Dec 19, 2019
“How am I telling the story, and how am I representing the people in that story?”: Sara Wong, Catapult Artist for December
“It’s not enough to consider the content—how am I presenting the content?”
“It’s not enough to consider the content—how am I presenting the content?”
“Always meet your deadlines, do good work, and be easy to get along with.”
“Because Catapult is multifaceted, because our content spans so many subjects, it seemed the Catapult Artist program would really be an extension of what the magazine was already doing.”
“Refrain yourself from throwing things away. Even if you think you’re going nowhere with what you’re creating.”
“When you’re a kid you’re not sure if you don’t know something because you haven’t been taught it or because you’re not supposed to know.”
“I think, in pursuit of truth, science and religion still have to wrestle with the strictures of human knowledge, error, pride.”
“The narration style feels very conversational to me. I liked how second-person really tries to make the reader part of the story as well.”
Learning to apply my curiosity wherever it’s needed has made my illustration career more fun and maybe more successful, too.
“I slowly connected the dots that nearly all my friends—no matter what continent we had been on—had experienced some level of sexual violence.”
“The themes of social justice, the magic of water, and the power of queer love to create a different world—these are themes that I return to again and again in my writing and my life.”
“Working for myself is all about balance. Although illustration is my career and passion, I still need to have a life outside of art-making.”
“Some stories just flow out of you and you try to keep up as you write them. This story was not like that.”
“When you feel like you have no power in a relationship, withholding becomes one of the only ways you can maintain the illusion of agency.”
“Inspiration came from the stupid pencil jar our family had when I was growing up.”
“It started with a voice—the young narrator telling me about her name.”
“For me, I guess fairytales are where I am simultaneously most at home, and most at odds with the world around me.”
I think what I love about illustration is that there are so many ways to challenge myself.
“‘Illustrator’ is just the easiest catch-all for many jobs—which again, I’m rather restless so it’s worked out great that I never get bored!”
By leaving her job as a lawyer and taking a leap of faith to become a full-time illustrator, Sirin Thada says, “I was finally honoring a part of me that had been there all along.”
“In college, I think there was this idea floating around that a real illustrator worked all night—and if they weren’t, they were half ass-ing it. [Now,] I like to give my brain some time to absorb and to rest in equal measure.”
