MFAIVC-viewbook-vol4-1_ISSU

VOL . 4, I S SUE 1

A RT S

a t WA S H I N G T O N U N I V E R S I T Y I N S T . L O U I S

Illustration by Maddie Baker, MFA-IVC ’25

S A M F O X S C H O O L O F D E S I G N & V I S UA L

Artist-Authors Drawn Together With paper, pen, stylus, and sketchbook, MFA-IVC students build unique stories Our program draws from tremendous Facilities & Resources, starting with our home in Weil Hall. See A3

Dive into our 8-page Student Work feature section with a spotlight on the MFA-IVC thesis project. See B1

Get to know our faculty — distinguished scholars and practitioners in illustration, design, and visual culture. See A7

A2

CURRICULUM

THE MFA-IVC CURRICULUM

T

he Sam Fox School’s MFA in Illustration & Visual Culture program combines studio practice in illustration and writing with the study of visual and material culture. With a focus on illustrator authorship, this twoyear, fully residential program is made for illustrators, comic artists, and designers.

MFA-IVC graduates will be prepared to work as author-artists of graphic novels and picture books, professors of illustration, critical writers on popular culture, and curatorial staff in museums, libraries, and auction houses.

The MFA-IVC program is built on the strengths and expertise of the school’s illustration and design faculty and the vast visual culture resources of WashU, including the Mildred Lane Kemper Art Museum and the Dowd Illustration Research Archive, a preeminent site for studying the history and culture of American illustration.

I finally realized this program is about finding your fellow travelers— whether they lived 100 years ago or sit at the desk across from yours.

Cultivating a unique voice comes from the people and material we surround ourselves with every day.

—James Palmer Jr., Class of 2027

NUTS & BOLTS

50% illustration studio work

YEAR 1 FALL

YEAR 1 SPRING

Finding Your Voice

Discovering Your Place

Understanding visual culture and mapping your own visual history.

Illustration Studio I: Drawing & Voice

Illustration Studio II: Artist / Author / Audience

6 CREDITS

6 CREDITS

Reading Pictures: Illustration History

The Designed Image

3 CREDITS

20% visual culture history & writing

Learning to narrate a usable history and finding a conceptual home for your work.

Reading Pictures: Material Lab

3 CREDITS

Reading Visual Culture 3 CREDITS

1 CREDIT

Exhibiting the Archive

Applied Illustration

2 CREDITS

3 CREDITS

Creative Writing for Illustration 3 CREDITS

10–20% hands-on archive work

YEAR 2 FALL

YEAR 2 SPRING

Framing Your Practice

Building Your Audience

Homing in on your core ideas and style to build your thesis statement and project.

Thesis Studio I

Thesis Studio II

8 CREDITS

8 CREDITS

Thesis Mentoring

Pedagogy & Professional Practices

1 CREDIT

10–20% electives

Showtime! Exhibiting your work, entering the industry, and planting your flag.

Writing Visual Culture 3 CREDITS

Elective 3 CREDITS

1 CREDIT

Electives 6 CREDITS

C A M P U S & FA C I L I T I E S

A3

Our Home in Weil Hall

View of Anabeth and John Weil Hall from the Jordan Charitable Foundation Central Plaza. Peter Aaron / OTTO.

O

ur newest building, Anabeth and John Weil Hall, houses all of the Sam Fox School’s graduate programs in visual art, architecture, landscape architecture, urban design, and, of course—the MFA-IVC! Designed

by KieranTimberlake, the 82,000-squarefoot, LEED Platinum facility includes our digital fabrication studio, a time-based media studio, numerous exhibition and project spaces, and an indoor courtyard with a two-story, living green wall—a favorite spot for students.

Located on the main floor of Weil, the Roxanne H. Frank Design Studio—a.k.a. the Roxy—is the MFA-IVC’s home base.

Each student has their own studio space and access to the MFA-IVC printer, scanners, Wacom tablets, cutting boards, and central AV. With ample space for pinups and group critiques, the Roxy also provides numerous areas to work, read, and sketch.

Continued on A4

MIDDLE: Students working in the “Roxy,” the MFA-IVC’s dedicated design studio. Whitney Curtis / WashU. BOTTOM: With a two-story, living green wall, Kuehner Court is a favorite hang-out spot. James Ewing / JBSA.

The design studio is gorgeous.

There’s amazing light and lots of areas to work.

It’s a very communal space, but you also have the privacy to focus on making great work.

— John Hendrix, Kenneth E. Hudson Professor of Art and Chair, MFA-IVC

A4

C A M P U S & FA C I L I T I E S

Sumers Welcome Center and Brookings Hall. Peter Aaron / OTTO.

Continued from A3 Vast Campus Resources In nearby Bixby Hall, our expansive printmaking atelier provides a dedicated space for MFA-IVC students to explore book arts and an array of printmaking approaches. The suite is outfitted with equipment for etching, letterpress, lithography, intaglio, photopolymer plate, silkscreen, and risograph printing.

At Island Press, the school’s researchbased printmaking workshop, students can assist in the production of prints by some of today’s most influential artists, including Trenton Doyle Hancock, Lisa Anne Auerbach, James Siena, Sue Coe, and Henrik Drescher.

Adjacent to Weil Hall, the Mildred Lane Kemper Art Museum offers three floors of gallery space to showcase its world-class permanent collection as well as exhibitions by leading modern and contemporary artists and designers. All students have free membership to the museum. The school also has a dedicated art and architecture library—which holds more than 105,000 volumes in various media—and an illustration research archive (see A5).

