures or displays that would impede the ability of other artists to draw traffic or conduct sales.

2. Application Process and Acceptances

a. Artists are only accepted in the Artist Alley if they complete the application process by the listed deadlines or are invited as guests of the event.

b. Artists who are not accepted initially may be kept on a waitlist. No entries will be accepted after the close date.

c. Offers will be issued to accepted artists who must fill out their booking digitally and make payment within seven business days. Failure to complete acceptance form and make payment within the agreed timeframe will result in artists losing their place, and space will be offered to the waitlist.

d. Contracted artists must pay for their stand in full upon booking. Artists who do not pay for their space or contact the organiser to organise alternative arrangements will lose their space to another artist in the waitlist.

e. Artists will have their table number confirmed after being contracted, but before the event. Consideration will be taken for specific requests as well as the overall aesthetic of the art and where it fits compared to other artists.

3. Portfolios and Curation

a. All artists were required to submit a portfolio of their work. It must have clearly demonstrated their current artistic capabilities and aesthetic.

b. Artists were judged primarily on their quality of their work but with priority given to those who are providing original art or comic books.

c. Artists from the city/state the event is being held in were given priority over artists traveling from elsewhere in the event of an equal assessment of the quality of their work.

d. Artists were also selected based on the number of artists demonstrating a particular genre. That is, if there is only one portfolio of acceptable quality working in watercolour or in a fantasy genre, it was accepted over an additional artist from an already well represented genre.

e. Artists that apply for multiple cities are not guaranteed to be accepted for all of their applied cities. Depending on the available tables, they may receive placement in only one city.

4. Fan Art and Original Art

a. Artists may sell fan art at their stand if it is clear that it is not being sold as an official licensed product. Artists may not continue to sell licensed work of any company that requests they cease trading.

b. Original artwork will be given a priority in the curation process, but will still be subject to the same standards of quality as other artists.

5. Multiple Businesses / Proxy Selling

a. Due to the limited nature of the space available in Artist Alley, Oz Comic-Con will only allow the sale of products that have been designed by the applicant and where the applicant is present at the event. If the application is for an art group, the artists themselves must be present and take a share in manning the stand. This rule does not prevent artists from bringing helpers to assist in selling their stock and covering breaks as long as the artist themselves are attending.

b. If you have two businesses registered separately (with one owner), with different staff attending, such that they could be allocated tables apart from each other and operate as separate tables, you can apply for more than one stand and each business will be judged on the strength of their own application. Note: the product or aesthetic of each business must be significantly different from each other.

c. Presently, publishers of comics, manga and graphic novels who otherwise fit the criteria for Artist Alley are exempt from this rule as long as representatives of the artist/author or publisher are present.

6. Handmade Stock

a. As a blanket rule, all product sold at Artist Alley stands must be

1. designed by the applicant/artist present and
2. handmade/crafted.

b. Oz Comic-Con recognises that certain items must be physically printed or manufactured such as prints, books or other forms of paper based media. Products in this category are exempt from being handmade.

c. All apparel/costumes, homewares, toys and other forms of soft crafts/fabric based craft must be handmade. Handmade in this sense means that the artist or someone in the artists group must have hand constructed the item, not an external party.

1. Toys, such as dolls and figurines may be constructed from an original commercially available base, only if substantially edited to be different than the products original purpose. That is, dolls that have been cleaned and repainted to create new characters in a new style with handmade costumes are permitted, whereas blank miniatures painted as the manufacturer intended are not.

d. Jewellery/badges etc must be handmade or hand assembled. Hand assembled goods (ie stamped badges and pre made keyrings) are acceptable to be sold, however hand crafted product (ie resin moulded or laser cut) will be given a strong preference in the portfolio assessments.

7. Event Cancellation and Refund Policy

a. In the case of event cancellation or postponement for any reason, including venue, event organiser, or government mandated cancellations, offers and payments will immediately rollover to the next available Oz Comic-Con event in the same city the artist was accepted to. In this instance the artist would not have to reapply.

b. All Artist Alley payments, including packages, insurances, and any add-ons, are 100% non-refundable.

c. Once Artist Alley Package payment is made, should you decide to withdraw from the event for any reason, you will forfeit the full package amount.

8. Stand Operation

a. Artists must have a fully operational stand during the entire opening hours of the event. This means displays must be setup and the stand ready to sell by the time doors open and remain so until the event closes each day. Artists may not pack up before the event finishes or may subject to future exclusion from the alley.

b. Artists may not sell adult material (ie nudity, strong language, overtly sexual themes) on public display so that it may be seen by children. They may sell adult (but legal) material under the counter and in sealed packaging.

c. It is the exhibitor’s responsibility to read the exhibitor manual on publication for each event and complete the required forms. This will contain more information on move-in and move-out and stand operation that they must comply with.

9. Rule Changes

a. Exhibiting rules and terms and conditions are subject to change at any time by the organiser and interpretation and enforcement of the rules are at the discretion of the organiser.