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Nov 26, 2024
You can find the work of local artists on any given day at the Wex—just peruse the stacks in the Wexner Center Store. The density of talented people in Columbus who are putting their words and art into books is truly extraordinary.
For this year's gift guide, we asked some of those artists and authors to say a little something about their new or recent books and to suggest who on your gift list might get the most of out their respective works.
We encourage you to stop by the Store to check out these and other great local books and artist-made items in person. It's the best way to see everything available—we have a healthy selection of author-autographed books, for example—and to take advantage of all the deals available throughout the holiday season, including Museum Store Sunday at the end of this week. But you can also find many of the local writer titles available at the Store online.
Photo: Melissa Starker
On his collaborative zine This is Columbus!!! Not Wherever the %#@& You’re From:
This is Columbus!!! Not Wherever the %#@& You’re From is for those who appreciate city history, local music, and bar stories. Printed using the risograph process, it’s also a unique art piece. The zine was inspired by a few weird conversations with people in Columbus who were self-conscious about the city, constantly comparing it to places like New York or L.A.
However, I quickly discovered the vibrant people, places, and activities that make Columbus special. The book explores the city’s push to become like other major cities, driven by developers and investors aiming to replicate “wherever.” What makes Columbus great is already here, and the real danger lies in displacing the people who have shaped it—embodied in the idea of CSBYS (Columbus Sucks Because You Suck).
Courtesy of Fantagraphics
On her illustrated biography Tell Me a Story Where the Bad Girl Wins: The Life and Art of Barbara Shermund:
We need to support bad girls more than ever right now. Tell Me a Story Where the Bad Girl Wins: The Life and Art of Barbara Shermund sheds light on the history of a forgotten feminist cartoonist who helped set the visual style of The New Yorker magazine back in the 1920s. Despite decades of killer contributions to nearly every major magazine in the United States, her work has been largely left out of the canon. Her sharp and witty sense of humor is incredibly contemporary, and this book would make a great gift for anyone passionate about women in history, lovers of The New Yorker, and anyone with a good sense of humor.
Courtesy of the author
On his illustrated children's book Sole Mates:
Sole Mates is an ode to a boy and his imaginary talking shoes that took me back to my childhood days of delivering newspapers to earn enough money to buy the first Air Jordans. It was written with grownups in mind, but illustrated for little ones. If you’re a fan of sneakers (or Bill Watterson), this book is for you!
Courtesy of Macmillan Publishers
On Call Me Iggy, the young adult graphic novel Rosado cocreated with Jorge Aguirre:
My book, Call Me Iggy, is many things: a love story, a tale about finding your true self, and an exploration of what it means to be Latino in this country. It’s also a ghost story—though not the scary kind. I believe any young person (or even an adult, for that matter) grappling with questions of identity and their place in the world will connect with Iggy.
Courtesy of Simon & Schuster
On her memoir You Could Make This Place Beautiful:
"I'm someone who believes that storytelling is one of the most powerful ways we can connect with other people. My one small hope for You Could Make This Place Beautiful was that just one reader would feel less alone in their experience because of what I shared. By telling our stories we build community, and we also build empathy, and we need those things more than ever right now. If you have a friend or loved one navigating a difficult time in their life, I think this book will help them see all of the possibilities in front of them."
On his brand new poetry collection, Black Night is Falling:
If you're a fan of blues, you'll find a lot to love in Black Night is Falling. If you're not a fan of blues, you will be by the time you get done with this poetry collection. They're not blues poems per se; they're poems that function the way blues songs do: they make you cry, they make you move, they make you wonder what your ex is doing on a Saturday night.
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