Students will find the museum curators and subject librarians eager to help with their research!

Because all of our programs are located on campus, students have access to the full resources of WashU. They can engage with students and faculty from other disciplines through classes and collaborative projects, participate in student organizations, and easily access the city of St. Louis (see A10)—one of the best reasons to become a WashU student.

MIDDLE: (left) Students learn printmaking

techniques while assisting visiting artists with projects through Island Press. Caitlin Custer/ WashU. (right) The MFA-IVC’s communal studio space in “the Roxy.” Audrey Westcott/WashU. BOTTOM: (left) Visiting artist Deb JJ Lee

conducts one-on-one reviews with students.

Carol Green / WashU. (right) Lobby of the Mildred Lane Kemper Art Museum.

Virginia Harold/WashU.

TAKE A 360° TOUR OF OUR SPACES! Get an inside look at the Sam Fox School’s studios and facilities from the comfort of your couch.

>> samfoxschool.washu.edu/the-school/visit

C A M P U S & FA C I L I T I E S

What is the Dowd Illustration Research Archive?

T

he Dowd Illustration Research Archive (DIRA) is the most comprehensive archival collection of periodical illustration held by any academic institution. Established in 2007, the DIRA aims to acquire, preserve, promote, and bring sustained academic consideration to the culture of illustration.

The growing range of the collection extends from book, magazine, and advertising illustration to comics in all their forms—caricature, poster design, and virtually every aspect of visual culture. A particular focus is 20th-century periodical illustration, including the collections of some of America’s premier illustrators such as Al Parker, Robert Weaver, Henry Raleigh, and others.

The collection also includes the Walt Reed Illustration Archive, a distinguished resource comprising original illustrations, periodicals, books, and magazine tear sheets from the 1860s to the 1970s. It is a tremendous resource for students and faculty alike.

The MFA-IVC program works closely with the DIRA and the University Libraries’ of Special Collections, whose faculty co-teach courses in research methods and curatorial practice. They foster the discovery of new materials and new perspectives, and are an indispensable part of Team IVC.

A5

151k

We have worked to diversify our holdings and prioritized women and people of color, including the acquisition of illustrators represented in the collection drawings and papers of the cartoonist and novelist Charles Johnson. The students are also benefiting from rich material in years of illustration rare books, too—for instance, a gold mine represented of 18th and 19th century caricature. In the 1,000+ age of the digital file, tangible physical linear feet of archival materials objects can seem magical. digitized tear sheets

115

163

Featured artists:

—D.B. Dowd, Professor and Faculty Director, Dowd Illustration Research Archive

SPENCER T. BANKS R.O. BLECHMAN NELL BRINKLEY SEYMOUR CHWAST BERNIE FUCHS JOHN HELD, JR. ROSE O’NEILL GLADYS PARKER ROBERT ANDREW PARKER JACK UNRUH

ACTIVITY ZONE!

1

2

3

4 1) J.C. Leyendecker. Tearsheet of The Saturday Evening Post cover, July 7, 1934.

Al Parker, for The Saturday Evening Post, June 1, 1946.

From the Dowd Illustration Research Archive collection, digital archives.

2) E. Simms Campbell. Tearsheet of Judge magazine cover.

3) Original works of comic art from the Craig Yoe Teaching Collection. The drawings are part of the Dowd Illustration Research Archive in Special Collections at WashU Libraries.

4) A selection of Golden Age comics from the DIRA’s archive.

EXTRA-CURRICUL ARS

A6

Visitors Bring Inspiration, Big Ideas

E

ach semester, the Sam Fox School brings nationally and internationally recognized illustrators, designers, architects, artists, landscape architects, urban designers, historians, and critics to campus, promoting new ideas in practice, theory, and technology. The MFA-IVC program also brings in accomplished artists for class visits, workshops, and individual critiques. You’ll have the opportunity to meet exciting practitioners in the field and learn about many professional paths.

IVC VISITORS

Recent collaborations have included the Illustration Media Symposium in 2019 with the DIRA and the Norman Rockwell Museum, as well as Blind Spots, the 13th annual Illustration Research Symposium, in 2023.

BELOW: Alison Bechdel received the Washington University

International Humanities Prize in November 2022. MFA-IVC students met with her in studio for a pin-up critique. Whitney Curtis / WashU.

ELEANOR DAVIS

NGOZI UKAZU

CARSON ELLIS

ACTIVITY ZONE!

MY FIRST DAY OF GRAD SCHOOL Last night I had the started out

a

noun

drawing implements

were

large object

, and my

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same animal, plural

say

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p lu r al noun

plural noun

. The Cintiqs

color

, which is exactly when I

. No matter, I thought, and grabbed

plural noun

exclamation

favorite childhood toy

object on your desk name of your nemesis

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and some

same famous illustrator

earworm noun

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and draw

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instead. But that’s when the

letter of the alphabet

started ,

. Of course, there’s nothing I fear more than

animal

really hit the fan. I hit Cmd

walked in singing

, but how do you tell that to

won’t notice, and I drew dozens of

turned

article of clothing

famous illustrator

told us to take out our

out of my pocket and put that on instead. Not a moment too soon, either,

because that’s when a

, and I couldn’t find anything but

JILLIAN TAMAKI

. When I finally found my desk, I bumped squarely into

snack food

discovered I wasn’t wearing my a

least favorite color

to draw on. The printers had been replaced by

were made of a

, but then it got really weird. First of all, when I got to

adjective

studio, all my

dream about my first day in grad school. Things

superlative adjective

noun

.

to print my work, like usual, but then

verb ending in -ing

same famous illustr ator

from the risograph. Before I could was

verb ending in - ing

over me wield-

, yelling, “You know less about illustration and visual culture

type of pet

!” I’m so glad I’m going to the Sam Fox School because

now the only thing that frightens me more than

same animal

Text by Stephanie Ellis Schlaifer

is

same famous illustrator

.

