An Autobiographix Year in Review - 2023

This year has been so busy! Nora started a Masters in Social Work program and for some reason, a million administrative duties have fallen in Amaris’s lap. Still, we carved out time to meet on zoom, early in the morning, or late in the evening, to talk about the comics we love and write for Autobiographix. Even a two-hour time zone difference couldn’t keep us from brainstorming ideas for posts and people to interview–and of course, dreaming of future book projects. 

Behind-the-scenes:

It’s early in the morning at the end of the semester….

Here’s a quick snapshot of what we were up to in 2023:

• We started the year with presenting: “Daily Habit: Diary Comics,” at the Southwest Popular Culture and American Culture Association Conference, in Albuquerque, NM. 

• Our academic article, “Troubling the Sequential Image: The Poetry Comics of Bianca Stone,” was published in the Comics Studies Journal. Here is the abstract:

Bianca Stone’s poetry comics often cast narrative and common panel transitions aside to centre the lyricism and playfulness of text and image, while retaining some ‘hallmarks’ of comics such as the speech bubble and pictorial sequence. Stone’s Poetry Comics from the Book of Hours is one of the few single-authored collections of poetry comics currently in print. In addition to her poetry comics, Stone has collaborated with poets to create illustrated texts. Notably, her collaboration with the poet and translator Anne Carson produced a new translation of Antigone (Antigonick), which moves beyond a strictly illustrated text without becoming a full-fledged graphic novel. Most recently, Stone ‘illustrated’ a Gertrude Stein poem to make a children’s book, A Little Called Pauline; she notes that this book would be challenging to read to children since images are a further abstraction of an already abstract text. Like much of Stone’s work, A Little Called Pauline defies a direct adaptation of the text. Despite all her work in the field, Stone’s comics remain largely unstudied. By examining three of her books, this article will illuminate Stone’s important, ongoing, role in the world of comics hybridity and rightfully place her in the rich history of dynamic creators who beg us to reimagine the comics medium and its definitions. To better understand her techniques, we consider her work using existing ideas about comics from a variety of creators and scholars. As we explored Stone’s work, we found that poetry comics is a rich genre, often opposing traditional definitions of comics, that could benefit from more study by comics scholars.

• Amaris’s debut graphic memoir came out! Unfiltered: A Cancer Year Diary was published by Casa Urraca Press.

“Amaris Ketcham starts her daily diary comic without knowing anything about the cancer diagnosis awaiting her partner. Yet even in the thick of his tests and surgeries, she chronicles her cats and her meals, they take hikes, and the world-at-large somehow continues on. This graphic memoir shares the ups and downs of their cancer year together with honesty, humor, and always a sense of resilience.”

• Amaris also flew to Toronto to present on diary comics and mindfulness at the Graphic Medicine Conference. 

• Amaris and her students did follow up on one of our January resolutions and wrote some fan mail—to Craig Thompson!

• And, Nora wrote about Graphic Medicine for a new publication highlighting the positive intersections of technology and health. 

• Nora presented on poetry comics at the Youngstown Lit conference, where she saw Jennifer Sperry Steinorth and asked for an interview on her graphic work for Autobiographix! 

• Since our call to action about creating wikipedia pages for female and non-binary comics artists, two new pages have been created and one was edited. Read more about Teresa Wong, Kelcey Ervick, and Sarah Shay Mirk at wikipedia! 

Amaris and her Graphic Memoir students had a table at the Albuquerque Zine Fest.

Year in numbers:

• We wrote 26 newsletters this year, and interviewed 12 new artists!

• In case you missed it: Our top post from this year was an interview with Ellen O’Grady with 815 views.

• Just before the new year, we hit 300 subscribers! Thanks to you all who follow and read! 

What we’re looking forward to in 2024:

• We will be back at the Southwest Popular Culture and American Culture Association Conference, this time talking about “Crafting Connections: The Handmade Comics Revival,” in Albuquerque, NM.

• Amaris is excited to be teaching creative writing in Glasgow, Scotland this summer–and taking students to the Glasgow Zine Library to learn about zines in Scots!

• Nora’s ambitious (unrealistic?) summer project is to catalog her 200+ vintage comic collection!

• More reviews of comics, interviews with creators, dives into history, comics prompts, and more right here!

---