Sketchbooks always reveal something about an artist’s process — but Brianna Rose Brooks’ 2018 Perfectly Acceptable release, Oh My (Bri), goes a step further by revealing much of its author’s psyche. It’s an intimate glimpse at a remarkable talent — disarmingly intimate, in fact — but it’s also not necessarily for those who don’t appreciate a challenge when they’re “only” expecting to look at some amazing drawings.

Described by its publisher as dealing with “topics of intimacy, identity, and blackness” — truth in advertising, I assure you — it’s nevertheless a safe bet that readers will be at least occasionally taken aback by how far she goes in exploring these themes, visually and literally. And while the sketches and essay collected herein span a roughly three-year gamut, the cumulative effect of the work as a whole bears the conceptual weight of a liftetime having been spent not just…