IVAN BRUNETTI UNIVERSITY NEWS

Alison Bechdel Receives 2022 Washington University International Humanities Prize Awarded by WashU’s Center for the Humanities in Arts & Sciences, the biennial prize honors the lifetime work of a noted scholar, writer, or artist who has made a significant and sustained contribution to the world of arts and letters. The prize is accompanied by a $25,000 award.

B1

STUDENT WORK Our students create work in a wide array of forms and media, from books and comics to posters, games, and film. Each contributes a unique and valuable perspective to the field, shaped by their diverse experiences and backgrounds, both personally and professionally.

Katie Klaras

SPECIAL FEATURE: STUDENT WORK

B2

Tommy Attwood

Kruttika Susarla

SPECIAL FEATURE: STUDENT WORK

B3

SPECIAL FEATURE: STUDENT WORK

B4

THE MFA-IVC

Thesis What is an MFA in Illustration & Visual Culture thesis project?

And…what can it be?

T

he MFA-IVC thesis project defines a professional orientation in the practice, criticism, and curation of illustration and cartooning today. Thesis projects have both a studio component and a critical component, drawing on a student’s creative work and the cultural archive as zones of investigation and achievement.

For the studio component, students create an original and complete work. This might take the form of a picture book, zine, game, animation, comic, or another form of publishable matter.

Students also write and design a critical essay that establishes an editorial position for engagement with visual culture. This document addresses the student’s working process and provides the historical and contextual framework of their work within the field.

Students begin work on their thesis project in the fall of their second year (see A2). In the Thesis Studio courses, students receive critical feedback and support to help them frame their ideas.

In the spring, thesis projects are shown at a public exhibition.

Taylor Dow, MFA ’21 Selected card designs from Bad Baby Lich Lords.

MFA candidates exhibit their work at the 2023 MFA-IVC Thesis Exhibition. Dmitri Jackson/WashU.

SPECIAL FEATURE: STUDENT WORK

THE MFA-IVC

THESIS ESSAY As part of their thesis project, MFA-IVC students write a critical essay, which establishes a historical and contextual framework for their work.

Liam Cassidy, MFA ’24 Laughing in the Wrong Places: Daniel Clowes and the Danger of Nostalgia

This essay explores the relationship between art objects and our past, narrowing in on nostalgia as a malevolent force in American culture that will lead to its eventual downfall.

Focusing on Daniel Clowes’ latest graphic novel Monica as a case study, I demonstrate how graphic stories like this seek to reflect rather than interpret, and are often more closely aligned to the creator’s biography than an attempt at broad strokes or political pandering. The essay uses interviews with Clowes at various points of his career, reviews of Monica, academic essays on Clowes, as well as articles and books dissecting nostalgia and its correlation to American politics. I take a unique approach to this essay, placing my narrative voice in a fictional post-apocalyptic scenario. I did this because I am a fiction writer and this position felt natural, but also I wanted to emphasize the real stakes facing the United States in our upcoming election. In this essay, I focus on blending visual and literary analysis when looking at Clowes’ work. This is a subtextual argument that I am making in terms of how we consider comics and graphic narratives, as much of the source material I looked at that was specific to comics leaned heavily in the literary direction and neglected visual cues for interpretation.

Work by Tommy Attwood, MFA ’25. Virginia Herold/WashU.

Cora Trout, MFA ’24 Cover, Uncover: The Changing Face of Architecture on Locust Street

Locust Street was once a vibrant banking and commercial district in downtown St. Louis. Today, it is an untidy collection of new, old, dilapidated, semi-intact, restored, and vacant buildings punctuated by crumbling parking lots and garages threatening imminent collapse. To understand why, we must reassemble Locust Street. As St. Louis watched its wealthy, white population flock to the suburbs at mid-century, the revitalization of the decaying urban center became one of the city’s primary preoccupations. Beginning in the early 1950s, a calculated and conscious physical transformation of the central business district began, lasting through the 1960s.

This essay, which integrates my personal experience walking and exploring downtown with archival research, reconstructs the fierce modernization arms race that consumed the street’s large financial institutions, the competition between small commercial businesses for the most modern storefront, and the drama surrounding the construction of a contested parking garage.

These events have shaped the subsequent development and current preservation agenda of the street, both of which have contributed to the street’s indecipherability. Understanding the impetus for and enactment of Locust Street’s architectural transformation helps newcomers to St. Louis, visitors, and longtime residents alike empathize with a city that has been poked and prodded, built and rebuilt, by city planners, boosters, and elected officials for more than a century.

Work by Sarah Hawkes, MFA ’25. Virginia Herold/WashU.

Work by Dee Cea, MFA ’24. Carol Green/WashU.

B5

SPECIAL FEATURE: STUDENT WORK

B6

Danielle Ridolfi, MFA ’23

Cora Trout, MFA ’24. Cora Trout/WashU

Cleonique Hilsaca, MFA ’25. Virginia Herold/WashU.

Jeffrey Johnson, MFA ’24. Carol Green/WashU.

