visual art – Writers Resist

Welcome to Writers Resist the Fall 2024 Issue

The collage by Kristin Fouquet is an apt introduction to this issue, launched in the final throes of the chaotic, often hateful presidential campaigning. How wonderful it would be if the joyful prospect of electing the first woman president of the United States could be just that.

Perhaps we can make it so by encouraging all our sisters and other beloveds to use our hard-won right to vote. As Kristin’s artwork warns us, “Suffrage or Suffer.”

But first, a very fond farewell to one of our founding editors, Sara Marchant, who has a few words to share:

In the last days of the late 1900s, I woke up underneath a beanbag chair on the bamboo floor of a thrashed house not my own, missing a shoe, cake-frosting in my hair, and with full awareness that hijinks had ensued. My first thought was: That was an excellent party.

Today, while reading this issue of Writers Resist, please picture me in my pajamas, bedhead resplendent, toasting you, dear readers, contributors and editors, with my second cup of coffee.

Writers Resist was born from worried dread about our future and righteous anger over our present reality, and there is still much work to be done, but I know I leave her in capable hands . . . and it has been an excellent party.

Now, this issue has a notable dose of dystopias, but—or because of that—you should find some kindred souls in the works of our contributing writers and artists—and if you’d like to join them for our virtual Writers Resist Reads, on Saturday 16 November at 5:00 p.m. PACIFIC, please request the Zoom link via WritersResist@gmail.com.

D. Arifah, “Watching Over the Horizon“

Linda Bamber, “Endless War“

Robyn Bashaw, “Beware the Homo Sapiens“

Cheryl Caesar, “Grass“

Chiara Di Lello, “Abecedarian for Billionaires“

Matthew Donovan, “I Believe Her“

Kristin Fouquet, “Suffrage or Suffer“

Ellen Girardeau Kempler, “Poem in Response to Mass Shooting Number 130 in the United States 2023“

Michael Henson, “The Dream Children of Addison Mitchell McConnell III“

Jacqueline Jules, “How I Feel About the 2024 Election“

Craig Kirchner, “The Coming“

Christian Hanz Lozada, “When I hear ‘migration,’ I think of ships“

Rasmenia Massoud, “Who We Are, More or Less“

Ryan Owen, “Breathe“

Kate Rogers, “Sisters“

Elizabeth Shack, “tree : forest :: ad : internet“

Angela Townsend, “French Kissed“

Rachel Turney, “Respect“

Diane Vogel Ferri, “Election Day“

Welcome to Writers Resist the Summer 2024 Issue

It’s summer and all kinds of things are in bloom—beautiful and ugly—but we’re happy you’re here.

We’re moved by the courage of those who give voice to their righteous struggles.

We’re determined to continue to be able to challenge the inequitable and untenable.

We’re hopeful climate leaders will be followed.

We’re particularly grateful to Dorothy and Rebecca for their extraordinary, generous support—thank you!

And, we’re delighted to give thanks to this issue’s contributing authors and artists:

Kayla Blau, “God in Hiding“

Anna Lucia Deloia, “In Florida“

Dameien Nathaniel, “Trans Joy: A Selfie in Five Parts“

Ell Cee, “Make a Splash“

Laura Grace Weldon, “Miss Suzie Had a Baby, She Named Him Tiny Tim“

Zhihua Wang, “2020“

Myna Change, “Suburban Survival“

Elizabeth Birch, “Come Mourn with Me“

Eduardo Ramos, “Shukran“

Micaela Kaibni Raen, “Death Equals Silence“

Michal Rubin, “Numbers“

Shieva Salehnia, “Baptism“

Dick Westheimer, “Inside the Serotonin Industrial Complex“

If you’d like to join them for our virtual Writers Resist Reads, on Saturday 27 July at 5:00 p.m. PACIFIC, please request the Zoom link via WritersResist@gmail.com.

A note from Writers Resist

You, too, can join the Dorothy and Rebecca donor club: Make a small, medium or large donation to Writers Resist on our Give a Sawbuck page.

Photo credit: K-B Gressitt

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Make a Splash

By Ell Cee

Artist statement

As a queer person and artist, I’ve been struggling with the constant legislative attacks against the queer community echoing across America. So what’s at the heart of my piece, Make A Splash? Honestly? This is me looking into the eyes of homophobic politicians, homophobic people, and those who just sit neutrally on the fence and let it happen, and licking my sapphic lips at them. This is me bending over and spanking my ass in their general direction, while winking mischievously. With Make a Splash I wanted to celebrate and relish queer joy. I wanted vibrant colors, rainbow vibes, womxn intentionally and joyously existing as sexual beings. I wanted to celebrate the bodies of womxn. I wanted to be very open about what this piece was. I loved the image of a blue jeans model from the 80s bending over and looking at the camera. I put the kicking legs of cabaret dancers around the edges. I put a cut open, ripe, luscious strawberry surrounded by lips. I put winking-eye photos that almost look like Polaroids everywhere, echoing through the piece. I included lush greenery at her feet and last but not least, tickets to ride placed between her legs. And of course, the cherry on top of it all: the caption I created in the top right corner that reads, “Great Lady WITH HER OWN AGENDA.”

