Return to Academia

If you recall, I have spoken several times in this blog about my past life in academia, the quarter-life crisis that resulted from it (not the full story), and the occasional spasm of desiring institutional recognition.

I am willingly! voluntarily! going back through the gates of the ivory tower.

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A Letter to the New Year 2023

For the past 3 years I had written my letters as personal blog posts - it used to be in comics form for the public. Will it ever return to that old format? Who knows?

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The 21st Century Vibes of Alexander

So I was pinged to this fascinating post that spoke of the strange muddying that comes from interpretating and appropriating epic literature. It was an epic by itself, starting from allegory to how people tend to project their contemporary sensibilities (or false claims) to old things to comics to the theory of Monomyth to fandoms. Here then my Alexander Comic emerges, and this is how I was pinged, because the author, Owl*, referenced that old nugget about If My Alexander Comic is Fanfic or Not.

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The Rise of the Bots; The Ascension of the Human

A very grandiloquent title for some ramblings (as usual) about the current discourse: the intersection of art-making and AI.

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All the Things That Mean Nothing

About the miasma of art made in the chain of blocks. A personal ramble. Just to preserve my current thoughts for my future self.

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Webcomics & Validation

I've been in this webcomics game for... close to 10 years now (if you don't count the 3 years of prep). The second I graduated from secondary school, I jumped right in to launching my first webcomic. Things and mindsets and empires have come and gone since then, including my idea of what success and validation means.

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Meme of Brian David Gilbert saying 'I'm not your friend and you have no say on what I do with my body'

Of One’s Own

I'm thinking about how it's time I finally do some #Representation work in my storytelling.

I've a lot of complicated, jumbly feelings about writing stories which borrow too much from my life experience. Since forever ago, I've subconsciously and intentionally avoided writing what they call "ownvoices" fiction. I've so many strange stories featuring a varied cast of characters in my roster, but never one set in Malaysia, and never a character who completely shares major parts of my actual identity: Malaysian Chinese, ace, sort of? non-binary, definitely queer, first-gen immigration of Australia, and other biographical fun facts.

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‘Comics are a valid art form too!’

On the rare occasions I step out of my bubble (or, I don't even need to: sometimes the call is coming from inside the house), I time-travel to the era before the rise of Alan Moore, Neil Gaiman, Art Spiegelman, Marjane Satrapi, etc, and encounter publishing or academic or institutional or creative people who think comics are not a valid art form or even a medium. Despite the fact comics are flourishing in the US, already a core part of literature in Europe and Japan, accessible to a varied audience, and proving itself a strong representational medium for a variety of issues/topics/experiences. But I don't have to reiterate the statistics and official articles and journals to confirm this. It should be as mundanely acceptable a phenomenon as prose books and films in the global cultural consciousness, because it already is a part of said consciousness.

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Letter to the New Year 2021

Since 2016 I've written and illustrated these letters to the new year, as a way to summarise my thoughts and feelings regarding the old year (and express my hopes and aspirations for the new). But for obvious reasons, I decided to skip it this year.

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Reimena Yee talks about political action

Politically Around

For the past few months I have been thinking about my political role as an artist. It is very strange to be at the point (both maturity and career-wise) when I must assert my intention as a person who tells stories and produces images/words for the world at large. I believe words and images have meaning, therefore they have impact. But what does impact mean on my own terms? (more…)
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Reimena Yee is a graphic novelist, artist and flamingo enthusiast.

She writes and illustrates quite a few webcomics and graphic novels. When not making books, she lulls away her time with essays on craft, life and experiences in the publishing industry. Some of her thoughts of art and life are rather unstructured and will evolve over time as this blog matures, as they should be.

Currently committed to being Alexander the Great's death doula. Is a nerd for all things spooky and historical.

Melbourne / Kuala Lumpur

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