Last weekend the second annual ACE—The Artist & Comic Expo was held at Lakeview Recreation Center. I missed last year’s event, so I made plans in advance to check it out this year and I went Sunday and took photos and met lots of interesting people, artists and vendors. If you missed it this year, come along and take a virtual tour here on MBIP and then mark your calendars for next year’s event! Till then, here we go back in time to last Sunday at ACE @ Lakeview Recreations Center! Sherman...set the Wayback Machine to last Sunday, please...
And thank you!
Okay, here we are, back in time to last Sunday! This is the Landmark Recreation Center which is located in the back of the Lakeview park area. Rachel and Olivia were working the front table and gave me a press pass for the event. In the last photo I thought I’d just hang around for a few minutes before...
Going inside! Wow, there’s a huge crowd here and the first vendor I ran into was Jessica from Lit. On Fire Used Books who was manning her booth with her son Byron assisting her! she had a nice display of paperback books on display and then I turned around and saw MBIP Pal and Contributing Writer, Bob Gordon, owner of Acme Comics! As you can see, Acme has some classic comics on display and Bob was busy at the booth, so I thought we’d come back at the end of our visit.
This is artist J.M. Hunter, who told me he’s going to be involved with several art shows coming up here in Peoria, stay tuned for more information on that and it the meantime check out his facecrack page right here.
Artist Philo Barnhart is a Disney artist and animator and was busy talking with fans so I didn’t bug him, just snapped a few photos of the man and his artwork on display.
In addition to comic books and art on display, some people showed up in costume like these too, very cool!
Here’s a familiar face to MBIP, artist and musician, Alejandro Juvera! Alejandro is displaying his art today including prints from his upcoming comic book, Xeno Guardian Red Visor Go! Check out Alejandro’s facecrack page for more information and here’s the Red Visor Go! page! And for even more updates on his art and music, follow Alejandro on Twitter.
As I turned around I saw yet another familiar face, artist and man-about-town, Jeff Carlson with his Mani-Yack Monster Designs on display! I love this display and artwork because it reminds me of Coney Island culture! Here’s Jeff’s website for more monstrous information: Mani-Yack Monster Designs. And I absolutely love the “Cash Only,” sign, ha ha ha!
I turned around from Jeff’s booth for a second and when I turned back around I found...
Jeff taking pictures of more familiar faces, the whole stinking Ingles family! You’ve seen one or more or perhaps all of these Ingles people on MBIP at one point or another and they are from left: Shannon, Brennen, De and John! Please note that only Brennen had the good sense to look at the MBIP camera...I frankly don’t know what to do with the rest of them! Sheesh! P.S. Don’t forget to check out Smiley Graphix!
John and De then took me down to their friend, Jeremy Berkley’s booth. Jeremy’s a silk screen artist and I love these designs! My favorite is the John Belushi Little Chocolate Donuts, so I had to purchase that one! Check out more of Jeremy’s work right here.
And this fellow serves as a reminder that not only comic book artists are here, the place is also loaded with...
Comic books! There’s vintage comic books, classic comic books, new comic books and, well, lots and lots of comic books are here, okay? Okay!
I met artist Ali Cantarella over here at this booth. Ali is from Chicago and said she was having a great time at the Ace Expo and in Peoria. She does comic art, illustrations, caricatures and watercolor among other types of art. Check out more of Ali’s art right here.
Mike from Home Team Caricatures was here all weekend doing caricature art for the guests and vendors and nearby Mike at a table I saw two more familiar faces, JoAnn and Greg from Popcorn Heaven! Great to see them again and check out Mike’s caricature he did of them on display behind their table! Very cool!
Artist Kagan Masters specialty is Coffee Art, which I had never seen before and she does some fantastic work with the java grounds! That’s Kagan’s husband, Timothy seated to her right. More of Kagan’s work is on display via the internet right here: redeemedink.com.
Okay, it’s been a fun day here at ACE, but I’m starting to wear down, so let’s go back to where we started...
The Acme Comics booth! Looks like Bob is still busy, but as you can see, the Acme booth is loaded with comics, figurines, young reader books featuring comic book heroes and comic book banks. And finally, Bob Gordon poses for his MBIP portrait and I think I’ll call it a day! Thanks to everyone at ACE for a fun day, I’ll definitely check it out again next year and so should you! We’ll see you all tomorrow!
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