Ink Tea

About the Artists

Dax Tran-Caffee and I met, and within a few hours I’d stolen his flag. He retaliated months later by stealing my trophy. He plays the part of the villain better than most, and also plays a mean squeezebox.

Puppets invaded Dax’s artistic practice in 2008, derailing a promising career as a painter. He apprenticed with the Blair Thomas & Co. chamber puppet theater in Chicago, has since begun touring solo puppet shows of his own, and is currently building his first large-scale festival puppetry performance, “The Museum Proper.” He is a co-founder of the Corpus Callosum music & performance ensemble, which was recently awarded the Collaborative Grant by the Belle Foundation for Cultural Development. Dax is an organizer of citywide anti-consumerist psychogeographic street games in Chicago and Oakland, which he hopes will change the world someday. Amid all of this, he still continues to paint, and is assembling a new body of work inspired by crossdressing. He holds a BFA in Painting and Drawing from the California College of Arts & Crafts, and an MFA in Performance from the School of the Art Institute of Chicago. His work is online at norestforthewicked.biz, museumproper.com, corpus.cc, and chicag0.org.

Dietrich Poppen has known me since I was 15 or 16. An incredibly talented Minneapolis musician, he collects instruments and plays all of them, most often with his band, Prozac Rat. His talents also extend to theatre tech, acting, watercolor (apparently), and telling lies.

Juan Santapau is a Chilean webcomic writer and artist, whom I met online through our mutual friend Jhayne. Juan weaves haunting speculative fiction stories, and beautiful examinations of day to day intimacies with a wry look at humanity in The Secret Knots.

Aaron Edelson was the weirdest guy I met in college, a short goofy fellow who always seemed to be painting his nails. Aaron lives in L.A. now, and is celebrated for his strange and wonderful collagework, illustration, and probably his antics. His website

Andrea Heilman is another friend from college, met when cast in bit parts in a Brecht play. Andrea taught me how to make a rusty dystopian alleyway and a witch’s moldy staircase. She’s an talented set designer from Saint Paul, whose hair always smells amazing.

Cali Mastny and I met at a goth club and within a few months she’d convinced me to go to Nevada with her. She’s the best vegan cook I know, an incredible illustrator and costume designer, a great Minneapolis dj, and a perfect buddy on a roadtrip.

Max Lindorfer is my nemesis. We met in Mickey’s diner, and grew to despise each other when he began dating my roommate, who is now his wife. His strengths are making excellent illustrations and flying their cat, Sushi around their house in Minneapolis.

Meredith Rogers had been on my radar before I met her at Colleen’s wedding. Her playful illustrations of reckless pirate girls won my heart, and when she heard Cinderella she got the rights to illustrate it. She is awesome sauce and lives in Michigan.

Colleen Laird looked like Scully when I met her in college. She was pithy, sharp, pretty, and aiming for the FBI. She’s now a film studies professor in Eugene, OR, and one of those people who seems to be amazing at everything she does, especially photography.

Jay Al Hashal’s artistic prowess escaped my notice for too many years, as I knew she was a computer genius and a wonderful geek. She did the most amazing printwork I’ve seen, and once told me I have a face like home. She makes clever films and lives in Seattle.