Lisa Wool-Rim Sjöblom

Illustratör, serietecknare & grafisk formgivare

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Tails from the Burrow-almanackan 2011

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Instagram: @chung.woolrim

Sorting old boxes at my mum’s in Stockholm and just came across the socks I wore when I made the long and strange journey from Korea to Sweden. When the socks were put on me I was 정울림, a Korean child, falsely and deliberately labelled an orphan, and when they were pulled off me, I had turned into Lisa Sjöblom, a foster child in Sweden, who would soon be adopted by strangers and assimilated into a Swede.

I still find it hard to believe that I held a creative workshop and gave a keynote speech at Harvard University last week. I’m sure it was just a dream but there is photographic evidence of the events so perhaps not … I think it went well, I had a great time even though I was pretty nervous! At the workshop I talked about my work and how I use comics to portray adoption and trauma, then I made the students do a little exercise. The next day, the wonderful Professor Kelly Mee Rich - who made all this happen! - and I facilitated a group meeting with adopted people from around the area and I talked a bit about my work and showed some of my illustrations to inspire discussions mainly about what pisses us off as adoptees. After that I took to the scary podium to deliver my keynote speech. Then Kelly and I had a conversation and an audience Q&A. The evening ended with a loud, yummy dinner where I got to know some wonderful people. I will cherish this forever and can’t thank Kelly enough for inviting me and making one of my biggest dreams come true. I’d also like to thank everyone else who helped organise this; Sol Kim-Bentley for making sure I had somewhere to stay and a plane to catch. Thanks to @youngeun_koo for meeting me and walking me through my adoption papers, and @oh_myo_kim for introducing me to your important research. And thank you @anne_heffron for giving @i_own_my_story_maria_diemar and me a lift to Boston from Providence.

Yesterday, I spoke at a conference organised by the Swedish support centre Tjejjouren, a feminist organisation by and for people who identify as girls and women. The conference focused on suicide prevention, and I was invited to educate the participants about adopted people, a group that is overrepresented in all figures about suicide, suicide attempts, depression, self-harm, addiction, eating disorders and more – while at the same time, one of the most overlooked groups. Our struggles are ignored at best but far too often claimed they don't exist or are turned against us. However, instead of presenting them with figures of our suffering, I walked them through adoptee-specific issues that non-adopted people won't know about unless they spend a lot of time with an adopted person and listen deeply to our stories, like why adopted people can feel that they're dying in situations non-adopted people feel are perfectly normal and safe, like saying goodbye at the end of a night or hanging up the phone. When you walk around in a body that is constantly in survival mode, it's no wonder you struggle with managing life.

Thank you to @zzzhuoting for this beautiful promo animation for my upcoming lecture at Konstfack! I've never seen myself animated before, I'm extremely flattered ❤️

I'm giving a lecture on Wednesday, 17 April, at 4.30 pm at Svarta havet, Konstfack in Stockholm. It's free and open to everyone! Please come and listen to me ramble about my struggles with turning adoption trauma into a graphic novel. It'll be thrilling!

Last night, I presented my work at the Adoption & Culture Conference at Brown University in Providence, and if anyone wants to watch it – here it is – thanks to my excellent partner in crime, @i_own_my_story_maria_diemar, who filmed the whole thing. Thanks to @abolish_and_build , who facilitated the panel; thanks to the other artists and researchers who also presented their work; thanks to the incredible @emilyhipchen, who made the whole conference possible and so kindly included me in it; thanks to everyone who stayed late and listened, and last but not least, thanks to the Swedish Arts Grants Committee for enabling my participation in this wonderful event.

I answer 5 questions for the online magazine Young Adulting Review.

As I said in my previous post, I'm packing for my first US trip! So the first week, I'll attend the Adoption and Culture Conference. Then, I'll head to Boston for three events. The first one is a creative writing workshop with undergraduates at Harvard University. This feels absolutely surreal. For most of my young adult years (after having watched Dead Poets Society – what can be more inspiring for a transracially adopted Asian girl in a tiny village in the north of Sweden than a bunch of privileged, White, boarding school boys reciting dead white poets in a cave?), my dream was to study literature at an Ivy League Uni, but it just wasn't possible for many reasons. So, the younger me can't believe this is really happening (nor can the current me, to be honest). Then, I'll meet people from the Boston adoptee community to talk about my work, particularly my latest book, which centres on trauma and mental health. And straight after that, I'll give a talk and Professor Kelly Mee Rich, who has put all of this together, and I will have a conversation and a Q&A. The final event is open to the public and will take place at Barker 110 (Thompson Room) at Harvard University on April 10, 6-7.30 pm. Hope to see you there!

I'm packing for my very first trip to the US ( I don't count transferring planes at LAX as having been there)! During my first week there, I'll attend the Alliance for the Study of Adoption and Culture biannual Conference at Brown University in Providence. I'll present my work on a joint artist panel on Friday, 5 April, at McCormack Family Theater from 8:30 to 10:00 pm. I can't wait to meet all the other adoptees who'll be there and present their work, some of whom I've collaborated with but never met in person. In my second week, I'm heading over to Boston to do a series of events with the Harvard English department. I'll put up a separate post for this. Hope to see you in Providence in a few days!

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