OK, this is a big announcement!

Are you an artist? Did you like The Order of Odd-Fish? Do you want your art to be featured in a gallery show in Chicago next spring? Then read on.

For about a year now, I’ve been receiving stupendous fan art for The Order of Odd-Fish. Check out the picture above, of Jo and Fiona in their costume armor as Aznath, the Silver Kitten of Deceit, and Ichthala, the All-Devouring Mother. (It’s by Panndy on DeviantArt.) The fluffy silver armor! The terrifying Ichthala costume bristling with teeth and spikes! Jo’s wary, tough expression—and the bold, clean anime style! I love it.

Or how about the masterful chapter-by-chapter series of cut-paper art by Max Pitchkites? The lushly frantic work by Kevin Buckelew? The crisp, kinetic illustrations of Mallory Woods? The manic, hilarious drawings of Freya Trefonides?

(You can browse the complete galleries of fan art here.)

Artists like these deserve broader recognition. So this spring I’m planning an extravaganza of Odd-Fish fan art in Chicago!

The date set for the opening will be sometime in April. We’re celebrating the debut of the Odd-Fish paperback, which comes out in February and features new cover art by Paul Hornschemeier.

I’m working with Collaboraction, an award-winning Chicago theater group that is known for their spectacles as well as fantastic plays (I’ve seen their Jeff Award-winning adaptation of the George Saunders story Jon, and the similarly great Intelligent Design of Jenny Chow, which featured my friend Mia Park as a robot). We’re planning an Eldritch City Dome of Doom style dance party!

Might there also be an all-singing, all-dancing show of foppish cockroaches? Possibly! Will we construct life-sized replicas of Eldritch City and the All-Devouring Mother and the Dome of Doom? Just maybe!

Do you want your Odd-Fish art to be in this show? I’d love to see it. The deadline for submissions is March 15. I love the illustrations I’ve seen, but it doesn’t have to be just pictures! I’ve seen stuff as weird as a giant-fish-vomiting-the-Odd-Fish-lodge cake and a Belgian Prankster beer. You could even do costumes, like this mask I received of the Ichthala.

What will it be for you?

Construct a replica of Fiona’s All-Devouring Mother sculpture? Film your own episode of Teenage Ichthala? Create the music of an urk-ack? The stranger the better. (And the BIGGER the better, within reason.)

If you have some fan art you’d like to share, and you want to be in this show, please send it to me at kennedyjames [at] gmail [dot] com. We’ll find a way to get the physical version here in time for the show.

Necessary disclaimer: Sending fan art to me grants me the right to post the pictures to my fan art gallery and to other websites where I sometimes post content (like Facebook) and to share at public readings, school visits, etc. Don’t worry—I won’t sell or publish your pictures. I just want to share them with the world!

Include your name, where you’re from, and your age if you are under 18. If you want, I will post this info with your art in the gallery. I’ll also link to your own website or DeviantArt profile or whatever if you want me to. I promise I won’t post your contact info or share it with anyone.

Remember, the deadline to get art in for this show is March 15! I can’t wait to see what madness comes of this. I’ve been astonished by what I’ve seen so far—and humbled, and grateful. Thanks for helping create the world of Odd-Fish with me.