A couple of months ago I have interviewed for Global Comment two of my favourite graphic novel authors, the creative couple Teresa Radice and Stefano Turconi. The interview has just been published; we delved into the creative process behind their most interesting work.
Here is the link to the interview
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Middle East Monitor has just published my interview with Lena Merhej, Karen Keyrouz and Barrack Rima, members of the Lebanese comics collective Samandal
Here is the link to the article
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In their wonderful graphic novel/field journal “The Crack” photographer Carlos Spottorno and journalist Guillermo Abril report the unfolding of Europeʹs migrant crisis from Africa to the Arctic over the course of three years. Their aim is to identify the causes and consequences of Europeʹs identity crisis.
I have interviewed the two reporters for Qantara, a webmagazine promoting cultural exchange, based in Germany. I’m super-excited because of this new collaboration, which allows me to bring back my explorations in foreign realities back to my homeland Europe.
Here is the link to the interview
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I love the end of the year so much. Looking back and taking stock of what worked and what didn’t, because acknowledging that even what apparently didn’t worked is the seed for something even bigger to happen. And also, recognizing that nothing is ever wasted, and everything will converge eventually, because it’s all you, all one person is one universe following his own personal trail of crumbs.
In the past few months I haven’t posted on the blog my regular rants/reflections on my journey through life. This is because I realized that instead of being focused on the present and what was at hand, I was rehearsing the “narrative of my life” a little too often. Too much of looking back and planning ahead, instead of sitting down, spot the priorities and get down to them. Which resulted a dispersive mindset and lazy habits. And now that is the right time to reflect, look back and appreciate, it just feels so much better. A few lessons have unfolded. And while of course everything is unfolding all the time, I feel that right now I can see a motif appearing, whereas in the past few months it was more the phase where everything was colliding before taking a recognizable form.
Enough with vagueness! Let’s get down to the specifics; one thing I learned this is that when you ask your friends for feedback in a particular area of your life they know you well for, they will always tell you that “in the past you were so much better at this.” Of course you know that this is not true. There were movements where you showed up with your higher self in that sector. One particularly focused training session, a period where you were really pushing with work, another week where you realized a set of very good comic book pages. Growth is never even. You’ll have moments where you are quietly learning in some areas and it doesn’t show, and moments where it finally come up. It’s a gift to have friends to keep you in check, but most importantly you have to regularly practice, day in day out.
On the edge of 2017 I can see how all the expressions of my being are starting to come together, and hopefully in 2018 they will find a way to coexist harmoniously as an even flow. Ok, let’s be more specific. I guess I’ll start by looking at the year through the lens of my different practices.
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At the beginning of August I was invited to Tuscany for Teatro Nel Bicchiere – a three days festival matching theater and wine tasting in the small town renown for his Morellino di Scansano. While I had to pass on the wine tasting – I notoriously don’t drink – the theater part was very engaging.
Among the experimental shows, what struck me the most was Coppelia Theater, a mesmerizing marionette company. When I came to know the story of Coppelia, the gal behind the company, I had no doubts – I had to interview her for Times of Malta’s new Sunday magazine, Escape. So here’s Coppelia’s tale, involving Siberian cybernetics engineer, Mexican painters and Tuscany of course!
Here’s the link to the interview
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Do you remember MSN? That fairly basic chat you used to spend hours on, chatting with your faraway summer friends during winter? Ten years ago MSN was one the first ways to keep all your “contacts” together.
Back then, my friend Enrico was very big on “contacts”. He was – and still is – a very friendly person who is comfortable with pretty much everyone. When he was thirteen the idea of having all his friends in one single place was to him the most exciting thing ever – right after Harry Potter I suppose. As for me, I used to considered other people being an annoyance most of the times – fictional people like Harry Potter included – so the fact that he was bragging about the number of his MSN’s contacts sounded funny to me. Fast forward to the Facebook era, my friend’s account is bursting at the seams, and so he periodically purges it – only to repent short time after and re-add his unfriended ones.
Today as a grown up girl I finally understand the importance of other people. I gave up my antisocial punk attitude and I started to appreciate talking and exchanging ideas with people big time. If I have to spot a precise time I decided cut on my misanthropy, I would say when I first encountered the Roman art world. At nineteen I was going to plenty of vernissages, often with my two best mates – “compagni d’arte” – and we were wondering about why all those caryatids, err, older people, didn’t want to talk with us. If you are not familiar with art openings in Italy, you should know that you seldom see younger people there. This was far from bothering me. I figured I just had to be more stylish, so I started wearing a little black dress, red lipstick and the right amount of boldness.
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I always sought a day-routine, the only way to get things done, like my graphics novel and, currently, my book about Contemporary Art in Indonesia.
I was very much inspired by this articles on the amazing Brain Pickings website and, of course, I didn’t miss the opportunity of breaking the routine that I made for myself to read it and share, and write this post… Whatever!
I always was the kind of girl making daily schedule to force me doing my work during the day. It started when I was in the High School because I didn’t have a lot of time to draw, between school and homework.
I drew and thinking and building the stories during school time and I realized it after homework.
Naima Morelli is an arts writer and journalist specialized in contemporary art from Asia-Pacific and the MENA region.
She has written for the Financial Times, Al-Jazeera, The Art Newspaper, ArtAsiaPacific, Internazionale and Il Manifesto, among others, and she is a regular contributor to Plural Art Mag, Middle East Monitor and Middle East Eye as well as writing curatorial texts for galleries.
She is the author of three books on Southeast Asian contemporary art.
Reach out: contact [at] naimamorelli.com
Published! Graphic Journalism and Migration on Global Comment
My piece “How A New Generation of Graphic Novels Are Portraying Migration” has just been published on the webmagazine Global Comment. For this piece I spoke with graphic journalist Gianluca Costantini, comic book artist and illustrator Matt Huynh and SBS producer Kylie Boltin.
Here’s the link to the article
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