River Blues

Penelope Dullaghan is an artist and illustrator based in Indianapolis. She works in children’s publishing, editorial, and advertising. In her work she employs a range of mediums, including printmaking, paint, and cut paper.

For her Zócalo Sketchbook, Dullaghan imagines five phantasmagoric river towns—from a row of houses built along a river full of rowers to a lunar colony to a city comprising the shell of a World Turtle. Of her Sketchbook, Dullaghan tells Zócalo, “I’ve been watching too many nature documentaries lately that all present evidence that humans are overstepping their bounds with …

Creature Creations | Zocalo Public Square • Arizona State University • Smithsonian

Creature Creations

Violeta Encarnación is an illustrator and animator born and raised in Cuba, who now resides in New York City. She also works as a senior tattoo artist at Skinblu, an …

Wild Abundance

Farida Zaman is a Toronto-based illustrator and designer. Trained in fine art and illustration, she has found a wide versatility of applications of her style, which has been used in: …

My Brother, the Acclaimed Artist from the East L.A. Barrio

A Very Personal Chronicle of Painter Salomón Huerta’s Journey to the Whitney Biennial and Beyond

My brother, Salomón Huerta, is an internationally recognized visual artist. When I think about his rise in the art world, I can’t help but reflect on how far he came, …

When Music Became Therapy in Interwar France

In the Face of Uncertainty, Trauma, and Extreme Isolation, Musicians Turned to Their Art

In March of 2020 I found myself alone (except for my two cats) in a small bungalow in Bloomington, Indiana, trying and failing to distract myself from COVID-19. I was …

Nature Playback | Zocalo Public Square • Arizona State University • Smithsonian

Nature Playback

Jorge Verdin is a Pasadena-based designer, illustrator, and musician. Under the name Clorofila, he is known as a pioneer of the Nortec music style. The multidisciplinary artist has also created music …