SPECIAL FEATURE: STUDENT WORK

B7

Animated GIF Triptych Students designed a three-part animated sequence (or, ahem, a GIFtych) to create a dynamic narrative with ambient, looping motions. They began by making a list of 100 things they like drawing and then worked intentionally with them. “Learning to solve a project in a world that you enjoy is a huge part of finding your voice,” said program chair John Hendrix. “When we make things we enjoy, our work gets better.”

Shumyle Haider, MFA ’23

Emily Bielski, MFA ’23

Cleonique Hilsaca, MFA ’25

Noah Jodice, MFA ’22 Selected for the Society of Illustrators 64th Annual Exhibition—Uncategorized Moving Image

SPECIAL FEATURE: STUDENT WORK

B8

Early Career Success Recent graduates from the MFA-IVC program have found success in many areas across the illustration industry including publishing, studios, scholarship, and teaching.

Recent publications by MFA alumni Danielle Ridolif, J. Marshall Smith, and Stephen Barany on display in the IVC studio. Cora Trout/WashU.

PUBLICATIONS

TEACHING

RECOGNITION

STUDIO WORK

Danielle Ridolfi, MFA ’23 • When the Dark Clouds Come, 2025 Harper Collins/Quill Tree Books

Jeffrey Johnson, MFA ’24 • Assistant Professor of Graphic Design, Culver Stockton College

Shumyle Haider, MFA ’23 • Founder, Principal of Moji Studio

Stephen Barany, MFA ’22 • Alphabet Parade: An Alliterative Alphabet Adventure, 2026

Henry Uhrik, MFA ’22 • Assistant Professor of Practice, University of Utah

Cora Trout, MFA ’24 • Lewis E. Atherton Prize for an outstanding master’s thesis on Missouri history, State Historical Society of Missouri, 2024

J. Marshall Smith, MFA ’21 • Testament, 2025 Bulgilhan Press

Madeline Valentine, MFA ’21 • Assistant Professor of Digital Illustration, Wonsook Kim College of Fine Arts, Illinois State University

Taylor Dow, MFA ’21 • Art Director and Designer, Titmouse, Inc., Los Angeles

Noah Jodice, MFA ’22 • ICON13 Board, PR & Communications Chair • Silver Medal, Society of Illustrators 67th Annual Show Kruttika Susarla, MFA ’22 • Gold Medal, Society of Illustrators 67th Annual Show

FROM LEFT TO RIGHT:

Noah Jodice, cover illustration for the Sam Fox School’s Socially Engaged Practice brochure.

American Illustration 45 Chosen Winner.

Henry Uhrik, Boo Boo Kah Noo. 2024 Grand Prize Winner, Massachusetts Independent Comic Expo.

Kruttika Susarla, Albo! Albo is a steed full of stories, but when he mysteriously vanishes, three kids with big imaginations and little patience for unruly uncles team up, determined to find him.

FA C U LT Y

What Does Your

MEET OUR FACULT Y

MARK-MAKER Say About You?

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ADULTERATED SHARPIE MAGNUM

A7

Kenneth E. Hudson Professor of Art and Chair, MFA in Illustration & Visual Culture Program John Hendrix is a New York Times best-selling illustrator and author of many children’s books, including The Mythmakers: The Remarkable Fellowship of C.S. Lewis and J.R.R. Tolkien, Drawing Is Magic, and The Faithful Spy: Dietrich Bonhoeffer and the Plot to Kill Hitler, which won a Gold Medal from the Society of Illustrators. His illustrations have appeared on book jackets and in newspapers and magazines all over the world, including Rolling Stone, The New Yorker, Esquire, and The New York Times, among many others. John has taught illustration at WashU since 2005. jhendrix@wustl.edu

Keep an eye on me. Maybe both eyes.

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Professor and Faculty Director, Dowd Illustration Research Archive LINO CUTTER

I contain multiples.

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Bowties. My God, I love bowties.

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#2 & #4 ROUND WATERCOLOR BRUSHES, “MEDIUM-CHEAP”

D.B. Dowd is an illustrator and writer who lectures and curates exhibitions on the history of illustration and cartooning. Through his award-winning travel zine Spartan Holiday, he documents his engagement with the social landscape through a blend of reportage, memoir, and history. His book A Is for Autocrat: A Trumpian Alphabet, Illustrated (Spartan Holiday Books) won a national gold Addy award from the American Advertising Federation in 2021. Another book project, Reading Pictures: A History of Illustration, is forthcoming from Princeton University Press. dbdowd@wustl.edu

Not here to win any popularity contests.

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I answer to Banksy.

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Associate Professor A literary historian by training, Heidi Kolk’s research focuses on the politics of memory, especially the intersections of race and space, heritage, and the material history of American cities. Her 2019 book, Taking Possession: The Politics of Memory in a St. Louis Town House, engages many of these subjects. Heidi’s ongoing project on the “hidden” history of internment explores the lives and work of Japanese-American architects who survived WWII prison camps and went on to make vital contributions to the postwar American cultural landscape. hkolk@wustl.edu

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I ghost people.

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I beat the system.

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I don’t believe in coffee filters, either.

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Just the facts, ma’am.

PAPER MATE® SHARPWRITER

I just found 12 pencils in the bottom of my bag.

And my car keys!

