So I’ve Scanned The Pages Of My Risographed Fashion Study Zine (you Can Buy That Here) And Have Got

Three figure drawings, circa 2009 before I dashed my parents hopes by saying "I wanna quit art school, get a bachelor's in psychology, become a counselor with a focus on art therapy, and also I'm queer as fuck."

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Tomorrow at ass o’clock in the morning I will be getting on a plane to OK to pack my boyfriend, his stuff, two snakes, and a cat into a truck and then roadtrip it all the way back to the PNW!!!

Dreamed that my backyard looked into a forest. In the yard, I saw what looked like a large stag.

When I looked closer, I saw that the stag had a human face. It only had one antler, which was held in place by a ribbon. Instead of hooves, at the end of it’s legs were spindly fingers. It didn’t walk with the ‘palm’ flat to the ground like an ape, it balanced on the very tips of it’s fingers, and it’s legs didn’t move, just the spindly fingers.

Had this dream after I had spent the day wondering what I would look like if I were a demon.

Dreamed that I was putting on make up. I used gold liquid eyeliner to write “Jesus loves me, this I know. Yes, Jesus loves me.” across my cheek bones. I put sparkly orange eyeshadow on my eyelids and the end of my nose.

Dreamed about A. R., a boy that emotionally abused me from 5th - 8th grade. He seemed threatening, but also like he was coming on to me. He stood behind me and slipped his hands up into my shirt. I reached back, grabbed him by the ears, flipped him over my shoulder, and while he was on the ground, I stomped on him. Very satisfying dream.

When he bullied (abused) me, teachers and other adults frequently told me that it must be because he had a crush on me. I was very, very aware that was not the case. He never made “positive” sexual remarks towards me, never showed a lick of attraction, he loathed me. And, it seemed, women/girls in general. My therapist had a theory that A. R. was deeply repressed and self-loathing concerning possible same gender attraction on his part. He never spoke of finding women attractive, was blatantly misogynistic and lesbophobic, and actively drove me away from mutual male friends.

Maybe I dreamed of him being sexually aggressive because I’m thinking of myself as a trans boy, recognizing that a male identity means I could possibly be an object of desire for A. R., as I never was in the past. And I still rejected him. And I did what I said, for years, I could have done with half a chance — kicked his ass.

roycevomit said: this looks finished to me, it’s really beautiful regardless.

Awh! Thank you.

That's one of the things that I really like about your art -- you seem to know exactly when to stop. Your pieces aren't overworked or fussy, they feel straightforward.

I have a hard time stopping on my pieces. I keep working them until I look at them and go "Shit, I should have stopped, like, 8 changes ago." I've been trying to work on that, giving myself "assignments" or guidelines designed to limit my obsessiveness.

For instance, in the painting that I'm working on right now, I'm not allowing myself to use brown or black. That means I can only get a certain level of shadows and depth in the image, so that's one thing that I'm not stressing about.

So if you go to grad school for art therapy, you may end up taking a ferry out to an island to visit an aged psychoanalytic art therapist and present her with drawings of serial killers in exchange for her wisdom.

That's what I will be doing with my Saturday!

I'm giving her a picture of Jeffrey Dahmer and if the trip turns out to be some sort of elaborate murder mystery, please avenge my death.

Also, a collage piece about Edith Kramer and Margaret Naumburg, two early art therapists.

My Etsy: LINK / My Ko-Fi: LINK

Because the rigid heddle loom rolls up the cloth on the front bar, you can’t see everything I’ve woven, so this diagram is the best way to demonstrate how increasingly unhinged this weaving is becoming.

Doing insane shit with string today

(via original illustration fawn 2 by panicvolkushka on Etsy)

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how do you feel about your bart/chris/bobby comic being low-key iconic in some circles? I just read it again and it really brings me totears

I'm glad you find the comic so meaningful.

On one hand, it's gratifying as an artist, to know that my work has resonated with so many people. Based on some of the messages I've gotten from people, the comic has been part of how they processed their own childhood experiences or part of what inspires them to start their own therapy. That's amazing! It's not like I set out with that being the goal of the comic or anything!

On the other hand, it's given me a small experience of "death of the author." I didn't conceive of the comic as a sweeping critique of the "nuclear family animated comedy" or depictions of violence, trauma, or abusive relationships in media. I have LOTS of complex and contradictory opinions on "difficult" subjects in art. I created the comic while taking a class on family and couples therapy, and was inspired by the class to explore how real family/relationship dynamics might occur if I approached these cartoons as real families. I think a lot of people get this backwards -- they see the comic as using a lens of psychology/counseling to critique popular media. My actual experience of thinking up the comic was using popular media to explore what I was learning about psychology/counseling.

That said, I recognize that once something is out in the world, I can't completely control how it's interpreted or used. The positive messages I've received greatly outweigh my ambivalence about how some people view/interpret the comic.

I feel this is close to done. Just needs some more work on the hair and some highlights.

Another painting in progress

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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