Growing up with early childhood trauma Jessica developed new friends in her mind to help her survive. As the years passed, parts went their separate ways tearing her apart. Eventually Jess took over to find their way through the adult world. But can they survive being crazy?
**Content includes descriptions of child abuse, sexual assault and mental illness.**
“Here we see the artist sift through the husks of memories, and somehow they’re able to make them feel hopeful even when confronted with extreme injustice. Their skills as a storyteller and disinterest in ‘happy endings’ help the story feel raw and poignant. This book is a window box of wonders, and I encourage you to find a few hours to take in this visual celebration that reminds us that even among the shit of life, beautiful plants can flower and grow. For those of us with histories of childhood abuse or neglect, Shame, Shame, Go Away is a collective scream to highlight what has for too long been ignored and explained away by those who would rather paper over the afterlives of troubled childhoods in which many of us were not kept safe.”
—Hrag Vartanian for Hyperallergic
“SHAME SHAME, Go Away is written and illustrated by MacCormack, a Vancouver-based artist, activist and educator invested in queer politics, mental health, embodiment, and decriminalization. Dedicated to their late friend Mia Rose Cameron, a teenager who died by suicide, SHAME SHAME, Go Away shares MacCormack’s experiences to bring light to the impacts of childhood trauma on people’s mental health and the damaging effects of medical and [in]justice systems.”
– Rebecca Casalino for FEMME ART REVIEW
“Mask-like faces, faces within faces, scarlet red genitals leaking fluids, and toothy bleeding mouths – there is a nightmarish, carnivalesque aspect to MacCormack’s iconography of shame that is truly unforgettable. When I first stumbled across the book’s Instagram account and was exposed to its remarkable imagery I thought to myself that I hadn’t seen visualizations this potent since Frida Kahlo, Ana Mendieta, or Kiki Smith.”
– Kathryn Simpson for Bad Feeling Magazine
This book is 180 pages, full colour and off-set printed.
We acknowledge the support of the Canada Council for the Arts.
They/Them
Jess MacCormack is a queer, mad, disabled artist and white settler working on the unceded ancestral territories of the xʷməθkʷəy̓əm (Musqueam), Sḵwx̱wú7mesh (Squamish), and sə̓lílwətaʔɬ (Tsleil-Waututh) Nations. Their art practice engages with the intersection of institutional violence and the socio-political reality of personal trauma. Working with communities and individuals affected by stigma and oppression, MacCormack uses cultural platforms and distribution networks to facilitate collaborations which position art as a tool to engender personal and political agency. Working in various mediums – graphic novels, digital art, performance, installation, community art and video – their work explores queer politics, embodiment and criminalization.
Jess Mac’s digital art has been shared through various platforms, such as Artforum International, Hyperallergic, Canadian Art, VICE Creator’s project, White Hot Contemporary Art, Bitch Magazine, PAPER Magazine and Art F City. Their animations have been screened internationally at festivals such as the Ottawa International Animation Festival, MIX-26 the New York Queer Experimental Film Festival, LA Film Fest at UCLA, Transcreen Amsterdam Transgender Film Festival, Inside Out Film and Video Festival (Toronto) and Mix Brazil Film Festival of Sexual Diversity (São Paulo, Rio de Janeiro, Brasilia, BR). Their interdisciplinary practice has been supported and exhibited by the Academie der Künste der Welte (Cologne, Germany), arbyte (London, UK), articule (Montréal, Canada), Western Front (Vancouver, Canada) and many other local and international galleries.
They have an MFA in Public Art and New Artistic Strategies from the Bauhaus University (2008) and were an Assistant Professor of Studio Arts at Concordia University (2010-2013). Jess is currently an instructor at Emily Carr University of Art + Design and is working towards their PhD in Contemporary Art at Simon Fraser University.