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Assistant Professor Shreyas R Krishnan is an illustrator-designer from Chennai, India. She explores intersections between visual culture and gender, and personal and collective memory, through nonfiction comics and zines. She is an editor of the Ignatz Award–nominated South Asian graphic narratives project Bystander Anthology. Shreyas also co-organizes Bad Drawing Club, a monthly drawing group for folks of marginalized genders. sravikrishnan@wustl.edu

Lecturer Dan Zettwoch is a cartoonist, information designer, and printmaker. In addition to many self-published zines and handcrafted mini-comics, his books include Birdseye Bristoe (Drawn & Quarterly), Amazing Facts & Beyond (Uncivilized Books), and Science Comics: Cars: Engines That Move You (First Second). His goofball illustrations and jam-packed diagrams have also been seen in the Missouri History Museum, the State Capitol Museum, and in homemade screenprints commemorating local birds, baseball, and strange foods. dzettwoch9876@wustl.edu UNIVERSITY LIBRARIES STAFF

GENERAL PENCIL CO. KIMBERLY® #525 9XXB

The single-source, 82% extra dark chocolate of pencils.

Undertones of fig and wine. À

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Dowd Illustration Research Archive Curator LAMY FOUNTAIN PEN

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Andrea Degener develops and maintains archival collections specializing in illustration of the late 19th and 20th centuries. Her goal is to elevate the visibility of the Dowd Illustration Research Archive and the legitimacy of visual culture in meaningful scholarship. andread@wustl.edu

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There is a KyleBrush named after me.

Head of

Special Collections Management

Joy Novak oversees all curatorial and collection management activities for Special Collections, including collection development, instruction, reference, processing, cataloging, and space management. jnovak@wustl.edu SUPPORTING FACULTY

ADMINISTRATION

Heather Corcoran Gerald Early Jonathan Hanahan Bill Kartalopoulos

Charlie White Ralph J. Nagel Dean of the Sam Fox School Meghan Kirkwood Director, College and Graduate School of Art

Edward Kinsella III Vidhya Nagarajan Aggie Toppins

FA C U LT Y

A8

The Accidental Researcher When I was beginning my own graduate illustration experience, you would not have been able to convince

of course, that did not work. I needed a different approach. Naturally, I had to go back and track down all these citations and get the quotes accurate, and it was a mess. When I began The Mythmakers, my recent

me that “research” was going to be a critical part of my pracJohn Hendrix tice someday. What I loved was drawing and visual storytelling. But what I came to realize is that writing and research is a magic portal to creating the work you’ve always wished to make.

I'm an accidental writer, and I'm also an accidental researcher. I knew I wanted to tell stories about the fascinating lives of people like John Brown, Dietrich Bonhoeffer, and the Inklings. In order to do that, I needed to read a lot of books. Plus I had to find a way to catalog and index that information so that I can use it in some way down the road. Unfortunately, I did not get a chance to learn how to do this kind of research-for-illustration in graduate school. As you might expect, the lessons I learned came the hard way through experience (i.e.: mistakes).

For example: the rough first draft I wrote of Faithful Spy, my graphic novel about Dietrich Bonhoeffer joining a plot to assassinate Hitler, I wrote quotes in my

graphic novel tracing the creative friendship of C. S. Lewis and J. R. R. Tolkien, I had a much clearer plan of how to write and how to research. In many ways, we began the MFA-IVC program to give illustrators the tools to create research-based visual storytelling.

A good example of the challenge of visual research for storytelling is found in the example above, The Mythmakers. In this book, I wished to give young readers a birds eye view of the entire history of human storytelling. This was not only a massive challenge of research, but also of visual hierarchy and design.

In the image below, you can see Lion and Wizard taking readers through The Hall of Myth, and the Tree of Tales. These four pages took weeks of research, writing, and drawing to deliver just the right amount of context to the readers, while seamlessly fitting into the overall narrative.

When I describe my recent work I often say that they are books made of 100% words and 100% images.

That is a bit of a dodge, specifically when readers wonder about the category of what I’m making—are The Faithful Spy and The Mythmakers non-fiction novels or comics or something else? The contemporary practice of illustration today is found precisely in these odd, wonderful, and strange interstitial spaces. Illustrators today are simultaneously writers, researchers, artists, and designers. Truthfully, I make books for the way I like to learn things about our world— a blended synthetic language of images, maps, illustrations, drawings, comics, and prose. In the MFA-IVC program, we’re going to teach you to think of yourself as something beyond simply an illustrator. What is possible when research is a portal to storytelling? What might you make when writing is a pathway to drawing? What might the world learn when they see it through your own curiosity?

manuscript that I did not initially footnote because I thought I could simply remember where the original sources were located. Up until that point, the manuscripts I had written were for picture books, but this was a much bigger problem to solve. And

Exploring Public Memory As a cultural historian who began academic life as a visual artist and poet, I have long gravitated to cross-disciplinary study. I work primarily on 19th- and 20th-century subjects, tracing the persistence of established narratives, visual Heidi Kolk imaginaries, and material landscapes in the American city with the goal of understanding their power as a kind of unacknowledged—or at least underappreciated— form of cultural patrimony.

In recent years, my research has shifted from a concern with hyper-visible and well-tended sites of memory (for instance, the 1850s mansion near downtown St. Louis that became a celebrated “lone survivor” in a sea of urban renewal–related destruction, which is the subject of my book Taking Possession) to more submerged ones. My overarching research goal has been to interpret the processes by which memory is materialized (or reconstituted), not only through preservation and caretaking, and various acts of consecration, but also through their seeming opposite: acts of forgetting, erasure, and symbolic (or literal) violence.

What are you working on now?

