This comic was first found in the Life Next Door zine, edited and created by Karine Rupp-Stanko. It is based on a true story.
When we think of law as science
A comic. I don’t like philosophy but I may have waded into the territory of legal philosophy here…
I don't think I'm a morning person...
A comic.
When Are They Coming Back?
I feel most creative when making things in physical handmade books. Accidental things can happen and when I know I don’t have to make something sleek and perfect, it seems to turn out more fun. So when these words popped into my head, I decided to go back to the book format, which I hadn’t been doing as much lately.
I seem to be having the “When are they coming back?” conversation over and over and over again lately in every social context, so I had to poke fun at it a bit. I hate and I love this conversation at the same time.
A few years ago I made a Minnesota-shaped book about how everyone seems to move away from Minnesota, so this is the sequel!
"Everyone Wants to Know" Comic Published by The Rumpus
I recently had a comic published by The Rumpus, in their Spotlight series. I started this two years ago, then put it in a box for a year, finally pulling it out and getting enough courage to send it out.
It’s called “Everyone Wants to Know” and I’m glad to have released it into the world!
I dissent.
I drew my way through Supreme Court Justice Sotomayor’s dissent on whether the Court can review and temporarily stop the Texas abortion ban (Whole Woman’s Health v. Jackson). Normally the court would stop such a law, but Texas designed this so that it would be easier to claim the Court can’t review the law beforeit goes into effect (even though the law clearly violates current Supreme Court precedent). Decisions based on the process a legal question can be reviewed by a court conveniently allow a court to decide something without deciding the core issue, which is what happened here. That said, all indications are that that core issue will be decided and reversed later this year, as many of us have been dreading since November 2016 (and even more so when RBG died last year). My scraggly drawings with the text of the dissent are below. You can read the dissent in its original format here.
#letsdrawlaw #scotus
Art, Literature, and the Law
My local bar association did an issue all about “art, literature, and the law,” which just came out. It includes one of my “We will get through this” illustrations and some of my thoughts on being a lawyer who can speak are and law. I love how it turned out and it was so fun to be included!
It is fun to page through the issue and see so much creativity from members of a profession that is viewed as being anything but creative. I can’t quite put my finger on it yet, but it is weird to me how much law and art seem like total opposites but also very related. I think there may be a lot of creative people underneath the formal training and expectations of lawyers. That creative side just isn’t valued or encouraged unless it is in the form of making an innovative argument or, in the rare cases, writing a witty footnote.
I’ve been thinking a lot about the Venn diagram of art and law and what it means to inhabit parts of both of those spaces. I have no answers, but I do find it interesting to explore…we’ll see where that thread goes!
Minneapolis Institute of Art Virtual Family Day
Last summer, I told a friend I just wanted to design activities for kids. (I was clearly inspired by all the art and doodle activities that artists and illustrators like Mo Willems and Wendy McNaughton developed in response to the pandemic.) Somehow, I spoke that into existence. This winter, with impeccable art direction by Mia’s Natalia Choi, I designed an at-home art activity for Mia’s April Virtual Family Day: Coloring My Feelings.
Families could pick up a tote bag of simple supples from the steps of the Minneapolis Institute of Art. I loved seeing the different renditions of my little feelings blobs!
We also created a recording of myself reading The Book of Anger in my recently muraled studio space. The entire experience was just grand!
Adding Nuance When Click Bait is the Norm
After coming across social media posts (from news outlets across the world!) and news articles suggesting a recent Minnesota Supreme Court case was doing something it very much wasn’t, I felt compelled to try to explain what was actually going on in the opinion. What follows is more of less a sketchbook attempt to infuse the nuance missing in all the click bait. Imperfect, but the bones are there.
