We usually do a good job of recapping what to look out for over the weekend. This past weekend, we made a little goof: the opening of Mini Comic-Con occurred. We sent out a frantic Tweet Saturday morning to alert everyone and we made it out to see what was going on at the event since we will not be able to make real Comic-Con. It was a nice, little art show that had an accompanying print/zine/art fair, the literal manifestation of the title “Mini Comic-Con.”

The event was held at the Center for the Arts, Eagle Rock, which everyone knows is now a little hotbed of cool from all the cool concerts, art events, and local happenings they’ve been putting on. The space is a nice, large, Spanish mission style event space which was lined with tables of various artmakers in Los Angeles. There were only less than twenty vendors who were there to sell stuff on the occasion of the show’s opening. They ranged from the zine powerhouse Funchicken to the rad guys of Never Press to newly formed clique Space Camp, which is Bradford Lynn, Jesse Tise, and Erin Burrell. There were also some people who were a little too unique and, given the quaint space, you felt guilty not tipping everyone for showing up.

The actual Mini Comic-Con show itself is a little exhibit of works by a little less than thirty artists. It was curated by Andrew Cox and Laura Marchetti and celebrates local independent comic artists, who “blur high art, fantasy, and mundane” to make their work (according to the statement about the show). The pieces were all very good but, as Jesse Peyronel noted on Twitter, “it was quaint but too ‘mini.’” It was just a little corner or art that were fun and from varying degrees of successful artists. Many of them stood out–but if only there were more! It would have been super great if the entire space could have been devoted to the exhibit; but, of course, that would be a lot to demand from the multi-purpose art space.

Mini Comic-Con runs through June 7 and, like the recent surge of zine activity, yet again screams that this is a very Los Angeles thing happening right now. And, good for Center of the Arts, Eagle Rock for making something like Mini Comic-Con happen to celebrate this. It’s probably the first show done around this culture, at least on such a big level. This also appears to be the first little convention of comic/fantasy/etc. art they have done and we’re really hoping they keep it up and grow it into a bigger, less mini affair. Time will tell. In any event, pop into to see the show if you are going to be there for upcoming events of theirs like Black Dice, Dntel and friends, and Xiu Xiu.