M RAMIREZ PORTFOLIO 2025
FLEDGLING
This is a small drawing I made during a residency in CDMX last September. Made in the shadow of the one year anniversary of the beginning of the genocide in Gaza, it is a prayer for the safety of all young creatures across the world, especially children. It was made by rubbing colored pencil into a smudged graphite drawing on board, and attaching a found metal milagro charm with adhesive.
ERASURE - from whale fall (smoke and mold journal)
This is a one page comic exploring what is under the waves. Utilizing erasure as a storytelling tool, I ask questions about the importance of the natural world in our increasingly disembodied existence, where everyday items come from very far away, and we don’t know the history of them coming to be. This disconnect between understanding of things we interact on a daily basis encourages a further disinvestment from our place within the kingdom of animals, and seeing our own bodies as the nature they are.
WAVES
This is a short comic in which I attempted to capture the movement and shapes in the ocean as it crashed in front of me, which later was integrated into a longer format comic, whale fall. Drawn from direct observation in a sketchbook, I worked quickly and loosely to recreate the ethereal forms on paper. The poems that act as narration on the comic panels were simply my thoughts as I drew.
LABYRINTH - to be printed in Bernadette #2 (2025)
This amalgamation of graphite drawings is a retelling of the story of the minotaur and Theseus. Re-imagining the old tale as an opportunity for healing rather than domination, the main character ultimately embraces the minotaur, a symbol of their hurt parts. Similar to “Learning to Trust”, this work is an experimental reframing of the idea of a comic: panels scatter, and time expands forwards and backwards. The is a “comic” that can be read in any order, with infinite connections to be made.
HEARTSTRING DYPTICH (installation)
LEARNING TO TRUST
This was an installation I made using graphite, colored pencil, and yarn. It is an amalgamation of personal symbols, communicating with each other by simply being placed near one another. The viewer's eyes are led all over the installation, combining infinite combinations of the symbols, and creating new semiotic meaning. The theme of this collection of drawings was healing from codependency, fear, and trauma in relationships.
LEARNING TO TRUST (detail)
LUTEAL PHASE #7 (strip in Broken Pencil Quarterly Magazine)
MILAGROS (installation shot)
In this work, I explore the formal boundaries of what a comic can be by distilling its most important parts: sequence and semiotic impulse.
MILAGROS (detail: above, right)
Page from LADDERS (published by Floss Editions 2025) - A comic in which I explore the use of grids as paneling.
SEQUENCE FROM FLEA (to be released 2025 from Fieldmouse Press)
PERSONAL PUBLICATIONS
Upcoming: 2025 Flea - Fieldmouse Press / 2025 Ladders - Floss Editions / 2027 BOUND - Fieldmouse Press
2020-2024 Luteal Phase, A Quarterly Strip in Broken Pencil Magazine - Toronto, ON, Canada
2024 Soft Belly - Irrelevant Press
2022 A Walk - Self Published
2023 whale fall - smoke and mold
2020 MOAB - Self Published
AND SELECTED PUBLICATION CONTRIBUTIONS
Upcoming: 2025 Bernadette #2 Anthology
2023 Fun Size Anthology published by Tiny Splendor
2023 12 page feature in JAYWALK #5 published by Domino Books (JAYWALK Nominated for Ignatz award 2024: Best Anthology)
2023 whale fall featured in Smoke and Mold Journal Issue 8 (whale fall Nominated: Ignatz award 2023: Best Webcomic)