The Fourth Annual Prism Awards Will Be Presented Online – Saturday and Sunday, October 17 and 18, 2020

Prism Comics, Queer Comics Expo and the Cartoon Art Museum are excited to announce that the 2020 Prism Awards will be held virtually as a two-day livestream hosted using Facebook Live and Discord.
The livestream will air Saturday, October 17th from 2-5pm and Sunday, October 18th from 2-5pm and will feature panels with the finalists and judges leading up to the Prism Awards Ceremony in the 2-5pm Sunday, October 18 timeslot.

For viewing details please visit – Prism Awards Cartoon Art Museum

The Prism Awards are presented to comic works by queer authors and stories that promote the growing body of diverse, powerful, innovative, positive or challenging representations of LGBTQAI+ characters in fiction and nonfiction comics. The goal of the Awards is to recognize, promote, and celebrate diversity and excellence in the field of queer comics. Finalists and Award Recipients are voted on by diverse panels of comics professionals, educators, librarians, journalists and writers.

The Finalists for the 2020 Prism Awards are:

The Girl That Can’t Get A Girlfriend by Mieri Hiranishi
Cafe Suada by Jade Sarson
Magical Boy by The Kao

In Search Of Absent Pigments by Alex Assan
Pseudo Slut Transmission by Emma Jayne
One Day Out by Ina Bestari

Bloom by Kevin Panetta & Savanna Ganucheau
Laura Dean Keeps Breaking Up With Me by Mariko Tamaki & Rosemary Valero-O’Connell
Kiss Number #8 by Colleen AF Venable & Ellen T. Crenshaw

Trans Girls Hit The Town by Emma Jayne
Lemonade Summer by Gabi Mendez
Stage Dreams by Melanie Gillman

Come Together edited by Tab Kimpton and Alex Assan
Heartwood by Joamette Gil
Shout Out edited by Andrew Wheeler

The Prism Awards are organized by the 2020 Prism Awards Committee Chair Gladys Ochoa (Queer Comics Expo) and Prism Awards Co-Founders Ted Abenheim (Prism Comics) and Nina Taylor Kester (Queer Comics Expo, Cartoon Art Museum)

We were honored to have a diverse panel of 27 judges this year including:

Short Form Judges:

• Mey Rude (Journalist)
• E Jackson (Flux)
• Sfe Monster (The Beyond Anthologies)
• Heidi MacDonald (editor-in-chief of Comicsbeat)
• Breena Nuñez (I, Exist)
• Lawrence Lindell (From Truth with Truth)

Mainstream Press Judges:

• Brian Anderson (Stripling Warrior)
• Jack Baur (Librarian, Berkeley Public Library)
• William O Tyleer (Cinephilia)
• Kayden Phoenix (Jalisco)
• Greg A. Elysée (Is’nana)

Small/Midsize Press Judges:

• Hari Conner (Finding Home)
• Emma Houxbois (Transcription)
• Barry Deutsch (Ampersand)
• Noella Whitney (To Measure)
• Amanda Castillo (Mapmakers)

Webcomics Judges:

• Gillian Pascasio (Alphabet Arthropoda)
• Rob McMonigal (Site Editor at Panel Patter)
• Sean Cohea (Reviewer at Panel Patter)
• Becky Hawkins (Super Butch)
• Rhandi Fisher (The Pride of Life)
• Nick Porter (MEGASheen podcast)

Anthology Judges

• Malach Lily (The Boar King)
• Rhonetta Robertson (Hair Story)
• Nilah Magruder (Creaky Acres)
• Viktor Kerney (MEGASheen podcast)
• Michelle Zhuang (Permanent Alien: An Asian-American Comics Anthology)

About Queer Comics Expo
The Queer Comics Expo (QCE) is an event to celebrate queer culture and promote diverse queer representation in comics, animation and other great ways to tell stories. QCE is also a fundraiser for the Cartoon Art Museum, a 501(c)(3) nonprofit dedicated to preserving, documenting, and exhibiting the unique and accessible art form of cartooning in all its forms for over 30 years.

About the Cartoon Art Museum
The Cartoon Art Museum’s mission is to ignite imaginations and foster the next generation of visual storytellers by celebrating the history of cartoon art, its role in society, and its universal appeal. The museum’s vision is to be the premier destination to experience cartoon art in all its many forms from around the world, and a leader in providing insight into the process of creating it. The Cartoon Art museum can be visited online at cartoonart.org and at its new location 781 Beach St, San Francisco, CA 94109.