I Think I Am In Friend-Love With Yumi Sakugawa
“Until I saw other people of color writing their own specific experiences into stories and characters which gave me permission to consider doing the same, I unquestionably assimilated into the widespread culture of white storytelling and was invisible to myself.”
Get to know Yumi Sakugawa, the LA based comic artist, author, and wise woman behind I Think I’m in Friend-Love with You, and Claudia Kishi: My Asian-American Female Role Model of the 90’s, to name a couple.
If you want to cultivate peace in your daily life, and maybe even get closer to finding your place in the universe, Yumi might be able to help you. Her whimsical comics are accompanied by stories covering topics of self help, meditation, identity and representation, and more.
With lessons like “Have Cake and Tea with Your Demons,” Yumi encourages us to face and accept and befriend the darker sides of ourselves in fun and approachable way. With her recent release, Fashion Forecasts, she imagines a future free from sexism, racism, ageism, ableism, and classism, where all people are celebrated and celebrate each other. Her work has an important message, and it always does the trick to help me feel lifted.
She’s well-known for spreading quirky and digestible nuggets of wisdom, too. She’s a nominee for the Ignatz Award, has contributed to Bitch Magazine, and has shown art in the Smithsonian. You can find her books at stores like Kinokuniya and Urban Outfitters.
We got to ask Yumi some questions about her life and career — see what she had to say.
Samantha Skinner: Your comics are easy to connect with and feel therapeutic to read through. What informs the writing and style of your art?
Yumi Sakugawa: I am always asking myself, why should my art exist? Why should my art be given attention? How can I justify the right for my art to exist? I do want my art to be worthwhile of your attention and time. I consider this to be a huge responsibility. Otherwise, I am making art just for myself and then there is no need for me to share it with other people.
And because I want my art to be worthwhile of your attention and time, I am conscious about wanting to impart a specific energetic resonance, paradigm shift, or transformation to you if you are going to take the time to invest in my art and storytelling.
Sam: How did you get your start as a comic book artist?
Yumi: I went to art school thinking that maybe I wanted to become a painter. But then I got turned off by the very elitist, esoteric nature of the fine art world and became more interested in indie comics and zines. I wasn’t interested in making some grand statement on the history of art — I was more interested in wearing my heart on my sleeve and telling stories about heartbreak, longing, the desire to be understood.
I told my emotional stories through sharing drawings and writings on my LiveJournal, and that eventually led into making longer and longer comic stories that I made into zines or posted online. In 2012, my webcomic essay, “I Think I Am In Friend-Love With You”, unexpectedly went viral, which became my first published book.
Since then, I’ve released several more books and comic zines. I imagine I’ll be doing this for the rest of my life.
Sam: How does being an Asian woman and feminist shape and inform your art?
Yumi: Being an Asian American woman means I have been hyper-aware since being very young the sting of having zero representation, and the flip side of the coin, which is the immense relief and joy of seeing yourself depicted artistically, whether it is in a movie, a book, a TV show, or a comic. And because I am very aware of that, I want to pass that joy along to other Asian American women and to all my younger past selves. As a feminist, I am also always very aware of the fact that we are living in a patriarchal culture where the man is the default universal human experience, and the experiences of a woman are never taken as seriously. The fact that the only way this is going to change is if more women become creators and share their own stories as much as possible and support other women creators.
Sam: The first work of yours that I saw was your comic about your 90’s role model, Claudia Kishi. As an Asian American girl, I was so excited to see art acknowledging frustrations with the narrow representation we have in media. Can you share your beliefs on the importance of seeing people who look like you reflected in media?
Yumi: When you don’t see yourself reflected in the media, you subliminally believe that you don’t really matter because your experiences are not worth the screen time as other people and other people’s stories. A lot of my creative writing stories as a kid were about white girls and white families, because those were primarily the only stories I was consuming in books, movies, and T.V. shows. Honestly it probably wasn’t until high school or college that it occurred to me that my own creative writing could be about my own culture. And I think about that a lot when I think about the importance of cultural representation. Until I saw other people of color writing their own specific experiences into stories and characters which gave me permission to consider doing the same, I unquestionably assimilated into the widespread culture of white storytelling and was invisible to myself.
Sam: Your recent release, Fashion Forecasts, is a joyous celebration of diversity and respect for all experiences of life. Can you talk about the main underlying themes in this comic and why they are important to you?
Yumi: Fashion Forecasts started out as a series of drawings I sketched out of boredom and posted on Instagram. It was my way of poking fun at super high-end fashion, but also expressing a desire for fashion to be more accessible to everybody instead of just the prettiest and the richest, because everyone needs to wear clothes and everyone, regardless of body shape, age, socioeconomic status, cultural background, ethnic background, religion, etc., should have access to that joy of authentically expressing oneself through clothing. I started really defining my own fashion style in the last few years, which I feel has been a spiritual practice for me. As a conscious and creative human being, you get to exercise your free will to play around with how you want to present yourself to the world. I would hate to think that I would have to give that up after a certain age, and I want all walks of life to be able to enjoy this life-affirming ritual of presenting oneself to the world according to their desires.
Sam: How often do you have creative blocks/pauses, and how do you get past them?
Yumi: I get creative blocks ALL the time. It’s part of the process. One thing that recently has been helping me is to have multiple projects, so that when I feel stuck on one project, I get to work on another project, which then makes the original project hungry for attention and also gives me new perspectives on how to approach the project I feel stuck on. It’s like having a project spouse and a project lover.
I also think you need to have a lot of movement and energy flow in your life to keep things energetically flowing — like going on nature hikes, doing yoga, checking out interesting new events and happenings, and connecting with friends.
Sam: Lastly, what advice would you give to other women interested in being working artists — specifically those who may struggle with imposter syndrome?
Yumi: Start a project and finish it and put it out in the world for other people to see. Repeat as often as possible.
Surround yourself with positive people with good vibes who are just as excited as you are to make art and tell stories.
Find your community and get involved somehow — whether it’s volunteering for a zine fest, going to a monthly poetry reading, or getting involved in a literary magazine.
Success is not a vertical ladder, but a horizontal ecosystem. Grow yourself, grow your projects, grow your relationships. One small seed, over time, can grow into a beautiful garden, and then a lush rainforest.
Meditate every day. Express gratitude. Read a lot of self-help books. And if you have the time and resources, do therapy.
Here is something very tangible that worked for me. I put myself in a lot of situations where I had hard deadlines for creative projects and I had no choice but to finish them. I signed up for zine fests, and the zine fest event would be my deadline to finish a new zine. For a while, I committed to making a new comic for The Rumpus, an online literary magazine, and I had no choice but to come up with something no matter what. Deadlines are actually your greatest allies for creating your best work.
Check out more of Yumi’s work on her website. My favorite ways to keep up with the Yumiverse have been through her Instagram and Patreon account ❤ Thank you for reading, and check back in next month for another FemBeat interview!
P.S. Thank you Yumi for endulging us with our disposable camera experiment! You’re a peach without the pit :)