I am working on two projects at the moment. One is a book that explores the phenomenon of what I call “negative heritage”—sites and histories that are especially vexing or problematic, and often alienated from collective memory.

Some, like desecrated burial grounds, have grown increasingly stigmatized over long periods of time, while others, including many in St. Louis, have suffered acts of willful disregard and neglect, abuse, or even wholesale obliteration. This project reconstructs the cultural history of negative heritage, and argues for its new significance in this era of reckoning.

The second project, Beauty in Enormous Bleakness, is a multifaceted research initiative (yielding oral histories, a podcast series, an exhibition and digital archive, and publication) that documents the experiences of four especially creative members of the interned generation of Japanese Americans, all of whom attended WashU’s College of Architecture. By engaging their biographies and exploring their architectural works, the project illuminates hidden histories—and largely untold narratives—about Japanese Americans’ internment and postwar experiences. It also seeks to expand the public imagination for the legacies and inheritances (positive and negative) of internment.

FAC U LT Y BO O K S H E L F FF S TA K !

PIC

DOWD

A BOY CALLED DICKENS

With acerbic wit and vision (and even hope), this is an abecedarian for understanding—and rebuking—the rise of American autocracy.

ABE LINCOLN CROSSES A CREEK

C H A R L I E H E B D O : A P U G N A C I O U S E L E GY

A IS FOR AUTOCRAT: A TRUMPIAN ALPHABET D.B. Dowd

HENDRIX

HENDRIX S H O O T I N G S TA R S : T H E X M A S T R U C E

RUTHERFORD B., WHO WAS HE?

NURSE, SOLDIER, SPY

MCTOAD MOWS TINY ISLAND

RONAN BOYLE

AND THE BRIDGE OF RIDDLES

RONAN BOYLE

A N D T H E S W A M P O F C E R TA I N D E AT H

FF S TA K !

PIC

RONAN BOYLE

A graphic novel biography of two literary lions—C.S. Lewis and J.R.R. Tolkien—following the remarkable story of their friendship and creative fellowship, and how each came to write their masterworks.

INTO THE STRANGEPLACE

THE MYTHMAKERS John Hendrix

FA C U LT Y

A9

Reading Pictures Introduction from Reading Pictures: A History of Illustration

Reading Pictures is my attempt to tell a story of how printed images and texts developed, engaged, and sometimes D.B. Dowd manipulated audiences in North America, Europe, and East Asia from the early modern period to the present day, with greatest emphasis on the era of mass culture during the late 19th and 20th centuries. I am concerned with the uses to which illustrated materials were put, and the particularities of precisely how words and pictures were combined:

when, where, and why.

From the early 19th century, pictorial accompaniments made books and booklets more appealing; in the early twenty-first, hybridized literacy requires a blend of reading and looking.

The cumbersome ancient scroll was replaced by folded codices that later blossomed a millionfold into modern books and magazines. Yet now the electronic scroll has pushed back, and what we call “reading” has changed.

Illustration has simply become a dimension of late modern reading through comics and manga, sundry interfaces,

informational arrays, and more. Reading Pictures should be understood as a double entendre: when the stress is on the first

word, it conveys pictures that go with reading; if the second is emphasized, the phrase suggests decoding images. Today, both frequently apply.

Examining Culture, Comically I am an illustrator and designer from Chennai, India, and I am interested in the ways visual culture Shreyas R Krishnan and gender studies intersect. At the core of my work is memory—both personal and collective—and this translates into nonfiction zines, comics, and documentary drawings, often centered on women.

Drawing, for me, is a way to remember and record the world around me. It’s absolutely fascinating to me that images can be so instantly accessed by different audiences. When I began making comics, I felt like I discovered a new language that made it much easier for me to communicate using both drawing and writing.

I joke that I’m on a #comicscrusade. I want to equip more people not to just read comics but to actually make them. On an individual level, they help people navigate

their emotions and responses to external events. At a community level, comics have helped report and break down societal issues. When more people make comics, we have more voices heard, more representation, and more normalization of the diversity that is constantly around us.

What are you working on now?

I am working on The Spectacle of Violence, a comic-essay that studies one major moment of gender violence in comics interpretations of the Ramayana.

On a lighter note, I am also illustrating a bilingual (Tamil and English) large format poster-zine about fruits.

ABOVE: Pulling from real life events and their coverage in

the media, Select Focus (2021) asks who the bystander is in the act of image-making, from subject to creator to consumer.

Written by Aarthi Parthasarathy, illustrated by Shreyas R Krishnan.

LEFT: From Alphabreasts (2019), an A-Z zine on the anat-

omy, process, mythology, pop culture, and language around breasts, made in collaboration with Akhila Krishnan.

MOUND CITY TATTLER Dan Zettwoch

KOLK

FF S TA K !

PIC

KRISHNAN

TAKING POSSESSION Heidi Aronson Kolk

BYSTANDER ANTHOLOGY Co-edited by Shreyas R Krishnan

Through the story of an 1851 St. Louis town house, Kolk’s timely and revealing volume unearths the nation’s systemic failures by exposing what—and whom—we choose to protect.

KRISHNAN

A collaborative, nuanced, and radical act of seeing and being seen through the eyes of 51 artists and writers from around the globe.

FF S TA K !

C I P

ZETTWOCH MISSOURI WEIRD & WONDERFUL Amanda Doyle & Dan Zettwoch A fast-paced, fact-filled collection of the most fascinating parts of life in Missouri, with a kid’s-eye point of view.

