Roshan Ganu is a multimedia narrative artist originally from Goa-India, now based in Minneapolis. As a part of her narrative work she makes comics, cartoons about her surroundings, and also builds multimedia installations, based on what the story/concept demands. She is the recipient of the Next Step Fund and Arts Impact for Groups awards by MRAC, MNiatures by the Minnesota Opera and has worked with Minneapolis Institute of Art to build narrative engagement. In 2021 she co-founded ‘Aapli Library’, a zine space for community and conversation in Minneapolis with the help of Springboard for the Arts initiative titled ‘Artists Respond: Combating Social Isolation’. As a comic artist she has taught comic making workshops with a focus on personal narratives at the Minneapolis College of Art and Design, Socially Engaged Craft Collective, KCLAS in India and at Aapli Library. Her work overall has been recognised by the Star Tribune, MinnPost, MPLSArt and SOTA podcast and has been exhibited at galleries such as Soo Visual Arts Center, Allianz Field- Saint Paul, Duluth Art Institute, Second Shift Gallery, Artistry-Bloomington, ArtReach St.Croix, among others.
Humour, building classroom relationships and exploring themes/subject matter through the medium of Comics and Narrative, are some things Roshan enjoys the most while being a Teaching Artist. Not all comics are humorous, but all forms of comic art are friendly and approachable, and contribute to building relationships between individuals as well as communities. This notion forms the core of her teaching philosophy.
More About the Artist
Through original and engaging lesson plans that carry unique themes, Roshan guides participants to ideate and brainstorm a compelling narrative based on personal experiences and/or world topics. These themes can be tailored to different school subjects as well, such as science, geography, history, environmental science, language learning etc. by taking one component of it as a theme. For instance, a comic can be made about the ‘cycles of water’ in a geography class and in a different instance a comic lesson can be curated to a short story in a language learning class. Structures and frameworks for the story are provided to make the building process a comfortable one for beginners as well as advanced level participants. The next step is to break this narrative into 4, 6, 8 or any other number of steps depending on how many panels/pages of a comic we plan to create. Most often, a beginner comics class will start with a 4 or 6 panel comic. Roshan specializes in short form comics and zines, which means that at the end of one session the participants will have a complete short form comic.
Program Offerings
Residency
Long Story Short: A Storytelling Residency with the Comic Form
This residency is the exploration of storytelling in the comic art form mining from daily life experiences, with a head-nod to humour (the humour part is optional). This is a longer form of the workshop model wherein we will learn about a brief history of world comics, learn about environment development, penciling, inking, and production. The final goal is a short form comic anthology OR a short form comic of 6-8 pages compiled in the zine format. The student will be able to keep the original work and will be guided on creating copies which can be included in a zine library, a coffee shop or any other public place.
Workshop
That’s Funny!…Or is it?: A Short Comic Making Workshop
Using a ‘Slice of Life’ narrative approach from the recent past, distant future, distant past or near future, participants will create a 4-6 panel comic that may or may not be funny. They will brainstorm, refine their ideas and dissect the story to fit within a pre-decided number of panels. Ink them, colour them or finish them black and white. You will leave with a finished short comic about a moment/incident/experience in your life.
“A playful, creative, reflective class that will prompt you to see and appreciate your world in new ways.”
Workshop participant, Minneapolis College of Art and Design
