One the most intriguing new voices to emerge in cartooning over the past year has been Tana Oshima, and after reviewing her self-published minis Vagabond, Filthy, and Masquerade in recent weeks, I wanted to reach out to Tana herself and allow her to “have her say” in regards to her own work rather than subjecting you all to more of my blathering about it. Without further ado, then, here she is on her life, her work, her influences, and her aims, interspersed with images from two works in progress :  a short-form strip entitled Nabakova, and a full-length graphic memoir.

4CA : By way of introduction to readers who may not be familiar with your work, what is your artistic background? Did you attend art school, or are you entirely self-taught?

TO : I didn’t attend art school. I was in Spain back then, and you had…