In conversation with .. 4!

Suzanne Forbes
Berlin, Germany
@suzanneforbesartist
It’s been almost 2 months since selfisolation
has been enforced worldwide,
how are you feeling?
I’m feeling ok. I am extremely privileged to
be able to work from home, because of the
support of my Patrons, and I’m so grateful
to be in Berlin. I overworked the first seven
weeks, so I’m recovering now.
What have you been doing to pass your
time in quarantine?
I went into self-isolation on March 1, the day
after Torture Garden Berlin. I’m disabled,
asthmatic and immunocompromised, so I
knew I was locking down for the long haul.
I slept for four hours after TG and then
immediately started working from the
minute I woke up to the minute I went to
sleep, seven days a week, until late April.
With simpler drawings, I worked even faster than usual, and on one night
I drew from THREE shows. I haven’t drawn three shows in a night since
Folsom Weekend 2006 in SF! Like a kid in a candy store, I overdid it,
triggered my autoimmune disease, and now I am resting and recovering.
Of course, I have FOMO about the online shows I can’t draw, just as I have
FOMO about the IRL events I’ve missed because of my health.
Do you have a day-to-day lockdown routine?
Nope, not now that I’m in a health problem flareup. I just sleep when I
can, throw food at my husband and cats, and work as much as I can. I am
trying to get 14 Patreon posts up per month since March, which is a lot,
since each post has at least a couple pieces of art, plus all the links and
info about the performers. But it means I have a couple hundred extra
euros to donate to Berlin mutual aid funds for LGBTQ folx, sex workers
and refugees each month.
Have any unexpected benefits come out of this situation for you?
Knowing I don’t have to do any of the things that normally drain me
and take energy away from my work, like medical appointments and
How has the situation affected your work?
For that first seven weeks, I felt fiercely
energized. I’m a trauma survivor with
C-PTSD, so when there’s a crisis I go
into endocrinological power space. I was
galvanized, and I worked so much. Suddenly
I could “attend” and do my documentary
drawing at far more drag and burlesque
shows than usual! Normally I have to ration
the events I go to really carefully, because of
my physical limitations. But suddenly all the
shows were coming to me, online!
It is very, very different drawing live from a
screen, from a Livestream. I keep the same
rule, that I have to do the main part of the
drawing while the performer is live, but a
feed provides much less information than
my eyes do. Even in a dark, smoky club,
I can see much more of the performer in
meatspace than I can when they’re reduced
to two dimensions on-screen. This is why
I’ve been live-drawing primarily streams
where I know most of the people and have
drawn them IRL before - I have a mental
map of their faces stored! My first livestream-drawings
were really bad. I got
the hang of it though. I make my stream
drawings a lot simpler.
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