#1: The Role of the Artist During Fascism

May 2025

Comic by Jordan Seaberry, based on a conversation with Daniel Denvir

As I set out to create this episode, I was thinking to myself… why this project?

I spent the winter in Guatemala. I returned to the states after the Inauguration, and after the first weeks of the new administration: ICE gestapos were abducting my neighbors, the anti-vaccine guy was in charge of vaccines, life-saving federal aid was frozen, the Dept of Education was on the chopping block, my artist studio building was being bought by luxury developers, and any small climate mitigation efforts were reversed.

I felt dizzy, lost.

For once in my life, my obnoxiously bottomless well of optimism had run dry. Looking at my neighbors under attack, I felt powerless.

I hate Zoom. I’m sick of it. So I knew I didn’t want to host another webinar or community town hall. Instead, I wanted to zip back to middle school—to that feeling of sitting down with someone who could help me make sense of things. I needed help understanding my place, my power, and the work ahead in this new paradigm.

So, I called up my dear friend Dan Denvir. Dan hosts The Dig, an incredible long-form podcast that dives deep into political movements. He came over to my living room, and we had the kind of conversation that helped me see the world– and my place in it as an artist– a little more clearly.

That conversation is now the first installment of our Vital Conversations series: real talks with brilliant thinkers whose insights can help all of us find our way in this moment.

For me, zipping back to middle school meant one thing: I had to make a comic book.

Scroll down to check out the first Vital Conversations episode– and the first comic I’ve drawn since I was sketching in the cafeteria in 2002.

View the full comic below, or click here for a mobile-friendly version.

Listen to Jordan’s interview on NPR’s Artscape to learn more about the inspiration behind this piece.

You can read the full transcript here.