On Visual Storytelling, Comics and Healthcare: Catching up with Sam Hester

You know a great storyteller when you hear one. But it takes an exceptional artist to help us really?see?a story.

Sam Hester?does just this — and both her skilled work and commitment to impact is one of a kind. A recognized leader in the field of graphic recording, Sam uses deep listening skills, her signature graphic style and a passion for community-building to engage audiences in meaningful ways.

I was lucky enough to find Sam through our mutual TED connections. In her TED Talk last year, “How Visual Storytelling Creates Better Healthcare,” Sam talked about the important and growing graphic medicine movement. To illustrate its impact, Sam shared the very personal role graphic medicine played when Sam was a caregiver for her mom –and the change that it drove for the better.

Sam instantly impresses, showcasing the intersection of her talent, passion and impact in both her words and pictures. In our interview, we discuss the benefits of feedback, the overlooked stories that inspired her creativity during the pandemic and her advice to others who are building their own distinct work in the world.

Laura: You have such an impressive spectrum of creative work — from comics journalism to the graphic medicine movement. When did you know you wanted to be an artist? Was there a moment, or was it fluid over time?

Sam: The stories came first: I always knew I wanted to be a writer. I studied English literature. But I suspected my writing wasn’t that great, so I supplemented my stories with pictures to make the stories more engaging. At the same time, when I drew or painted pictures, I found I was always including words, to add context to the images. Everything clicked when I started writing autobiographical comics in my early twenties, and I realized that?I didn’t have to choose between words and pictures — I could have both, and the work was better when I combined them. I’ve never looked back!

Laura: Who has influenced you as you’ve developed as an artist?

As a child, I read comics, but it was children’s writers and illustrators who inspired me the most. I loved it when great writers, like?Eleanor Estes and E. L. Konigsburg, were brave enough to illustrate their own stories. And I loved it when visual artists, like?Raymond Briggs, were brave enough to write stories to accompany their pictures. Of course, I love the work of author/artists like?Maurice Sendak?and?Arnold Lobel, who seem so perfectly at home in both.

As an adult, I continued to read and love young adult fiction, and was especially inspired by the funny and brilliant New Zealand children’s writer?Margaret Mahy, who placed her stories in her own local settings, at a time when publishers and audiences were skeptical about doing that. Mahy’s work really inspired me to rethink the way I saw my own local surroundings, and to be brave enough to write stories set in my own hometown!

I probably have to mention?Bob Dylan: I’d known him as a folk singer of my parents’ generation, but in the late 1990’s I was amazed and thrilled to discover that he was still playing amazing concerts all over the world. I followed his tour all over the place for a few years. Entirely apart from his skill as a performer, I love Dylan’s ability to use words in a powerful way, and I have been delighted to see his writing beginning to receive the recognition I think it deserves.

When my children and I talked about the artists and writers who have inspired me, we noticed that almost all of them are white English-speakers. I am glad my kids love them too, but?we’re always on the lookout for work by diverse creators, so that the stories and pictures we love are more reflective of the world around us.?We recently re-discovered the beautiful children’s story “Crow Boy,” by?Taro Yashima.

Read more of the Q&A here.