“Opting for Health”
"Opting for Health" MN Women Center Re-imagining Feminist Futures Zine
This summer, I saw that the University of Minnesota Women’s Center was seeking proposals for a zine they were creating about “Re-Imagining Feminist Futures.” I was intrigued but also disappointed with myself because I couldn’t think of anything that wasn’t just “not [current state of affairs in US].” That kind of approach is hardly reimagining anything. It would not have worked. So I asked some friends to think through it with me one weekend over a zoom call. It was late August when it seemed like the entire West was on fire, and the friends I was talking to were in Oregon and Colorado, all of them holed up in their houses hiding from the smoky, caustic air. As we talked about this and other injustices that felt especially salient at that moment, a friend noticed that it all kept coming back to health. And there it was. What if we weren’t making all our decisions based on “more money” but “more healthy”? I know it feels lofty, but what if that were our inherent metric behind everything? It’s at least worth imagining even if it’s not currently possible.
The MN Women’s Center released their Re-Imagining Feminist Futures Zine today and I’m very glad to say it includes this piece (albeit a vertical version)! You can go to their page and order one or download one if you want. There’s a variety of writing and art in there, all by folks affiliated with UMN. Can’t wait to get mine in the mail next month!
Staying alert, bringing meaning to numbers
Last week, I was scanning the headlines and found myself completely unfazed by the announcement of that day’s “61 deaths due to COVID-19” in Minnesota. Ugh! I don’t want to be numb to the number of people we are losing due to this pandemic and our country’s lack of leadership and accountability for allowing it to reach exponential levels. I don’t want to gloss over the way it’s been exacerbated by the outdated “rugged individualism” and “American dream” philosophy in our society, politics, and economic system. Each one of these dots is, was, a person in my state. Even if they would hate my commentary two sentences ago, even if they were 102, even if they had other risk factors, I don’t want to gloss over their death as I scan the headlines. So I have started keeping a daily log of the people we are losing in Minnesota. It is mostly to keep myself aware, you don’t have to love it, but you’re welcome to join me in this one little attempt to avoid being numb to the loss we are experiencing.
From December 5-12, 2020, 575 people died of complications of COVID-19, as reported by the Minnesota Department of Health.
We will get through this
I have been listening to CIDRAP’s Osterholm Update podcast regularly throughout the pandemic. I often do so while working on art projects. It was only a matter of time, then that it would make its way into one of these projects. “We will get through this” is an often repeated phrase on the podcast. We will get through this, but it’s crucial we work together, acknowledge this is our “COVID year” and “stop swapping air.”
Each of these is made with about 100 little blobs. A few weeks before I made these, I had cut out 545 little pieces of paper to make a visual marker of the 545 children who remain separated from their families due to the current administration’s actions at the border. I grouped them in groups of 100 (and then 45) to keep track. I wanted to turn them into something else, but wasn’t sure what. As I was playing around with 100 of them on a sheet of paper, this concept popped into my head. So, in many ways, from something hopeless comes something hopeful.
We will get through this.
At home gallery show
It’s COVID times, you just finished a series of collages that you want to share as a full unit, and you have a few white walls. What do you do? Put on your own at home, asynchronous, a little silly gallery show!
Well, that’s what I did, at least. Check out the Blob Party, where I introduced the collages I have been working on since Spring 2020.
The Blob Party is a great event for introverts! ;)
Naming Art and Electing Leaders
I made a very large, very colorful collage recently. I decided I wanted to name it. But I could NOT come up with a name, as hard as I tried. So, I stopped trying for a bit.
This week as the election happened, the results started coming in, I got more and more optimistic about a return to leaders we can be proud of….my brain also started circling in on a name.
Today, when the results were called, I finally had it:
Kamala wins (and Joe, too)!
This election doesn’t solve all our problems, but it sure is good news. Four years ago, when my international friends checked in, feeling compelled to share their disappointment with their personal connection to the US, I felt shameful. Today, they checked in again with congratulations and while I can’t quite express pride in the situation, I certainly feel hope.
Ruthless Times
I accidentally made a pun today.
