Mini-Comic Workshop

Learn to create 8-page, handheld stories with Nate from Optimist Comics! Try your hand at digital art with one of our drawing tablets and create a short comic story to share with friends and family. Participants will learn the basics of visual storytelling and apply them to create their own work of art. A printable version of your comic will be emailed to you at the end of the workshop.

Don't forget to head outside to the festival for curated readings and more activities.

Nate Olison has been a teaching artist in Chicago for the last 15 years, most of which were spent as a poet and fiction writer. Since then, he's added visual art to his skillset and spends most of his time as a cartoonist and visual artist. He recently founded Optimist Comics, an arts education company that uses the art of visual storytelling to facilitate immersive, project-based literacy instruction.

Host or Publisher Bookends & Beginnings