Thanks for taking the time to look at my work. If you're an art director, designer or editor I'd love to hear from you about collaborating on something. I’m currently interested in requests for picture book projects, short comics or short series, interior illustrations for chapter book stories, book covers, and editorial illustration. I’m also available for book and graphic novel projects depending on the pub date. Please reach out, I’d love to hear about what you’re working on and how we can collab!
PUBLISHERS, EDITORS, & ART DIRECTORS of BOOK PROJECTS please contact Steven Malk (Writers House)
I represent myself for all these fun activities:
Art Direction + Creative Consultation
Editing + Story Development
Comics + Illustration
Script Writing + Adaptation
Character Design + Storyboarding
Community Campaigns + Engagement
*LIMITED AVAILABILITY* - Currently my availability for new freelance projects is closed until September 2024. If you’re working on a project with a deadline in Winter 2024 or after please contact me.
BOOK BIO
Zeke Peña is a Xicano storyteller and cartoonist from El Paso, TX. His work is a mash-up of political cartoon, border rasquache and Hip Hop culture that addresses identity, politics, ecology and social justice. He recently illustrated the NY Times Bestselling book Miles Morales Suspended: A Spider-Man Novel by Jason Reynolds. He has received several awards for his book illustrations in My Papi Has a Motorcycle (Kokila, 2019) and Photographic: The Life of Graciela Iturbide (Getty Publications, 2017). He received a degree in Art History from the UT Austin and is self-taught in the studio. His work is in several collections of American and Latine art including the Smithsonian American Art Museum, National Museum of Mexican Art, and The Billy Ireland Cartoon Museum. Zeke is currently writing and illustrating a picture book about growing up in the Chihuahuan desert.
STUDIO BIO
Zeke Peña is a Xicano storyteller and cartoonist from El Paso, TX. He makes comics and visual narratives that reclaim stories and remix history. His work is a mash-up of political cartoon, border rasquache and Hip Hop culture that addresses universal themes of identity, politics, ecology and social justice. He received a degree in Art History from the University of Texas at Austin and is self-taught in the studio. He has received awards for his book illustrations and his work is in several American and Xicano art collections. Zeke is currently writing forthcoming comic and book projects that he will illustrate. @zpvisual | zpvisual.com
PLEASE EMAIL FOR PRESS PHOTO
Please message for CV, Press Requests, Academic bio and Inquiries.
For all book, comic book, graphic novel inquiries please contact my literary agent Steve Malk at: smalk@writershouse.com
Selected Publisher + Client List
Penguin Random House | Penguin Young Readers / Kokila| ProPublica | Atheneum / Simon&Schuster | Scholastic | Getty Publishing | The Ringer | Crown Books | NPR Latino USA | Holt-Macmillan | Algonquin Young Readers | The Nib | REMEZCLA | The Believer Magazine | Cinco Puntos Press
PRESS
My Papi Has a Motorcycle written by Isabel Quintero
2020 Pura Belpré Illustrator Honor Award
2020 Ezra Jack Keats Illustrator Honor Award
2020 Tomás Rivera Mexican American Children’s Book Award
Bank Street's Best Spanish Language Book Award
Leila Fadel | Samantha Balaban on Weekend Edition Sunday | August 25, 2019 8:06 AM ET
Publishers Weekly – ★ Starred Review
Booklist – ★ Starred Review
School Library Journal – ★ Starred Review
Review of My Papi Has A Motorcycle by Lettycia Terrones - The Horn Book – ★ Starred Review
Picture Books to Enrapture Little Readers and Listeners - by Maria Russo - The New York Times Book Review – Review
Photographic: The Life of Graciela Iturbide written by Isabel Quintero
2018 Boston Globe Horn Book Award
2018 Moon Beam Book Award
Review of Photographic: The Life of Graciela Iturbide - The Horn Book Magazine September/October 2018 -
A Gathering of Minds: A Hopeful and Incisive Bank Street Book Festival - By Matia Burnett | Publishers Weekly - Oct 30, 2018
2019 YALSA Great Graphic Novels for Teens
NPR Best Books of 2018
Booklist Top 10 Arts Books for Youth: 2018
One of School Library Journal’s Best Books of 2018