FF S TA K !

PIC

T R AV E L & L E I S U R E

A10

An Illustrated Guide to St. Louis St. Louis is one of the most affordable, culturally exciting cities in which to launch your career.

Here are a handful of highlights.

Our Next-Door Neighbor Located just across the street from campus, Forest Park is home to the Missouri History Museum, the Saint Louis Zoo, the Saint Louis Science Center and McDonnell Planetarium, the World’s Fair Pavilion, and the Saint Louis Art Museum.

Great Green Spaces With an expanding light rail system, hundreds of city, county, and state parks, and the Great Rivers Greenway—128 miles (and counting!) of bike and pedestrian pathways—St. Louis is made to explore.

Foodie Heaven St. Louis has been named a top food city by outlets ranging from Zagat to Yelp. Famous for local treats like Ted Drewes Frozen Custard (brain freeze warning!) and toasted ravioli, we’re also on the map for great tacos, dim sum, bubble tea, and gastropubs serving up farm-to-table eats.

Outsize Cultural Scene All of the city’s art museums and most of its major cultural institutions are free. This includes the Contemporary Art Museum St. Louis, the Pulitzer Arts Foundation, the Saint Louis Art Museum, and our very own Mildred Lane Kemper Art Museum.

Illustrations by Audrey Westcott, BFA ’12

ODDS & ENDS

GRAPHIC VINDICATION

By Stephanie Ellis Schlaifer ACROSS 2. Holy protagonist of prof John Hendrix’s comic 5. Famed “collar man” campaignD

by J.C. Leyendecker; also, a directional symbol 7. Printer’s approval 11. Experimental poet & painter who kept things on the lc 14. The writing on the cave wall? + 16. N.C.D who illustrated Treasure Island, 1911 18. 99% Invisible or Make It Then Tell Everybody, for example 20. Social distance, typographically 21. Digital sketch?

23. Illustrator’s org.

24. Comic exclamation 25. A way out, briefly 26. ReedD or Disney 30. Pilot of a Sopwith Camel doghouse 32. Riveting subject of prof Shreyas R Krishnan’s comic 35. Biannual illo conference 36. Hit ⌘-S 39. Definitive edition of definitions 40. Shadowing someone, linearly 43. 4-part alternative to RGB + 44. Prof Heidi Kolk pens hers with a Sharpie S-Gel (0.7 mm) 45. A pen’s business end

46. IndividualD who secretly illustrated an entire issue of Cosmopolitan (full name) 49. Engrave, acidically 50. Fin, in other words 51. Famed studio of GlaserD, Sorel, and ChwastD

When you say writing sample, do you mean I should, like, handwrite a fiveparagraph essay? Or, wait, do you just want my autograph? IDK, DM me?

–Inky in Indy I do loves me some quill pen lettering! But what we really want is to get a sense of your writing style. So, if nonfiction essays are your jam, then we’d love to read that!

Or maybe you’re more into short stories, critical reviews, or even poetry. (I’ve been known to dabble in verse, myself.) In any

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Felix, Hobbes, and Garfield WashU’s namesake Printing on the edge?

Like Vermeer’s View of Delft, to prof D.B. Dowd + 6. Visual journalism, categorically speaking 8. Rose O’Neill’s D impish baby dolls 9. Dietrich, of prof John Hendrix’s book, who plotted to kill Hitler 10. Trench-coated official of many a propaganda poster 12. Alt to et al.

13. Metal frame for type, or high-speed action between Tom & Jerry 15. Italian, but not italic, maybe 17. Foghorn Leghorn’s beginnings, essentially 19. Helpful meaning of dot dot dot dash dash dash dot dot dot 22. Standard ligature 27. Soft lead pencil, possibly a fave of Hamlet 29. Name hidden in many of Al Hirschfeld’sD caricatures

case, writing, authorship, and scholarship are major components of our MFA-IVC program. Show us a sample of your work that demonstrates how you communicate your ideas in writing.

I’m used to living with 6 roommates in a 472-square-foot efficiency apartment that costs $$$/month and overlooks both the sewer and a dumpster. (Inexplicably, we also have pets.) BUT…it’s only 90 minutes from anyplace we like to go! Does St. Louis have good living like this?

–Crowded in Crown Heights Oh, my. I’m not sure we can find you a comparable sitch here, Crowded, but how would you feel about something with a different olfactory profile? Would living close to restaurants, parks, and free museums be a deal-breaker? St. Louis is one of the most affordable cities in the U.S., and there are cool neighborhoods all around the university, like Tower Grove, the Central West End, and University City.

ICYMI, see A10 for some of our favorite things to do.

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Official MFA-IVC spokesperson Lightnin’ George answers your frequently asked, white-hot questions about the program.

I have made a series of 729 illustrations of cheese. Can I include all of them in my portfolio?

–Churning in Cheddar As much as I’d like to see (and sample) the entire fromagerie, I’m afraid you’ll have to narrow it down to your top wedges and wheels. If you happen to experiment with other things, like cracker GIFS, motion graphic crudités, or wine zines, we’d love to get a sense of the full range of your abilities. Send 12-20 images of your best, most recent work that is most representative of your practice.

