{"id":222233,"date":"2026-01-07T23:06:13","date_gmt":"2026-01-07T23:06:13","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/222233\/"},"modified":"2026-01-07T23:06:13","modified_gmt":"2026-01-07T23:06:13","slug":"lu-frasers-illustrations-of-microbes-and-infodumps-are-driven-by-a-culture-of-diy-possibilities","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/222233\/","title":{"rendered":"Lu Fraser\u2019s illustrations of microbes and infodumps are driven by a culture of DIY possibilities"},"content":{"rendered":"

Lu Fraser<\/a> is a UK-born, Iceland-based artist who describes their work as a \u201cbroad mess of illustration based creations\u201d. Starting in an interest in making comics and zines, Lu brought these sensibilities into everything from gallery spaces to noise shows. Noise, sonically and visually, plays a large influence in Lu\u2019s textural gestures, utilising the heavy grains of risograph and walls of speckled ink from print outs and blow-pens \u2013 \u201cThey\u2019re so bad but I love when my spit has a part to play in my process,\u201d says Lu.<\/p>\n

\u201cI really see the world as a big network, extending between the internet and root systems and nervous systems, and the cycles that keep everything whole,\u201d says Lu. \u201cFrom this I feel a great deal of kinship with the here and now and the then and there.\u201d Lu\u2019s work wonderfully merges the cartoon with the hyper-specificity of informational systems, using them to represent the concept of ruin \u2013 trash, death and compost as aesthetics of collectivity and growing together. Lu\u2019s gender transition drives the work politically, using the art as a \u201cvessel for political ideas that I am passionate or angry or scared about\u201d as a way of sharing that emotional space with contemporaries.<\/p>\n

\u201cA real pushing point for me to start creating was paying regular visits to stores in London like Gosh! Comics, Waste Store, Books Peckham and archives like 56a Infoshop and seeing the wild stuff that the self publishing world is churning out,\u201d says Lu. Energised by the DIY efforts of the local London scene, Lu was further inspired by artists like Leomi Sadler<\/a> and Stefanie Leinhos<\/a>, and now Lu is bringing that optimism for underground comix<\/a> and zine illustration to Iceland, whose own culture of noise artists and \u201cslimy queer photographers\u201d spiritually share the same aesthetics as Lu\u2019s curious, messy and humorous illustrations. When asked about their major creative influences, Lu answered simply: \u201c3D rotating blender dildos and water. The synthetic and the natural. The deep time and the not-here-yet.\u201d Well said.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Lu Fraser is a UK-born, Iceland-based artist who describes their work as a \u201cbroad mess of illustration based…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":222234,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[31],"tags":[442,498,499,500,501,156,111,139,69],"class_list":{"0":"post-222233","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-arts-and-design","8":"tag-arts","9":"tag-arts-and-design","10":"tag-artsanddesign","11":"tag-artsdesign","12":"tag-design","13":"tag-entertainment","14":"tag-new-zealand","15":"tag-newzealand","16":"tag-nz"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/222233","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=222233"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/222233\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/222234"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=222233"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=222233"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=222233"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}