A lot of things sound neutral, but they're not. A typical example would involve police violence. It's usually forbidden to call police "murderers," even if they're convicted of murder. People will say that it sounds hysterical and unobjective.

You can't use a drawing to prove a war crime. A drawing doesn't have that notion that it's proof of a reality. Because of that, you can do all sorts of interesting things in it.

I feel like the traditional patron system meant that you would kiss the ass of one rich person and then hide all of the financial goings-on of your work, and you could pretend you were pure.

The occupation is really terrible on a variety of levels. It's terrible on the "shooting people and torturing people in prison" level. But I think the thing that is very hard to convey is that it's also this bureaucratic grinding-down and daily humiliation that I think would probably be as horrible as the spectacular violence.

But the thing about proving things? Your jaggedness just goads you on – it makes you sharper and harder. It gives you swagger.

Different types of sex work are differently supportive. If I were working in a strip club, I would be competing with my colleagues, and while there would be support, there would be financial motivation not to offer too much support.

Working a model liberated me from ever having to hold a day job. I transitioned from doing that to working full-time as an artist. If you're 19 and living cheap, being an artist model can sustain you. I dropped out of college at 21 and my illustration hadn't yet taken off. It is more than working in a store. It is a hard way to make a living but you earn more than in a similarly unskilled job.