WHITE RIVER JUNCTION — As a broadcast news outlet and a community hub for burgeoning artists and filmmakers, JAM (Junction Arts & Media) traverses the space between the factual and the fanciful.

The organization’s new exhibition, a vibrant, incisive collection of comics by Center for Cartoon Studies fellow and journalist Arantza Peña Popo, stands at the intersection of those disciplines.

“We wanted to focus on their journalism work because that’s sort of in line with the mission of our organization,” said JAM coordinator and producer Cedar O’Dowd, who organized the exhibit.

Hailing from just outside of Atlanta, Ga., Peña Popo was drawn to the arts from a young age. In elementary school, they would often trace images off the internet and sell them to classmates for a dollar. “I always had a Crayola in my hand,” they said.

They continued to learn to draw using YouTube and Tumblr, finding inspiration in indie comics and zines. “Anything that pushes into abstraction or more conceptual stuff has been stuff that I’ve always been interested in,” they said.

After graduating from high school in 2019, Peña Popo enrolled in the University of Southern California in Los Angeles where they studied journalism. At first, the degree seemed at odds with their creative instincts.

“(Journalism) is very objective and facts-based, and sometimes when I would write something in class, my teachers would tell me that it had too much color, like it felt too subjective,” they said.

Around the same time, they started to learn more about comics journalism, such as the satirical cartoons that populated the now defunct website The Nib. Cartooning emerged as a kind of third door where art and journalism could coexist.

For one of their first assignments in journalism school, Peña Popo opted to make a cartoon about Frankie Consent, a Black trans musician whose creative practice was upended during the pandemic. “Rising from the Underground” is one of four comics that feature in the exhibition at JAM.

One of the cartoon’s panels depicts Frankie Consent performing on Instagram Live from the confines of their apartment. As they sing into a microphone, a tsunami of color rushes past the artist, its bubbling tendrils wrapping around the phone screens of a handful of onlookers.

“A lot of their artwork is very childlike and kind of a bit chaotic, and I tried to instill the same kind of feel stylistically into the piece,” Peña Popo, 24, said.

Some of Peña Popo’s work is autobiographical, such as a comic they made for the Los Angeles Times about joining a queer salsa group when they moved to the city, but the comics in the JAM show mainly revolve around their journalistic projects.

“I think their stuff is really fresh in that it lets you know that a person made this, that it’s coming from a person’s point of view,” O’Dowd said. “People are starting to embrace that there is no objectivity and that everything is coming from someone’s perspective.”

In conjunction with the exhibit, Peña Popo will host a workshop on May 2 that invites participants to make a zine about a recent breakup. This will mark the third iteration of “Make a Zine with Your Ex,” which Peña Popo hosted at the Berlin Art Book Fair and Festival last year after going through their own breakup.

They assured me that bringing your ex is not required to participate.

“Even though it’s a heavy topic, it’s a fun time. We have a lot of jokes,” they said.

Arantza Peña Popo’s Visual Journalism exhibition will be up through May 30 at JAM. The artist’s “Make a Zine with Your Ex” workshop is scheduled for 5 to 7 p.m. Friday, May 2. Admission is free, but participants are required to register in advance by going to uvjam.org.

Rock n Roll in Claremont

This Friday, Windsor music collective What Doth Life will host three bands at the Claremont Creative Center, the community arts venue that celebrated its grand opening last year. Among them is Chodus, a three-person alt-rock project with Claremont roots.

Guitar player and Claremont School Board member Loren Howard, 25, has been performing in Chodus since he was 13. Initially, he wanted to call the band “Chodus Maximus,” but a quick internet search revealed the name had already been taken.

As a kid, he learned guitar and piano from his older brother Nick, who played in a band called Dudestew. When Nick passed away in 2013 after a battle with mental illness, Howard doubled down on music.

“I really found music to be this emotional outlet for grief at first, and then it just kind of became everything for a while,” he said.

A Claremont resident to this day, he’s played in numerous bands over the years including Phrogs, who’ve previously performed at the Main Street Museum in White River Junction. 

Chodus has cycled through several iterations of bandmates, but the current version comprises Howard and two of his childhood friends, Jacob Ford and Jason Bengrazi.

What Doth Life helped Chodus book shows during the band’s early days. On Friday night, the Pilgrims, one of the collective’s longest-standing bands, will play a set before Chodus. Ezra Holloway, who hails from Saxtons River, Vt., will close out the night.

“I can’t express how much I love and respect those guys and how much they do for local music,” Howard said of What Doth Life.

It hasn’t been easy to find a consistent venue to play in Claremont, said Howard, which makes performing at the Claremont Creative Center particularly exciting.

“It’s a space that’s all ages, and it’s not serving alcohol and it’s not serving food, so its main purpose is exactly for music,” said Howard, who hopes the show could lead to a regular gig down the road.

What Doth Life’s concert is slated for Friday, April 18 at the Claremont Creative Center at 56 Opera House Square. Doors open at 6 p.m. and music starts at 7 p.m. Tickets are free with a suggested donation of $10. For more information, visit whatdothlife.com

Music for you,in South Royalton

Later on this weekend, another Upper Valley musician, Aleda Bliss, will host the second installment of her series “The Growing Season” at BALE in South Royalton. Right before Bliss released her debut album, “Every Song on This Playlist is for You,” in 2024, she held a series of listening parties.

This time around, the listening party is where the album starts. Over the course of three sessions, participants are invited to help Bliss and her two collaborators, Johnny Gifford and Trevor Robinson, workshop her new project.

The fruits of that labor have yet to be discovered and that’s kind of the point. As Bliss put it, “telling somebody a story is how you find the story.”

The second session of “The Growing Season” will take place from 4 to 6 p.m. on Sunday, April 20 at BALE in downtown South Royalton. The third session is scheduled for 6 to 8 p.m., Saturday, May 3. Admission is free. For more information, visit the artist’s Instagram page @aledablisspresents.

Marion Umpleby can be reached at mumpleby@vnews.com or 603-727-3306.