Apesar de não estar, estou muito / DJ Nobita Early Years 2002

This book was published as part of the exhibition, Diogo Jesus: Apesar de não estar, estou muito, curated by João Ribas, presented at the Galeria Municipal do Porto between June 2 and August 16, 2020. It is a split book, with both sides acting as front covers. One side displays various texts, a series of digital copies of Diogo Jesus’ individual artworks and photographs documenting the exhibition; the other gathers multiple zines drawn by the artist between October 2019 and July 2020 in different notebooks.

“From his first independently produced music and comics, to his recent projects as DJ Nobita and Gekiga Warlord, the drawings, objects, videos, ephemera and archival material presented survey a prolific artist’s projects and publications, moving in between genres and communities since 2007. What unites most of this work is a narrative-driven, subcultural and autobiographical dimension, its ironies joined as much by sardonic humour as eviscerating honesty. The revolving cast of friends, artists, heteronyms, appropriated fictional characters, and lexicon of subcultures in the drawings provide an ongoing commentary on questions of creativity, masculinity, personal obsession, gaming culture, DIY culture, precarity, and the conditions of making art itself.” – João Ribas