Hey, how does a signing event be determined? From what ive bee told by some artists, its whether the event has been (sanctioned? Endorsed? Given blessing?) By the pokemon company. Unfortunately it does not include solo exhibitions as confirmed by kouki saito and mika pikazo when i attended her solo exhibition on the 9th of may…
Are the signing events announced beforehand? And how can i be kept up to date on those?
Hello and welcome to the forums @itshr. Great to have you here.
From personal experience, I attended signing event for Arita which happened at GalaTCG event in Germany in the month of January this year That event was announced at least 2 months in advance. Usually the people or organization hosting it make a good job of advertising the event. For this particular event, they kept posting updates on social media and the official website regarding how to sign up for the slots, what is the pricing and what are you allowed to bring etc.
In 2023, a lot of artists did signing events for Regionals in the Americas and this was very well advertised through official channels and also through forums like E4. All details for the events were advertised on social media and via the official channels.
Based on the image you posted, this event is showcasing collections of Saitou’s personal works of art, which they do besides doing Pokemon artwork. To manage expectations, they are making it clear that no Pokemon related stuff will be signed. As per my understanding Pokemon company has strict rules against using their IP for monetary profit unless it is getting an OK from them. In this event they will commission an artwork based on your request in their art style, which, although not Pokemon is still really awesome.
So in short, keep an eye out either through the forums here or other social media and you might come across an official signing event by a Pokemon artist who is actually signing cards.
Cheers!
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As mentioned signing events are usually known or announced a couple months in advance or sometimes even longer depending on the event scale. For example, some artists in Japan can know 6-months to a year if they will be at a larger scale event or have a private exhibition. They will usually announce on there twitter or other social platform.
US had regional events hosted by Overload and sometimes artists were invited to sign. I believe the years were 2018, 2019, 2020 and 2022-2023. Usually the artists signing were announced about two months or a little over month in advance on E4 and Twitter.
However it seems all regional tournaments are now going to be ran by Gaming Generations this season and moving forward. So 2023 might have been the last time you would hear of artists signing at US regionals.
The quickest announcement I can remember was about two days in advance when Midori Harada was going to NYCC last year.
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Hey, thanks for the reply. How about within asia and japan?
You’ll see private exhibitions in Japan, China, or Malaysia, I think there has been one event that I recall in the Philippines. At most of these events, the artists have refused to sign.
Saitou is an example of not signing at an event, but signed some for staff. I believe that was in Malaysia (not 100% sure). I heard he hasn’t signed for staff at other events since.
Tokiya is an example of an artist who signs as he’s not contracted with Pokémon anymore.
Harada is an example of an artist who just had an event in Japan and was very outspoken about “don’t come if you only want card signed”. She hasn’t signed for her last 4 events and one was in Germany.
Most artists will announce ahead of time if they will not sign, if they don’t then either they said they wouldn’t sign at a previous event in the past so they’ll assume most people know they won’t sign, or it’s just random and up to them on how they feel.
Then besides events, you have mail-ins which rarely happen anymore and usually aren’t talked about in fear of someone ruining it and taking advantage of the artist.
Most overseas events in Asia were kinda ruined by a certain group of people (resellers) looking to flip autos. So that’s why it’s hard to find artists still willing to sign on Pokémon cards.
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Thanks for the info, i went to mika pikazo’s solo exhibition but she refused to sign cards, only got a shikishi board signed