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Above: Cover illustration for Family Style Zine.
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“Family Style: An AAPI Food Anthology” is a 44-page anthology publication by Asian and Asian American and Pacific Islander (AAPI) creators to share the lesser-known histories behind AAPI foods. Our diverse communities have created foods that serve as a record to reflect our resilience through long histories of colonialism and migration. We hope to connect our audience to the emotional and historical sides to these dishes through illustration and writings. Each illustration is accompanied by an abridged history on that dish that details its journey to what we are familiar with today. Through this collection of art and writing, we aim to serve up familiar dishes with their rich historical context to humanize our communities and deepen our relationships with food and each other.
Early February 2018, we put out a call reaching out to the greater AAPI communities in search of AAPI illustrators to interpret a dish and/or ingredient from their culture as a full-page illustration. We were so impressed by everyone’s pitches and was so grateful to have received just under 200 submissions.
We believe that this project is fuel for the soul in this age of racial and socioeconomic justice. Through artists’ interpretations of these dishes, we hope to visualize their significance and as an extension, the significance of ourselves and our people. We invite you to join us in cooking up a delicious and filling zine for our friends and communities.
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Here is a list of the dishes that will be explored in this edition of Family Style Zine, as chosen by our artists:
- Banchan 반 찬
- Bánh mì
- Bánh Xèo
- Beef noodle soup 牛肉麵
- Curry
- Egg tart 蛋撻
- Halo halo
- Hong Kong milk tea 港式奶茶
- Hot pot យ៉ាវហន
- Jajangmyeon 자장면
- Kalo
- Kare-kare
- Kimbap 김밥
- Laksa
- Ramen ラーメン
- Taiwan Breakfast Foods
- Tapsilog
- Wasabi ワサビ
- Yangzhou fried rice 揚州炒飯
- Youtiao 油條
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We are Cynthia and Farrah, two first-generation Taiwanese-American women artists in illustration and film respectively. As recent graduates who have experience leading and organizing within the Asian American community at the college level, we’re looking forward to expanding the scope of our projects to include a broader range of contributors and be accessible to a larger audience.
We met in our early years at an annual Buddhist summer camp, where we were taught respect for our food and its sources. These lessons followed us as we grew to consider food as an extension of our identity and a tool to understand our culture. We look forward to continuing this exploration of the intersection between our identities and food, through collaborating with other artists.
Cynthia Cheng is a Taiwanese American illustrator and cartoonist based in Oakland, CA. You can find her helping with Doodles in Google’s San Francisco office during the day and on the hunt for delicious foods in Chinatown after work. In her personal work, she focuses on creating identity-based illustrations and comics and has been excited about the intersection of food and history ever since researching for her thesis project, a series of editorial illustrations centered on Asian and Asian-American issues. With this next project, she’s looking forward to carrying on her passion for community, storytelling, and intercultural education.
You can find Cynthia's work and learn more here: (website / twitter / tumblr / instagram)
Farrah Su is a 1.5 generation Taiwanese American filmmaker and photographer born in Taiwan, raised in Long Island, NY, and currently living in LA. She recently graduated from Chapman University with a B.F.A. in Film Production, emphasizing in cinematography. Inspired by her experience in community organizing, locally and at school, and filmmaking, she works to use filmmaking and photography to uplift voices from disenfranchised communities and create visual language to empower these communities. She finds joy in meaningful relationships, good cups of tea, and watching video essays on almost everything.
You can find Farrah's work and learn more here: (website / instagram)
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THE ARTISTS
THE WRITERS
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Our contributors include our artists, artist/writers, and writers. We have 20 contributing artists for the illustrations ($150/each), 9 of them also contributing their accompanying writing pieces (an additional $50), and 11 writers ($100/each). The amount accounted for in under Artists include the payment for the Artists and Artist/Writers.
We are estimating the shipping costs, IndieGoGo platform costs (5%), Stripe fee (3% + $0.30 per transaction), and contingency to be $1,377. Thus making our fundraising goal to equal $7,500.
Once all our costs are covered, we will donate any profits made from the project to an AAPI food-related non-profit, that will be determined at later time.
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In celebration of Asian Pacific Heritage Month, Family Style Zine is collaborating with San Francisco Public Libraries to host workshops for teens and adults about turning passions in art and activism into tangible projects. Through these workshops which will be free to the public, we aim to provide visible examples of turning passions into projects while also connecting to the local community.
To continue the celebrations, Family Style Zine is hosting a launch event in May 2018 called, “Grand Opening: Family Style Zine Launch Event”, at Public Knowledge at the San Francisco Museum of Modern Art (SFMOMA). With this official launch event, we plan to bring more eyes to the zine and to create more opportunities to uplift both the AAPI creatives who have contributed to our zine as well as the greater San Francisco AAPI community.
We welcome anyone to join us, if you’re in the area! You can find the Facebook event here.
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Keep updated with us through our social media! We will be sharing more information on our artists, writers, and the dishes throughout the campaign!
TWITTER / TUMBLR / INSTAGRAM
