Falling the recent donation of numerous small press and indie comic books, today the Small Press Expo announced the acquisition and subsequent donation to the Library of Congress of original art by various Small Press Expo alumni and exhibitors. Sara Duke, curator of Applied and Graphic Material in the Prints and Photographs Division of the Library of Congress had this to say about the donation:

We are excited that our partnership with SPX is leading to a greater understanding of the  patrimony of comics; the wealth of original cartoon art here at the Library of Congress now includes independent and small press cartoonists. We are looking forward to the Expo in September, and hope that more talented artists will join the ranks of Raina Telgemeier, Jim Rugg, Jen Sorensen, Matthew Thurber, Keith Knight, Jim Woodring, and Matt Bors in the SPX Collection at the Library of Congress.

The originals include examples of Kurtzman and Glyph Award winner Keith Knight’s daily comic strip, The Knight Life as well as examples from his other strips K Chronicles and (Th)ink. 2012 Herblock Award winner Matt Bors donated a number of originals, as did Jen Sorensen, whose Slowpoke syndicated strip  won the 2012 AltWeekly Award for Cartoons.  Creators such as Jim Woodring, Matthew Thurber and Jim Rugg donated originals to be alongside their already donated printed versions.

Plans are for this to become a yearly donation.

The Small Press Expo Collection at the Library of Congress is a first of its kind partnership to preserve the legacy of the indie comics community by focusing on original art by SPX exhibitors, as well as limited edition mini-comics and other publications that are created by the SPX community.