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about kayla e.

Kayla E. is a Texas-born artist and designer of Mexican-American descent. Her comics practice centers around her childhood and functions as a map-making exercise. Leaning heavily on the fixed compositional structure and aesthetic codes of post-war American comics, she imposes order onto recollections once disorganized by intrafamilial abuse, addiction, and sexual violence. Her textile work and painting practice are concerned with memories that present as unmappable. She works as creative director at Fantagraphics and is the co-founder and president of Nat. Brut Inc., a non-profit that produces the art and literary magazine Nat. Brut. She earned her B.A. from Harvard University, where she was awarded the Albert Alcalay Prize in Visual Arts and served as the art director for the Harvard Lampoon. As a public speaker, E. has been invited to expand on her practice at universities and creative conferences across the country. For the past few years, she has worked out of her downtown attic studio in North Carolina, where she lives with her wife, Laura Bullard. Kayla is a recipient of a Princeton Hodder Fellowship for the 2023-2024 academic year. Precious Rubbish, her experimental graphic memoir, will be published by Fantagraphics in 2025. 

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Early praise for Precious Rubbish by Kayla E.

“FIVE STARS STUNNING! Precious Rubbish has the biblical-level artistry and poetry of William Blake combined with the playful commercialism of Mad Magazine.” Maria Bamford

 

“This is the scariest book I have ever read.” Mark Newgarden

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Precious Rubbish may help you come to terms with some things you’ve been privately avoiding or even things about yourself you didn’t know.” Chris Ware

Available from Fantagraphics in 2025

HONORS & AWARDS

  • Mary Mackall Gwinn Hodder Fellow | Princeton University | Lewis Center for the Arts | 2023-2024

  • Rockower Award in Layout and Design | American Jewish Press Assoc. | 2021

  • American Illustration 40 | AI-AP | 2021

  • Whiting Literary Magazine Prize| Nat. Brut | 2020

  • American Illustration 37 | AI-AP | 2016

  • Albert Alcalay Prize | Harvard University | 2013

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