Collectors Network Holdings, PBC (CNHP), a Public Benefit Corporation that owns ComicArtFans.com (CAF), the global hub for everything related to original art from comic books and other narrative or visual storytelling art, announces the successful production of its 13th Comic Art LIVE (CAL) virtual art convention on May 16-17, 2026. CNHP also announced dates for the 14th CAL, which will be held November 14-15, 2026, as well as the 15th CAL, which will be held May 15-16, 2027.
CAL is a twice annual (May/November) virtual art convention held on the CAF website that invites comic art collectors new and old from anywhere in the world to attend a free two-day online convention where artworks are presented for sale directly from artists, collectors, art dealers, artist representatives, and auction houses. CAL begins with our hugely popular Mystery Sketch Event, which launches six weeks prior to the show and offers a unique and fun opportunity to get convention sketches and sketch cards with artists randomly assigned from a list of emerging and established talent. CAL also houses our Indie Comics Creator Con (IC3@CAL) showcase in Hall I and produces two days of incredible live panels and exclusive art sale shows on our CAF+ YouTube channel, where you can ask questions to panelists, interact with the collecting community, and purchase art in the live chat.
Professional working artists, artists representatives, and indie artists are all invited to set up an exhibitor booth at CAL. Art collectors with a CAF Premium subscription (still only $75/year) receive a large number of benefits, including being able to set up an exhibitor booth twice a year at CAL along with access to the CAL convention halls two hours before it opens to the public.
“Our 13th Comic Art LIVE continued to show strong growth with our Mystery Sketch Event, the use of ArtScout keywords, and the participation of artists and artist reps, as well as healthy overall sales despite the lack of super high-dollar pieces selling,” said Kasra Ghanbari, CEO of CAF. “Our team is especially gratified to see more and more new collectors of original comic art and other narrative art use Comic Art LIVE as a low barrier entry point to learn and get exposure to a wide variety of art, industry-wide groups, and art collectors. We’re also thrilled to reach our goal of having CAL become a massive promotional vehicle for artists, artist reps, and indie creators, who are experiencing greater art sales and commission requests with each passing show. Artists: if you haven’t heard from us, you will soon.”
Highlights for the 13th Comic Art LIVE included:
- Exhibitors – total number of exhibitor booths (380), just short of record number (400)
- Booth Art For Sale – total artworks posted for sale (7,274), just short of record number (7,665)
- CAF Site Visits – with our new Web Analytics, traffic was up >50% at over 98,000 unique visits
- CAF Site Traffic – page views were 4 times normal on both days of CAL, on par with record numbers
- Artists Participating – record number of artists participating (173) between Halls A, I, and D
- Art Sales – over $1,180,000 in combined transactions, which doesn’t include items not marked sold, art commissions, and CAF Classified sales with a notable increase in overall transaction percentage combined with a reduction of high-dollar art sales (>$50,000/piece) consistently seen in prior CALs
- Mystery Sketch Event – records were set throughout the event:
- number of Mystery Sketches sold (598), 46% over prior high
- number of 9×12″ tier sold (252), 40% over prior high
- number of sketch card tier sold (346), 51% over prior high
- total sales of $80,920, >40% more than prior high
- number of artists participating (110)
- Art Commissions – large number of commissions requested directly to artists or artist reps
- Live Art Sales – $33,200 in art sales during the 4 live panels that offered art for sale
- Additional Site Sales – high site traffic spilled out of CAL and into CAF’s regular classified art listings with significant verified sales and post-show sale reports estimated to easily exceed $150,000 and could be many times more
- HALL C – Collector Booths
- 267 of the 380 CAL exhibitor booths (70%)
- 149 booths realized sales (56%)
- 474 total pieces sold of 4442 available (10.7%)
- $749,976 total sales in HALL C
- HALL I – Indie Creators – the fourth IC3@CAL with Hall I dedicated to indie creators with diverse creators (33 booths) and increased indie artist participation in the Mystery Sketch Event
- ArtScout Keywords – ArtScout is becoming a hit, with CAL 13 seeing a 25% increase by CAF account holders compared to last November’s CAL 12
- Saved Art – saved art pieces by attendees came in right at second most ever (10,794)
- Checkout/Feedback System – increased use of our checkout system for instant payment processing with interlinked feedback, which will have greatly expanded use by artists, art dealers, artist representatives, auction houses, and select art collectors for the 14th CAL in November
- Technical Upgrades/Issues – total site redesign with mobile friendly environment implemented, no major issues discovered, support inquiries throughout the weekend were low, updates were made on the fly to address minor issues related to the new format, and enhancements are planned for CAL 14 in November that will materially benefit both buyers and sellers
- Live Panels – 12 live shows/panels were held on our CAF+ YouTube channel beginning Friday night with our Mystery Sketch Kick-Off and with weekend highlights including artist and art rep interviews and sales shows with Daniel Scott of Scott’s Collectables; Yoshi Majima, Sunao Saito, and Takumi of Japan Comic Art; David Stoupakis Artist Spotlight; Paolo Rivera and Mark Hay of Splash Page Art; Bart Sears, Jamie Jones, and Marlin Shoop; and a two-hour long IC3@Jacksonville artist panel with Jamie Jones, Matthew Allison, Jim Rugg, Deanna Soukiasian, Ro Higashi, Dean Haspiel, Keyla Valerio, Keith Browning, Sam York of The Artist Bullpen, and Dan Goodwin. Other highlights included the Animation Art Space & Auction Review with Xenosgalla, the traditional Anthony & Sharon Snyder Warehouse Sale, and Next Comic Art Themed Sale (Absolute DC & Ultimate Marvel)
“Comic Art LIVE has become one of the most anticipated and trusted events in the market space,” said Bill Cox, Chief Content Officer of CAF. “This first CAL after a total site redesign was exciting to follow on the tech side. Mobile device traffic was up compared to desktop, and the network changes we implemented in early May to mitigate DDoS attacks provided CAL 13 visitors with dramatically improved page load times. Our thanks go out to the entire community for their participation and active promotion of the event, as well as for their critical cooperation in a virtual setting to quickly address art inquiries and mark pieces sold while letting us know about your experience with helpful feedback.”
THANK YOU TO THE COMIC ART LIVE 13 SPONSORS FOR SUPPORTING
THE GROWTH OF THIS GLOBAL COMMUNITY EVENT!
The newly designed CAF site builds on our design work and what we learned constructing the deCAF mobile app in creating an intuitive and user-friendly interface that keeps the large number of site tools and site features readily available. This includes ArtScout, the most powerful web crawler ever offered, which serves everyone from new art collector to professional art dealers as your 24/7 global monitoring assistant that seeks and identifies newly posted art for sale that matches your CAF Want List Keywords.
The newly relaunched CAF site has been designed to work on all devices. Opening an account is free while taking less than one minute to create, and Premium Subscription features are continuing to expand. Our deCAF mobile app is free to all CAF account holders and is available for both iOS and Android devices under “Comic Art Fans” through Apple’s App Store and Google Play.
Between the CAF web site, deCAF mobile app on Apple’s App Store/Google Play, twice annual CAL virtual convention, CAF+ YouTube channel, and our OAX and IC3 show platforms, CAF has in place the central 24/7 hub, networking tools, educational materials, and events to assist and enable everyone from the first-time art collector and early career artist to the most seasoned art collector, art dealer, and professional published artist.
