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Author Bio: Henry 磊磊 Roark is beloved. He wears many identities and walks in many worlds.  He enjoys reading nonfiction; writing narrative nonfiction; and making visual art in wide ranging media, currently collage and origami. He had one long and many short-lived careers along with unfinished graduate degrees in architecture, divinity, and library science. After stepping down from various volunteer commitments, he currently only serves as the Council for Neighborhood Libraries Representative for Harvey Milk Memorial and on the Board of Directors at the Roxie Theater.

Artist Bio: My first medium was Ticonderoga HB #2 pencil and printer paper, sketching portraits of hot Goku. Then I armed myself with my uncle’s old Minolta and a darkroom in high school, where I developed portrait photography and exhibited Faces of IMSA outside the principal’s office. I focused on capturing emotional presence, a subject I’ve continued to explore across mediums, at a highly technical boarding school Wired called “Hogwarts for Hackers.”

In Copenhagen, I shifted to architecture and furniture design, drawn by how structure and form can shape feeling, while deepening my interest in how material objects can carry emotion and narrative.

In San Francisco, my practice drifted to gestural expression in painting. I rented studio space at Art Explosion and exhibited at Unit 809. After the space and materials took too much overhead, I worked on one-off wood projects. 

As a sober QTPOC with a disability, I hone my practice to ask how emotion can take form—and how making can become a form of grounding.