Emergence Issue: TGD’s fifth issue features a dynamic group of 15 creators who are deeply committed to addressing systematic challenges in their communities through creativity and emerging ideologies. Buy Now Will you talk about the neighborhood and the community where you grew up? I’m second-generation Chinese American, and I grew up in a predominantly …
Emergence Issue: TGD’s fifth issue features a dynamic group of 15 creators who are deeply committed to addressing systematic challenges in their communities through creativity and emerging ideologies. Buy Now Reflecting The Great Discontent’s commitment to accessibility—in all forms, including language—this interview with Sheharazad (Pezeshkpour) Fleming and Meena Khalili was translated in the print edition …
Emergence Issue: TGD’s fifth issue features a dynamic group of 15 creators who are deeply committed to addressing systematic challenges in their communities through creativity and emerging ideologies. Buy Now What would excite you to talk about today? Human potential. Possibility. That’s always made me happy, even as a kid. When other little girls …
Micheal Two Bulls is an Oglala Lakota artist from South Dakota whose work spans an eclectic array of disciplines and mediums. Two Bulls weaves together elements of photography, drawing, painting, printmaking, songwriting, and other creative disciplines to create multi-layered compositions that invite his audiences to question and explore. At the heart of his creative process is a unyielding commitment to collaboration, community, and family. This commitment is reflected in the nature of this interview, which includes Douglas and Reed Two Bulls, family members who feature in many of his creative projects, including The Wake Singers band.
From being forced to leave art school before graduation, to jumping straight into freelance design with little to no experience, John Zabawa has taken anything but a traditional path. We talked with him recently about what prompted his move from the Midwest to California (he’d lived in Chicago for ten years before landing in LA); the realities of living and creating as a low-income artist; how point of view may be the great differentiator in the age of the ubiquitous image; and why place and space are everything.
Shawna X was born and raised at a cultural crossroads; her Chinese heritage on the one side, and a newly-formed Asian American identity on the other. When she moved to the US from China at the age of 7, she quickly realized that language was a barrier to connecting with other kids. So she learned to cultivate a different, more universal kind of language—drawing. Here, the Brooklyn-based artist/designer reflects on rejecting her family’s expectations for her future, and how she eventually reconnected with her roots through art. Touching on ethnicity, sexuality, tokenism, and cultural pride, Shawna gives us a glimpse into the backstory that’s informed her iconic illustrations and paintings.
Adam J. Kurtz has been making, commodifying, and promoting what he makes since he was just a teenager using the internet to connect and share with community. Here, the Brooklyn-based artist and author reflects on his self-made creative path and process; from setting up shop at church-basement emo shows in the Baltimore suburbs, to the novelty t-shirt that saved him during a period of unemployment, writing his first book of essays, and the accidental mantra that’s made all the difference in his outlook.
Gary Taxali’s body of work has influenced many artists and illustrators over the years, and the imprint of his distinctive aesthetic has touched everything from children’s books and toys, to album covers, men’s fashion accessories, and even 25¢ coins for the Royal Canadian Mint. Here, he recalls childhood days spent in Toronto’s Little India, and the impact both Bollywood “bad guys” and Hindustani classical have had on his work; why he’s always felt like he was born in the wrong era; and how he’s channelled his lifelong love of the classics into a successful, decades-long career as an artist, illustrator, and educator.
Laura Letinsky grew up in Winnipeg, where she had the freedom to experiment artistically without any concern over who was watching or judging her. Having since made her life in the US, she continues to push societal norms and expectations though the artwork she makes. From her studio in Chicago, she spoke to us about the roles that tenuousness and imperfection play in her process, why it’s important for her to provoke and unsettle by way of the photographic still life, and how there’s really no such thing as ‘balance’ in her life as an artist, professor, and parent.
Brooklyn-based artist/illustrator Dan Christofferson’s personal story is deeply rooted in the fantastic imagery, iconography, and narratives of Utah’s Mormon church & state. Here, he reflects on making the decision to move his family from his hometown, Salt Lake City, in order to carve out a new path in Brooklyn; on the mutually-beneficial nature of his partnership with Dan Cassaro at Young Jerks; and how his ideas around design legacy (and working late) shifted once he became a father.
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