We were talking about the context of this recent Supreme Court appointment process—a last-minute attempt to hang on to power —as the piece that is so heart wrenching. “It’s just so ruthless in this context,” I said. Ah! What did I just say? Well, it is. Ruthless Times. A Ruthless Supreme Court.
I’m not looking forward to being in Ruthless times. I’m concerned about what a Ruthless Supreme Court will do, and I really can’t predict how exactly this will impact our laws moving forward. But I do know our new ruthless Supreme Court is missing one staunch advocate for human rights. It is missing a justice who saw the injustices in our system—and the way the law could be interpreted to remedy them—instead of hiding behind the text and claiming powerlessness.
On a related note, I went in search of some Constitutional-political commentary today from a law professor whose perspective I always appreciate (who just so happened to clerk for Justice Ginsburg). Instead of commentary, I got something that is probably more valuable: a reminder to be especially conscious of being kind right now. So, we may be in the midst of ruthless times in the political sphere, but we don’t have to be that way on a personal level. That’s what I’m thinking about today.
And I still love this RBG collage so so much.
Finding Joy in Mourning RBG
Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg was an inspiring woman in so many ways. As a female lawyer, it’s hard not to look up to her and aspire to be like her in some way. But the most surprising way she has been inspiring to me is the way she’s popped up into my art. Her possible death has been a concern for me since November 8, 2016. A huge concern. As I said in this zine in early 2019, it was such a concerning thought that I couldn’t even think about it or the likely the ramifications of such an event.
And then it happened. And somehow, despite the urge to wallow in despair at the predictable consequences of her death, I started joyfully making things:
First it was the impromptu collar made the morning after I heard the news. Made with scraps of colored paper, and documented to the tune of the Marriage of Figaro.
The next day, not sure what to do, I started making her response to the “When will there be enough women on the Supreme Court” question.
And finally, I responded to a friend’s request to draw her by cutting, pasting, and playing. It turned into a wonky portrait that I adore to pieces and a lawn sign.
May her legacy be honored and may she keep inspiring us all to create and act in positive ways.
The periodic nature of social media
There was a time when I spent all my free time on AOL Instant Messenger. (Check out the perfectly on point Pen15 if you need a refresher on the sounds and sights of those days). Then it got old.
There was a time I spent all my free time on Myspace. But I never really understood what was going on there and something better came along.
There was a time (a long time) when I spent all my free time on Facebook. Then it got old, manipulative, and impersonal.
There was a time I spent some time on Snapchat. But I was 5 years too old and Instagram was more fun.
Then there was a time when I spent too much free time enjoying Instagram. That time is still now. And, to a certain extent, it’s a great and easy way to share and get some feedback on creative work. But lately it is feeling more and more manipulative and out of control. I haven’t abandoned it yet, but its demise feels on the horizon.
After a few years into each form of social media, the luster goes away, the thing that made it special gets replaced by ads and manipulative algorithms, and it’s just not fun anymore. Well, these are my observations, at least.
So, I’m going to try to share more on this space that I own and and manipulate myself and that won’t be affected by the constant adoption and abandonment of social media. (Austin Kleon has some great thoughts about the value of owning the space where you share your work.) We’ll see how it goes….
Stay Tuned for Blob Collages!
I just finished a collection of blob collages. I started these in early lockdown days, almost as a meditative practice. My goal was to complete thirty of them and here they are, in a glorious pile! If you want one, stay tuned!
Rainbow Collages in UMN Artistic Antidote to COVID-19
Making rainbow collages kept me sane through the most nerve-wracking early days of the COVID-19 pandemic. The Artistic Antidote project by the UMN Office of Clinical Affairs featured this project (my own personal artistic antidote) in mid May.
American Illustration 39
Two of my illustrations from by little “Book of Anger” were chosen to be part of the online archive of American Illustration 39! They are available here with the other winning illustrations of 2019.