Ell Cee (They/She) is a lifelong artist as well as a member of the LGBTQIA2S, genderqueer, and disabled communities. They create one-of-a-kind pieces whose vibrancy and glow inspire joy. Ell uses recycled materials in much of their art, such as cardboard boxes, packaging materials, repurposed labels, and even discarded library books. Her art ranges across mediums: from watercolor markers, highlighting elements, paints, pencil, photography, mixed-media, hand lettering, to pen & ink, and high resolution image conversion processes. Find Ell’s art online at https://linktr.ee/EllCeeTheArtist and @EllCeeTheArtist on Instagram.

A note from Writers Resist

Thank you for reading! If you appreciate creative resistance and would like to support it, you can make a small, medium or large donation to Writers Resist from our Give a Sawbuck page.

Death Equals Silence

By Micaela Kaibni Raen

Artist statement

I am my grandmothers’ dream, and she is mine. We exist together through Tatreez, Indigenous Palestinian textiles and embroidery. We share cultural memory and wisdom traditionally handed down, Palestinian female to Palestinian female. As a Palestinian lesbian artist, I feel Tatreez patterns hold a deep connectivity to ancestral Indigenous femininities that can be accessed through creating art based on the patterns, repetitions, and mathematical matriarchal matrices inherent in Tatreez stitching sequences. My goal is to take these intuitive insights and formulaic computations to create a new visual artform, Queer Tatreez. A style of art focused on ancestral wisdom that embraces inclusivity, diversity, and the land that gives us life.

My mission, with this artwork, Death Equals Silence, is to educate others in order to bring an end to the military occupation, and ongoing Nakba, in Palestine. I am living in exile in North America, and my artwork strives to bring our sacred teachings, rooted in spirit and land, fully into the present moment. Two keffiyeh scarves are shown, one is black and white, while the other is pink and white. To me, the keffiyeh is a symbol of cultural identity and sumud/steadfastness. Two color variations are shown to represent both the Palestinian men and women killed since October 2024. The kite image symbolizes the children of Gaza who currently have the Guiness World Record for the most kites flying at once. With little documentation and no headstones, the black kite flies as our death marker, re/telling the stories of the thousands of children that have been targeted and killed during the current genocide.

The Aids Coalition to Unleash Power (ACT UP!) has used the slogan Silence = Death to mark many social justice movements from the HIV/AIDS pandemic, Queer and Trans human rights, the Palestinian genocide, and more. At the top, I have flipped the words to read, “Death = Silence.” This is not a general statement of truth. This is in direct reference to…whole families (and their genetic line of familial relatives) that were targeted and killed since October 2024. Especially targeted were teachers, leaders, doctors, activists, journalists, authors, humanitarian workers, social workers, etc. Statistics show that death disproportionately silences children and those working toward justice. The words in the artwork combined with the lips sewn together represent the current global climate of racism, ethnic-cultural-erasure, shadow-bans, and censorship of Palestinian voices.

For this artwork, I researched ancient and modern patterns of Palestinian embroidery and keffiyeh scarf patterns. I used two keffiyeh scarves to design textile/images through high resolution scans and graphic art. Through art layering, I placed the images onto a graphic art layer and then designed the text and other graphical elements. My work incorporates multimedia modalities and is an ever-evolving journey. Contemplating Tatreez patterns, and the act of Tatreez creation, become a bridge into deep space time where I sit with my grandmothers in a sacred Tatreez Circle, embraced, and listen.

Micaela Kaibni Raen is a Palestinian-American creator, cultural worker, queer femme-dyke, mother, and global Queer/Trans human rights activist. She is most known for Queer Tatreez, a style of visual art and visual poetics based on Indigenous Palestinian Tatreez embroidery. Her work appears in Mizna; Qafiyah Review; Rowayat; Yellow Medicine Review; The Poetry of Arab Women; and El Ghourabaa: A Queer and Trans Arab and Arabophone Anthology. For more information, visit her website and Instagram.

A note from Writers Resist

Thank you for reading! If you appreciate creative resistance and would like to support it, you can make a small, medium or large donation to Writers Resist from our Give a Sawbuck page.