Content Warning: Depression, sex, self-hatred, eating disorders, self-harm, trichotillomania, sex work (escort service), suicidal thoughts, mental health Book Review by Soph Myers-Kelley Kabi Nagata creates a beautiful world of simple, soft drawings with beautiful shades of pinks, white, and black. The imagery draws you in and make you connect with the cute depiction she’s made of her likeness, as well as her experience. This book is recommended for teens older than 16. Welcome to the feeling of helplessness and hopelessness of a 28-year-old who’s never had sex, never had a career, and is in the deep nasty pits of… Read More
Bobby Baker Diary Drawings Mental Illness and Me
Guest Review by Katya Robin Bobby Baker is an artist who makes installations and does performances about women’s daily lives. She was diagnosed with Borderline Personality Disorder (BPD; Endnote 1) in 1997. When she started going to a mental health day centre, diary drawing became a core element of her daily art practice and self-care. Her self-imposed daily drawing continued for the next eleven years, thereafter changing to weekly updates. Over this time, she included a series of more than 700 drawings. A selection of 158 photographs of these drawings were exhibited at The Wellcome Collection (Endnote 2) in 2009…. Read More
Eating Matters
Book Review by Kevin Wolf Ink in Water: An Illustrated Memoir (Or, How I Kicked Anorexia’s Ass and Embraced Body Positivity) Eat and Love Yourself Blossoms and Bones: Drawing a Life Back Together Guts Fat Free: Amazing All-True Adventures of Supersize Woman! Eating is an essential part of life. When we have a problem with food it impacts everything else about ourselves. This review covers five books that relate to eating matters. These graphic works provide a variety of very personal stories (except Eat and Love Yourself which is fictional) of eating disorders. They reflect the memoirist’s environment,… Read More
Thick and Thin by Bruce Mutard
I have just returned from the Graphic Novel Conference at Mansfield College Oxford, where MK, Michael Green and I conducted a panel on Graphic Medicine. Among the speakers was the Australian graphic novelist and writer Bruce Mutard to whom I was introduced by Paul Gravett. Bruce was interested in what we are doing at Graphic Medicine, and told me that he had previously drawn a strip on eating disorders in the male. The strip is viewable online (scroll down through Bruce’s short stories to find it) Published in Tango, Love and Food. Edited by Bernard Caleo, published by Cardigan Comics. This… Read More
Thick and Thin
A short story about eating disorders in males, by Australian comics artist Bruce Mutard. Published in Tango, Love and Food. Edited by Bernard Caleo, published by Cardigan Comics. can be viewed online here This is what Bruce says about the story: ‘There is a popular perception that eating disorders only afflict women and are in response to popular media portrayals of skinny models and actresses as exemplars of modern beauty and femininity. Bullshit and bullshit. Perhaps my view is overly subjective, but for me, an eating disorder is generated by low self-esteem, not necessarily linked to appearance, wherein one attempts to… Read More
Daddy’s Girl
Originally published in 1996, reprinted in 2008, Daddy’s Girl neatly illustrates the reason I think it is pointless to try to divide graphic memoirs from graphic fiction. It is a “quasi” memoir, based on Drechsler’s childhood experiences but narrated by two adolescent girls who both suffer abuse at the hands of older males. The naive style and heavy monochrome brushwork complement the teenage language. Most of the book is concerned with Lily, who, among her 3 sisters, is singled out for sexual abuse by her father, a working man who, in his spare time likes to do charitable work distributing goods… Read More