‘Gutters are Elastic’ Poster - Final Art

My spouse, Momoko Usami, and I were invited to be a part of a group show at the Nanaimo Art Gallery on Nanaimo Island, located on the lands of the Snuneymuxw near Vancouver, Canada, July 15, 2023 – September 25, 2023. It will include a number of artists utilizing comics as a means of personal expression; Sonny Assu, Shary Boyle, Whess Harman, bailey macabre, Cole Pauls, Jillian Tamaki and Ronald Wimberly. Here’s a link to the gallery’s site, if you’d like to know more: https://nanaimoartgallery.ca/exhibition/gutters-are-elastic/

I was honored to be asked to design one of the posters for the show. The human world had been on my mind lately, I was wondering what it would be like if other animals behaved like some of our human neighbors do? And then I wondered, what if I was a smaller primate in their company, and then what if we were all on the same sinking / burning boat with each other? What if?

The owl monkey in the drawing, related to a collaborative piece I worked on with Momoko for the show, represents those of us who don’t feel the need to intimidate and/or murder their fellow citizens while shopping for groceries, receiving basic healthcare, buying new shoes, learning the alphabet, watching the television in their living room, driving to a thankless retail job, taking a bite of birthday cake, milking the cows, having an autistic breakdown, stretching at dance practice, playing with a sparkler in the backyard on the 4th, knitting a winter scarf for their granddaughter, holding hands in a theater on their first date, not being white and on and on and on and on and on and on and on and on, etc.

Some may think of themselves as the ‘good guy’ with a gun, but I’m hesitant to ask whom they believe the ‘bad guys’ to be.