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CROSSWORD

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31. Hansel and Gretel denouement 32. Hybrid printers that take it one color at a time 33. NYC loft district once home to many artists 34. Magazine page, on the loose 36. Author of Blobby Boys comics; also, prof D.B. Dowd’s standard poodle 37. Sigh of satisfaction or relief 38. Van Gogh, to his buddies 41. Elemental symbol, from the Greek for “carving”

42. Outdoorsy illustratorD who gave some fine advice on living in Texas 47. Earthy residence of Sam, the Sam Fox fox 48. Sometimes, they pay the bills

I think my application is pretty rad and am hoping to save a few bucks on tuition. What kind of financial aid and scholarships can I apply for?

–Frugal in Fresno I get it, man—I am always low on the Benjamins (my face is only on the dollar!).

And I have great news for you: all MFAIVC students received financial support from the university last year. We offer competitive assistance, based on a combination of need and merit, including several full-tuition scholarships, such as the Sam Fox Ambassadors Graduate Fellowship Program, which includes an annual creative activity and research stipend, and the Director’s Full Scholarship, along with the Catherine M. & Stanley R. Miller Scholarship, which covers 75% of tuition. Check out the full list of awards on our website, including other full-tuition scholarships WashU offers.

I am writing a graphic novel about a self-actualizing garden snail who casts off his earthly bounds and heads to space. It’s slow-going. Can I enroll in courses in other disciplines at WashU to help fortify my fiction with facts?

–Discouraged in Des Plaines You bet! You may take courses at the 300-level and above from across the university—in subjects like writing, philosophy, art history, and the sciences—as long as you have the proper prerequisites.

So, fear not, D—It sounds like you and your Astropod are already well on your way.

I see you have a swanky studio just for MFA-IVC peeps. But, what else ya got?

–Scrutinizing in Scranton Well, Scrut, we’ve got all measure of swank. We have our own world-class art museum, an integrated printmaking suite that includes a book studio, a digital fabrication lab, wood and metal shops, an art and architecture library, and more… and that’s just in our six-building Sam Fox School complex! (You might want to pull up a chair and pour an espresso if you want to hear about all the additional resources at the university.) Check out our facilities spotlight on A3.

+W ith the yellow squares in 14-across, 4-down, and 43-across, the acronym of this MFA program D Represented in the collections of the DIRA

St. Louis native!

WashU alum!

What does one do with an MFA in Illustration & Visual Culture?

–Pragmatic in Presidio I admire your brevity, P, so I’ll come right to the point of the pencil. Our graduates will be prepared to work as authorartists of graphic novels and picture books, professors of illustration, critical writers on popular culture, and curatorial staff in museums, libraries, and auction houses.

We know you’ll go far!

Can you show me how to make lightning bolts come out of my eyes?

—Curious in Curitiba Can’t be taught. But, MFA-IVC students have a statistically higher chance of becoming positively electrified with knowledge than any other sector of the population.

Got a question about the MFA-IVC program?

Hit me up! samfoxgradadmissions@wustl.edu

CL ASSIFIEDS

A12

GET WANTED SAM FOX SCHOOL VINDICATED Graphically! seeks new class of amazing

ILLUSTRATORS WRITERS/VISUAL CULTURE-MAKERS for MFA-IVC program.

Other interests may include drawing, painting, sketchbookery, motion graphics, typography, printmaking, storytelling, comics, animation, writing, art, book-binding, viz journalism, Americana, illus. history, zine-ing, hand lettering, kerning, archivescouring, et al. viz nerdcetera. Must be willing to relocate to bustling cosmopolis w/ good eats & EZ livin’. No curmudgeons, snoots, or malcontents need apply. Excellent qualifications req.

N IO PS T I TU HI L L A R S L E! U F OL AB H SC VAIL A

Learn more about the MFA-IVC program, our scholarships and financial aid, or how to apply.

The SAM FOX AMBASSADORS GRADUATE FELLOWSHIP PROGRAM

provides exceptional graduate students with full-tuition scholarships and an annual stipend for creative activity and research. All MFA-IVC program applicants will be automatically considered. samfoxschool.washu.edu/admissions

Apply for free by December 14.

Apps due January 10 samfoxschool.washu.edu/mfa-ivc @washusamfoxschool

APPLY WITHIN samfoxschool.washu.edu/ mfa-ivc ANSWER TO TODAY’S PUZZLE C

ABOUT THE SAM FOX SCHOOL

T

he Sam Fox School of Design & Visual Arts offers rigorous degree programs in design, art, and architecture; an outstanding collection of a world-class art museum; and the unparalleled resources of a leading research university. With a nationally and internationally recognized faculty, innovation and collaboration are at the core of our mission. Through the work of our students, faculty, and alumni, we are striving to create a more just, sustainable, humane, and beautiful world.

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ACTIVITY ZONE!

M.Y.O. Comic

CHOOSE ONE

Awkward Introduction / From the Frying Pan to the Fire / Bad Date / Peekaboo!

Using one of the prompts above, create an action sequence involving two or more characters.

No words allowed.

Draw in the space provided, or go nuts and work outside this publication. If you are bold (and so inclined), share your finished work with us on Instagram: Based on an actual assignment from Professor D.B. Dowd @washusamfoxschool.

Washington University encourages and gives full consideration to all applicants for admission, financial aid, and employment. The University does not discriminate in access to, or treatment or employment in, its programs and activities on the basis of race, color, age, religion, sex, sexual orientation, gender identity or expression, national origin, veteran status, disability, or genetic information.

Applicants with a prior criminal history will not be automatically disqualified from consideration for admission. Inquiries about compliance should be addressed to the University’s Vice Chancellor for Human Resources, Washington University, MSC 8016-29-2220, One Brookings Drive, St. Louis, MO 63130.