My name is COSE, and I am a colourful, queer, Rotterdam based storyteller. My work is like an anticapitalist playground, which I am continuously building. The tools I use to build are art, activism, and academic theory. Theory is like a map which helps me analyse the current system. Activism is like a hammer which can be used to smash oppression and simultaneously to build the foundation for an alternative, community-based society.
Upon that foundation, my playground is built, where art brings theory and activism together. In it I design, draw, write, sing, dance, perform, and play. Sometimes I work digitally, other times I use material that is at hand, leftover, the scraps. My style is colourful, bold, and simple. I would rather tell ten stories in quick line drawings, than one story in a detailed oil painting.
The stories I tell critique capitalism and/or imagine a non-capitalist world. That is important to me because capitalism is exploiting women, workers, racialised people and nature. In my view, art is political prefiguration; through art we can show the future we want to see. I take joy as a guiding principle, rather than efficiency, and want to collaborate with people and organisations that do the same.
Projects I would love to do include but are not limited to: collaborating with musicians (designing album covers, posters and on-stage visuals), taking part in a performance, illustrating an activist children’s book, and learning to tattoo.
Want to work together? Contact me below!
Email: soitcose@gmail.com
Instagram: @soitcose