The Wallaby

#29 Art & Comics, #29 Itch, New Content, The Regional Review / By
Joshua Santospirito

Joshua Santospirito (he/him) is a graphic novelist and multimedia artist living in Nipaluna on Palawa land, Lutruwita (Tasmania). He is one half of the beloved experimental soundscaping band Bing/Santospirito. His third graphic novel will be published in 2024 by Scribe.

His expansive art practice, which includes painting, performance, music, comics, and writing, often focuses on identity and modern Australia. His writing, comics, and illustrations have appeared in the Monthly, Island Magazine, and Meanjin.

A colour comic with 3 rows of 2 panels per page. All text is featured in white boxes and speech bubbles against the art. The colour palette is purple, brown and blue. Page 1: Panel 1: Against a white background, brown text reads, “The Wallaby. Payathinima. Written and drawn on Palawa/Pakana land, Lutruwita, Tasmania. By Joshua Santospirito. Panel 2: A man in blue shorts and an Akubra hat walks along grass, passing a wombat. There is a house, trees and a mountain in the background. Near the wombat, text reads, “Flinders Island, Bass Strait.” Text in the foreground reads,”‘Trousers Point. An arts residency with some friends.” Panel 3: The man, now a small dot in the landscape, stares into the distance looking at Mt Strzelecki ranges, purple in the late afternoon light. He says, “Might climb Mt. Strezelecki tomorrow.” Text reads: “The evening light was just so so dreamy on these walks.” Panel 4: As a silhouette, he walks down a path through a thick melaleuca scrub. Text reads, “Melaleuca scrub surrounded our house – it was super dense.” Panel 5: The man peers into the thicket of the melaleuca scrub whilst squatting. It is dark inside the thicket with sticks on the ground. The text reads, “Taking a shit I could see where the wallabies had stomped about.” Panel 6: In bluish purple light, several wallabies stare blankly at the man (who is out of view). Text reads, “Their wary button eyes were watching in the grass.”
Page 2: Panel 1: The man looks over his left shoulder as he hears a FLOP sound from the grass behind him. Text reads, "I met her around the back of the scrub in the grass.” Panel 2: Close up of the man, wearing glasses, a brown jacket, and an Akubra. He smiles and says, “Hello there little one.” Panel 3: From a low perspective, the wallaby is low down to the ground. She pants. The man stands behind and watches. Text reads, "I watched her for a while. She was turning her ears.” Panel 4: A close up shows the wallaby's yellowish, brown fur and brown eyes. Text reads, "She didn’t look directly at me like the others…” Panel 5: Against a white background, the wallaby spins around, stomping, and swishing her tail. The text reads, “…There was something odd about her movements too.” Panel 6: The wallaby pushes her forehead into the ground with some lines coming out of the point of impact. The wallaby moves her head back and forth making a SCUFF sound. Text reads, “Was she trying to get a tick off her face?”
Page 3 Panel 1: The man stands with thumb and pointer finger on his chin, gazing at the wallaby behind him, who stares at the ground. Text reads, "It finally dawned on me that…” Panel 2: A close up of the wallaby's eye with the text, “…she was blind.” Panel 3: Wallaby stands, with the man sitting down on the grass in the background. The air and grass is coloured with psychedelic blues, greens, oranges and pinks. Text reads, "I was also now less convinced…” Panel 4: The colouring becomes exclusively bright pinks and light blues. The man sits cross legged as the wallaby pants. The text continues, “…that she was even full aware of my presence.” Panel 5: The man, now a dotted outline, is shrouded in darkness, while the the wallaby, coloured in a luminescent blue and pink, glows. Text reads, "Perhaps she was more concerned with blindness and confusion.” Panel 6: Wobbly lines radiate in and outside of an outline of the wallaby. Text reads, "It’d be some neurological disease. Probably wouldn’t survive long.”
Page 4 Panel 1: A large brown tick swells with blood within a glowing blue outline. Text reads, "Later I asked Tom about ticks that might cause blindness.” Panel 2: An orange circle filled with smaller circles - the toxoplasmosis parasite under a microscope - glows. Text reads, "He reckoned these were classic signs of Toxoplasmosis.” Panel 3: A cat looks over its shoulder with a jagged line indicating its line of gaze. Text reads, “84% of introduced feral cats in Tasmania carry the parasite.” Panel 4: The wallaby munches on grass. A toxoplasmosis parasite glows underground, beneath the wallabies’ feet as she munches. Text reads, "Wallabies eat feaces in grass and transmit from mother to baby.” Panel 5: Against an orange-green background, the wallaby spins in a circle formation with white eyes, her nose almost touching her tail. Text reads, "They go blind, are tormented,” Panel 6: Against a white background lays an off-white wallaby skull. Text reads, "and die in large numbers.”
Page 5 Panel 1: An x-ray of a mouse's profile shows orange toxoplasmosis circling inside its head and rays coming out of it. It sniffs the air. Text reads, “Scientists say it’s a sneaky thing. It has to return to the cat.” Panel 2: The mouse leaps towards a cat on the horizon that looks over its right shoulder. The mouse says, "Take me, death." Text reads, “The feline digestive tract is where it completes its life cycle.” Panel 3: The mouse’s stylised silhouette flies upwards with wobbly ray-lines coming from it, backgrounded with an orange blow. Text reads, “In rodents the disease increases their risk-taking in such a way…” Panel 4: The cat remains sitting without moving its paws. The mouse flies into its open mouth. Text reads, “‘…that they are actually attracted to cats!!!” Panel 5: The wallaby crouches down in the dark green grass looking at the ground. The air is filled with pink, blue, orange spots of colour. Text reads, “Being a lot larger, wallabies are not the prey of cats…” Panel 6: Against a white background, the wallaby is close to the ground but her fur is now psychedelic colours instead of orange and brown. She pants. The text reads, “…but they have no defence against the parasite.”
Page 6 Panel 1: The wallaby, back to brown and pink colours, sits with the cross legged man, in an outline, speaking to her, “Don’t worry about me little one.” Panel 2: The wallaby moves, looking towards the left. The character continues, “I’m not your predator.” Panel 3: The wallaby faces away from the man. He tells the wallaby, “You aren’t long for this world.” Panel 4: Close up of the wallaby's eye with text indicating a voice out of view, “Let me sit with you a while.’ Final panel: A wide angle of a silhouetted dark mountain range and the sky dark purple. A spotlight of white in the grasslands outlines a man sitting next to a slumped shape in the grass.

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