Select a region
One of Jersey's most remarkable Occupation heroes is for the first time to become the subject of a graphic biography, thanks to a US cartoonist and YouTuber with a following of nearly 400,000 people.
Kaz Rowe, who was born in San Pedro near Los Angeles but is now based in Chicago, creates videos about history and is also the author of the urban fantasy webcomic Cunning Fire.
Entitled 'Liberated: The radical art and life of Claude Cahun' and published by the Getty Museum, Kaz's new book aims to bring the story of Claude Cahun and Marcel Moore to a new audience.
Ahead of its publication in September, Express got to know Kaz further...
I have been interested in illustration my whole life, so I attended art school at SAIC (School of the Art Institute of Chicago), a university that has no majors. This allowed me to freely study film production, writing, oil painting, and finally cartooning, which all collectively help me with my job today.
Video: Kaz has built up a significant following on YouTube, with videos touching on LGBTQ+ history, as well as other quirkier, lesser-known areas.
At school I revived my longtime interest in history and set out to research the gay Golden Age illustrator JC Leyendecker, and I created a short graphic biography about his life. At the beginning of the pandemic, Getty Publications reached out to me about doing a graphic novel about the life of Claude Cahun and of course I was in love with the concept.
I have known about Claude Cahun for many many years, since lesser known histories and especially queer histories are so important to me. Naturally as an artist I'm drawn to other artists. I came across their story while researching a completely different artist and made a mental note to read more one day, so I'm very glad the Getty gave me the opportunity to bring their story to a wider audience.
There is actually a lot I have in common with this couple. Of course I'm not French, but reading Cahun's writing there was a lot that resonated with me. Their Jewishness and struggles with antisemitism, their sinking feeling in childhood that they were different from other girls in a way they couldn't define yet – a feeling which would later turn out to be attraction to women and a struggle with gender.
????️???? #HappyPride! ????️????
— Getty Publications (@GettyPubs) June 27, 2023
We've got another incredible look from @KazRowe cosplaying as queer Surrealist #ClaudeCahun!
Learn more about Claude Cahun's life & art in Kaz's forthcoming graphic novel #Liberated, out 9/12! https://t.co/GJ08C1dVJn
Photo courtesy of Kaz Rowe pic.twitter.com/c7Qcqeff61
So there is a lot of myself I see in there, but also the way Cahun and Moore endlessly fought for freedom of expression and against fascism is hugely inspiring and I think can easily provide not only an example for readers today, but inspiration. We are currently living through a similar rise in fascism that Cahun and Moore grappled with, so looking to the past for examples of brave people who fought against it is more important than ever.
I think graphic novels and visual art provides something so valuable to the experience of learning nonfiction. It's the reason so many people prefer to learn through documentaries or biopics. It may be difficult for some people to fully grasp the enormity of the story through prose alone, sometimes. With visual media there is the chance to play around with symbolic imagery and theatrics, which we did in Liberated through thematic framing devices, like Cahun and Moore sitting in a boat on a turbulent sea, referencing one of Cahun's short stories from their schooldays.
We are very lucky with Cahun in that the late 20th century saw an uptick in interest in their work, leading to some fantastic research being done by writers like Jennifer Shaw, Tirza True Latimer and Jeffrey Jackson for example. So luckily I had a lot of great biographies to reference, as well as scholarly papers. I had some great help sourcing these from Audrey Warne, who was a Getty intern at the time, and my editor Ruth Lane. We are also especially fortunate, as we so often aren't, that Cahun and Moore left behind so many autobiographical writings. We have an immense collection of their own words to draw from, and I was able to incorporate many of Cahun and Moore's own direct words into the book, which reads in a first person point of view.
Alas, I haven't! I would have loved to go research on Jersey or in mainland France, but it was the height of the pandemic and travel was out of the question (not to mention expensive, coming from Los Angeles). I have been to Guernsey, and Normandy, but that's as close as I've ever gotten and I would absolutely love to visit Jersey and Nantes in the future. I feel like I owe it to Cahun and Moore now, to go say hello.
I hope that people firstly take inspiration from Cahun and Moore's bravery and creativity. They were not only brave enough to express themselves the way they wanted and love each other so fully in an era that discouraged both, but in the face of horrors so great as the Nazi occupation during World War 2, facing starvation or worse, being sent to a concentration camp and killed, they both still remained steadfast in their strength. Even after being sent to prison and slated for execution they never wavered. It is truly inspirational.
I also hope that LGBTQ readers are able to see their story and find a mirror in history. We have always been here, and our stories are vital too, and Cahun and Moore's queerness is a part of their story that cannot be erased.
The graphic novel is available for pre-order. You can find out more on Kaz's website.
Comments
Comments on this story express the views of the commentator only, not Bailiwick Publishing. We are unable to guarantee the accuracy of any of those comments.