The 2007 Ignatz Award nominees have been announced. Unless I already posted something about them, in which case, here they are again! It's probably a bad sign I don't remember -- for me and the awards. Anyhow, the Ignatz Awards, given out during a ceremony at the Small Press Expo in Bethesda, Maryland, are a juried-nomination award celebrating creator-driven work of the type that exhibits at the Expo.
I'm a little surprised by the appearance of a Sara Edward-Corbett co-created mini-comic on the best mini-comic list, given her presence on the jury. Did they not institute a Frank Cho rule to guard against that kind of thing? I thought they had. I mean, I don't want to punk on the nomination or call it into question -- that's a lovely mini-comic, one I would nominate, and I'm sure no one exerted any influence -- I just didn't think it was possible.
Update! Or, "Ask A Question, Get An Answer"
The Ignatz Awards coordinator wrote in to clear up how you can be a juror and a nominee -- the upshot: you can't nominate your own work, but you can be nominated, as the juries are working blind, without even knowing who the other jurors are. Mr. McElhatton's full letter follows:
Hey Tom, just saw your post on the Ignatz Awards.
In answer to your question -- after the 1999 Ignatz Awards, the rules were changed to explicitly state that jurors are not allowed to nominate their own work.
However, one of the reasons why the jurors's names aren't revealed until the ballot is released is that each juror is unaware of who the other four members are. All submissions, correspondence, and voting goes through the Ignatz Awards Coordinator (in this case, me). This way, creators can serve on the Ignatz Jury without suddenly becoming ineligible for the award that year; no one else on the jury knows they're a member. That procedure has been in place since Ed Brubaker and Chris Oarr created the awards back in 1997.
So, in short, Sara Edward-Corbett's nomination was based entirely on her talent and had nothing improper connected to it in any way, shape, or form. Her placement on the ballot is because of other jurors who didn't know she was serving.
If you have any other questions, please feel free to ask!
Well, that's that! Plus, I didn't know that Ed Brubaker co-created the awards.
