Comics as Care

Prioritizing mental health is important for everyone. However, traditional mental health resources are not always readily accessible, nor are they appropriate for every individual. Creative, accessible, and alternative methods of self- and community-based care are arguably just as important as their medicalized counterparts. 

Join PhD Candidate and Public Scholar Amy Mazowita for an afternoon of comics-making and conversation about all things mental health. This two-part event will begin with a mental health-focused comics-making workshop led by author and illustrator Sandra Dumais. A collaborative group discussion between speakers and attendees will follow. 

This event is open to the public and welcomes folks from all backgrounds—existing knowledge of mental health rhetoric and/or artistic proficiency are not required! All necessary supplies will be provided for in-person participants.

Please indicate any access needs at the time of registration and we will do our best to accommodate.

How can you participate? Join us in person or online by registering for the Zoom Meeting or watching live on YouTube.

Have questions? Send them to info.4@concordia.ca  

Sandra Dumais

Sandra Dumais makes books, paintings and comics in Montreal, Quebec. When she is not reading, drawing or painting, you can find her and her family (including their dog Indy, obviously) exploring Montreal’s many parks and ice cream shops. For more ono Sandra’s work, visit www.sandradumais.com

Ariela Freedman

Ariela Freedman is a professor at the Liberal Arts College, Concordia University, Montreal. She works on comics and graphic novels in relation to representations of pain. Her work also focuses on modernist literature, literatures of migration, and representations of trauma. She is the author of Death, Men and Modernism (Routledge), and numerous articles, book chapters, and reviews, as well as three novels. 

Heather McLaughlin

Heather McLaughlin is an assistant professor in the Creative Arts Therapies department at Concordia University, where she is the option coordinator for the Art Therapy program. Heather founded and now directs the Concordia Arts in Health Centre. She is an art therapist, couple and family therapist, psychotherapist, and clinical supervisor. Heather has a BFA from the Nova Scotia College of Art and Design, with an exchange to the École National Superieur de Beaux Arts in Paris, a Masters in Art Therapy from Concordia, and a post-masters certificate in Marriage and Family Therapy from the Argyle Institute.

Amy Mazowita

Amy Mazowita (she/her) is a SSHRC-funded PhD Candidate in the Department of Communication Studies at Concordia University. Her doctoral research explores Instagram-based mental health comics and is situated at the intersections of social media studies, comics studies, and critical disability studies. Amy is a 2023-2024 Concordia University Public Scholar, a member of Concordia’s Access-in-the-Making (AIM) Lab, the communications representative for Concordia’s Communication Studies Doctoral Students’ Association, and a TA in the Department of Communication Studies.