My Beloved Is Unto Me As Myrrh

a boogie man from my Southern childhood

I distinctly remember, at age five, seeing our family friend Stephen Wade tell the 'Taily-Po' story, accompanied by his banjo. I couldn't find a recording of that, but here's a clip of Mr. Wade doing his 'banjo dancing.'

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My desk, with in-progress paintings and tapestries.

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It’s here!

“Emet,” my 12 page, full color comic will debut at @shortrunseattle on November 5th!

It’ll be available on my etsy store after Short Run.

(and before anyone goes “Women don’t wear tefillin!”, the gendered usage of tefillin varies based on the form of Judaism. The majority of Orthodox Jews feel that women should not/do not need to don tefillin, most Conservative Jews hold this view as well, although there is a growing movement of Conservative Jewish women who don tefillin. Opinions among Reform Jews vary from “Women don’t need to/should not don tefillin,” to “If that’s how you practice your faith, that’s great!” to “Why are you asking me? I don’t care.”)

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Queer Code -- hard copy $5!

So... this was originally gonna be a few pages explaining “queer coding” but the further I got in it, the more I had to say, so I chopped up the first few panels I made, rearranged them and added like 6 more pages.

When I heard they were making a tv version of “Preacher,” I decided to give the comics a read. I’d read some of Garth Ennis’ other stuff back in high school and I always heard him put up there with Neil Gaiman and Alan Moore.

By the end of the first arc in “Preacher,” I basically had to will-power my way through the rest of the comic because I wanted to know how it ended. Despite having read the whole damn thing only a few months ago, I can barely remember any of it, except for how utterly aggravated the whole thing made me. The most POSITIVE depiction of a queer character in the whole series is of a self-loathing gay cop who can only have sex with other men when they’re beating and humiliating him. THAT’S THE MOST POSITIVE DEPICTION OF A QUEER CHARACTER.

And then I recently read some contemporary manga

“Soil” -- One canon queer character. A gay man who is a serial child molester.

“One Punch-Man” -- One canon queer character. A gay man who is basically a walking prison rape joke.

“I Am a Hero” -- One canon queer character. A transgender man who is repeatedly misgendered and insulted and ultimately dies. But he’s not a rapist or a murderer, so yay representation?

I’ll admit, this comic is coming from a place of anger and disappointment. That the Big Names in Serious Graphic Novels (some of which I really enjoy and really influenced me) still have so much homophobic/transphobic content. That a lot of contemporary comics haven’t progressed much further. I don’t expect every queer character to be a hero, but when you have a mere handful of queer characters and the majority of them die or are villains, it’s a problem. I’d rather see a body horror metaphor for queerness than see another shitty canon queer trope.

Shout out to my fellow queer comic book makers. Even if you’re just xeroxing comics in the campus computer lab and giving them to friends, you are doing good work.

And if Garth Ennis wants to argue that “Preacher” isn’t homophobic, I am ready to throw down in the alley behind my apartment. And by “throw down,” I mean “debate.”

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I dreamed that, even though I'm not on testosterone, I grew facial hair along my cheeks and jaw. I was going to visit family and I'm not out to them, so my mother insisted that I shave. Even after I shaved, there was dense, white blonde hair along my sideburns, like the feathers of a baby chick.

Your painting “Pretty Bunny/Ugly Hare" has really resonated with me and made me cry. Thank you for creating it. It's beautiful and I love it.

Oh wow, thank you so much. I’m so glad you connected with my work.

Figure Study 2023

Work in progress pictures can be seen here

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You may have noticed that parts of this painting are done in different styles/with different techniques. This hand is painted similarly to a “grisaille,” base shadows painted with color built up in thin layers of glaze.

Screenshot study of Claudia from IWTV, done with Posca and Molotow paint pens

playing around with a more stylized approach

The text in this image is from the song "Pirate Jenny" by Bertolt Brecht and Kurt Weill, from the musical "The Threepenny Opera."

My favorite version is this one, by Shilpa Ray, Nick Cave, and Warren Ellis.

(This song is on the Claudia playlist that I have created. I might have created playlists for all the main characters in IWTV.)

!~Pretty Alien II~!

Here's the full body version of my Pretty Alien Sailor Moon. The tentacles on the face are sensory organs, but the tentacles on the chest and lower back are limbs. The tentacles evolved as a way to carry one's young and still have full use of one's hands. The opposable thumb on the feet is what gives the impression that Sailor Moon wears high heels. The "skirt," like the "collar," is a wattle that's inflated during mating displays.

I might revist this as a traditional painting...

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