Jonathan Hill is an illustrator, educator, and author who has been instrumental in making the art form of comics more visible through his work with Literary Arts' annual Portland Book Festival. He's taught at the Oregon College of Art and Craft and Pacific Northwest College of Art, and collaborated with writer M.K. Reed on two graphic novels, Americus and Wild Weather.
Hill's first solo graphic novel, Odessa, is a coming-of-age story set in a post-apocalyptic landscape. Ginny Crane, the young protagonist who echoes Hill's own Vietnamese-American heritage, finds herself at the heart of an odyssey that reveals not just her own ingenuity but also the dark potential of a dystopian America.
Jonathan sat down during the 2020 Portland Book Festival for a quarantined conversation with S.W. Conser about visual storytelling, cultural representation, adventure and tragedy, and the give-and-take of sharing your knowledge with the next generation.
An expanded web-only version of this episode, featuring an extra 20 minutes of content, is available at this link.
- KBOO