Curatorial Statement

Comics are one of the more raw and immediate modes of storytelling. I bet most of us diligently drew comics on our desks or notebooks in grade school, before we started to worry about whether anyone else thought they were any good. They remain a medium for the people. I celebrate that.

Please enjoy this first iteration of Agitator Comics! There are many more to come.

Gretchen Hasse, Curator
July 2021

Buppy on the Moon by Sean Mac
seanmac.com  |  @sugar.bro 

Hi, my name is Sean Mac and I like making comics that make people smile :). My comics range from the cute n cuddle to the creepy n crazy. I'm inspired by the DIY comics scene and making comics for risograph printing.

__________________

Remain  by Ash H.G. 
Ashhg.com  |  @ashleehg

Ash H.G. is a painter/illustrator & comic book artist/writer living and working in Chicago, IL. His recently completed graphic novel East District is set to be released in Fall 2021.

__________________

I Dreamed of Bowie by Carlos Luis Sanchez Becerra
tarmajenye.wordpress.com  |  @majenye

Carlos Luis Sanchez Becerra, (b. 1987) based in Carora, Venezuela is an interdisciplinary artist who researches Caribbean identity, queerness, folk art, and syncretism in the XXIst century. He uses painting, comics, performance, social media, and music to articulate his evolving speech. "Fanzinestesia," shown at the Espacio Proyecto Libertad, was a project in which the observers were able to insert themselves in his narratives and stories wearing his mask-sculptures while looking at Becerra's comics, in which Venezuelan national heroes have sex with dictators or dictators are portrayed as colorful animals in a meme. Inside the exhibition, participants left themselves outside to, for a moment, believe in pink crocodiles and submarine unicorns. Becerra's work has been shown at Non for profits and museums all over the world including MCA Zulia, MoMA Capital District, MoMA Maracaibo, Museum Juan Astorga Anta, Espacio Projecto Libertad, ABRA Caracas, German Embassy of Venezuela, Barquisimeto City Council, Ps122 New York, and others. He won the Hispanoamerican Young Artist award from the Alicante Council in Spain and the Corpozulia Biennial in Venezuela.

I Dreamed of Bowie by Carlos Luis Sanchez Becerra painted by Alonso Galue
www.agalue.com  @a.galue

Alonso Galue (Venezuelan, b. 1994, Chicago Based) BFA at University of Los Andes, is a multidisciplinary artist whose experimental use of traditional painting and sculpture articulates speeches on labor, existential crisis, and totalitarianism. Pulitzer Prize Jerry Saltz commented on Instagram Galue’s work is “a strong voice of the future.”

I dreamed of Bowie is a comic book project made by Carlos Luis Sanchez Becerra and Alonso Galue. The outline was drawn by Sanchez Becerra in Carora, Venezuela and later painted by Galue in Chicago, Illinois. This is their first attempt in creating four handed works based on their friendship, distance, and effects of globalization in the young latinoamerican population.

In the work David Bowie tells the story of Lou Reed’s death with a surrealistic plot twist that shows the dexterity of microstories that latinoamerican writers are known for.

__________________

When I Was Ten by Donna Kubica 
twitter.com/ripripred1

I'm in my mid twenties and I've always adored art and story. I went to uni for creative writing and constantly did art as a hobby through my life. Comics are a happy marriage of two of my favorite things that I love to do from time to time. I started drawing comics about things that were happening that had some weight on my mind. My attempt at self-art therapy, or like journaling but with art. This is one of those "journals" - a pretty-much-verbatim conversation I had in the car with my father. The mundane combined with tragic felt almost artful in itself.

__________________

My Turn by Sonali Kolhatkar 
SonaliKolhatkar.com  |  @sonalikolhatkar

Sonali Kolhatkar is an artist whose work focuses on identity and being seen in a world that invisibilizes women of color. She is also award winning progressive journalist, host and producer of Rising Up With Sonali, writing fellow at the Independent Media Institute, amateur musician and mother of two. The race between virus and vaccine has consumed the world as the COVID-19 pandemic continues to ravage societies and nations. But just as money and power are stratified between the haves and the have-nots, our vaccine distribution system was rolled out chaotically and I found myself among the masses of the desperate have-nots clawing my way into a system meant to exclude me so I could obtain safety - and clarity. 

__________________

4th by Jay Dearien
porcadis.com

Jay Dearien is a former database engineer who lived for many years in Tokyo, Japan. He began regular web postings of comics in 2013. He's written over 1.2 million words, including the novel, "Between Laughing and Crying," since 2011 in National Novel Writing Month. He's been an ML for NaNoWriMo since 2014. In this comic, a young man, Casey, dives into the depths of his own psyche, where his two spiritual tourguides, Louise Terrence and Shiela the Mermaid, burst into a parody of a familiar song to explain the crazy surroundings.

__________________

BLAH by Michael Abcede
abcedeart.com  |  @abcedeart

I am a visual artist and musician looking to amuse and irritate! I draw absurd/strange/corny cartoons for the amusement of very few people with the aim of achieving world peace.

__________________

Slackerverse Ramen by C Trevor Manika
@dotofthec

I am a skateboarder and interdisciplinary artist from the southside of Chicago. I work in the service industry and love printmaking. I am currently working on a book called 'Coping' which is a collection of interviews, illustrations and writings from people based in the communities of the service industry, skateboarding, and music industry, and how all these groups have dealt with covid. When it comes to my comics my work is derivative of loveable losers from my life. I compile certain aspects of these people into my characters, giving each of them all strong personalities.

__________________

It Is Okay / Todo Bien 
by Gretchen Hasse & Camilo Gonzalez
Translated by Alonso Galué
gretchenhasse.com  |  @gbhasse

Gretchen Hasse is a storyteller working in comics, collage, public art, and moving images. She curates with Agitator Co-operative Gallery, which she cofounded in 2017. Gretchen is drawn to stories and images that describe perseverance through pain, and she knows that a dark sense of humor, a keen eye for social criticism, and the diligence to work for change are essential tools for survival. I wrote It Is Okay after I began sequestering with my partner Camilo, late in 2020. He was born in Havana, and his family left in the early years of the revolution. Camilo has vivid memories of his life on the island. A few years after his family settled in Chicago, he became part of several punk bands, and lived vivid stories of a different sort. The comic was my way of stringing some of these stories together, and also a way to figure out more about a person I love. Special thanks to Agitator member Alonso Galué for translating.

———