Ndn Comix

 

Native Pride

Native artists have been working with carricature and image since early depictions of cowboy colonists on horseback getting an arrow shower. A recent exhibition at the Smithsonian American Indian Museum curates an outstanding collection of Aboriginal artists who work with comix or other allied illustrative styles. Including artists like Navajo artist Jolene Nenibah Yazzie and her Warrior Women series this show puts non-Native comix out there that feature Indians hunting dinosaurs or just being cannon fodder for cowboy’s to shame. My own work in comix has featured a re-telling of Aboriginal worker’s history as well as Secwepemc stories and legends. Working with Vancouver’s Healthy Aboriginal Network I have helped to letter and layout several great projects illustrated by Steven Keewatin Sanderson that use comix as a way to create positive messages and health issue awareness for Aboriginal youth. Inspired by comix like Super Shamoo, an Inuit superhero on the early Inuit Broadcasting Corporation turned comic to create awareness around glue sniffing, I worked with Redwire Magazine to create an all NDN comix version of the magazine that continues to be a collector’s edition of the mag. Native editorial and politic comics artist the late Everett Soop’s life and work was on display at the Galt Musuem, Everett Soop referred to himself as “the pit bull terrier of native journalism.” a member of the Kainai Nation, Everett’s biting commentary is an inspiration for many Aboriginal comic artists. I am excited to see his work memorialized. To read more about my own work and interest in Native comics check out this interview with Broken Pencil.