Rest for Resistance
Rest for Resistance is focused on writing and art that center holistic healing. We're the only LGBTQ+ mental health organization that offers pre-crisis resources, as well as the only publishing platform run by a team of transgender and non-binary people. All of our funding comes from community contributions.
We publish unique resources, created by queer and trans people of color (QTPoC), to promote rest in a way that centers emotional and mind-body wellbeing. We've been featured in VOGUE (twice), Complex, Eraced Mag, and Talkspace, and are included as a vital resource by Human Rights Campaign.
Our grassroots peer support organization, QTPoC Mental Health, has been operating multiple projects since March 2015: a large online peer support group, social media that reaches 1+ million people/year, and meditations that are interfaith and informed by our individual and collective traumas.
Rest for Resistance (R4R) is here in order to give people suffering from mental illness a place to rest as self-care and share our experiences with one another. We are owed by the world and society in it a place for ourselves to exist and vent and voice our experiences. Our work features community members with emotional struggles like bipolar disorder, chronic depression, OCD, and schizophrenia spectrum disorders; we’re consistently improving this representation for everyone.
Consider contributing monthly through Patreon:
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Our freedom requires rest.
We’re seeking an annual budget to carry us through mid-2022. Since we slowed down our plans for COVID, we’re dreaming big about a bunch of projects, along with restarting our publishing efforts on RestForResistance.com.
Here’s what we have planned:
– Audio recordings of all R4R writing
– New writers and artists published
– Featured series on psych ward survival & more
– An anthology of creative re-definitions of DSM categories
– Library of QTPoC-created zines available for purchase direct from the makers
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Who is Rest for Resistance?
A team of too many folks to name, so here’s who you likely see the most in the public eye:
Art Twink (they/them) grew up drawing critters they thought up to comfort themselves and their friends, and that mission continues to this very day. For Art Twink, art is for creating community and safety in a world that offers very little of either. After 6 years of working in graphic apparel design for brands like Disney, Marvel, Nintendo, and Star Wars, Art Twink is well versed in the technical and commercial world of visual art. However, at heart Art Twink is a storyteller. They carry on the tradition of telling stories that inspire, validate, and comfort people and creatures in hard times as a trans artist of color.
Princess Harmony (she/her) is a writer, artist, and the features editor of Rest for Resistance. She is a Puerto Rican and Haitian trans woman who lives on the run and supports revolutionary groups. She fights for the marginalized and the mentally ill who, like her, are oppressed for their thoughts and mental illnesses. Her dedication to her work is what keeps her going.
Eve Xelestiál (she/they) is a trans and queer multimedia artist of color living in San Diego. xelestiál spends their time challenging the hegemonic media that is imposed on queer and trans people of color. She thrives/enjoys resisting with other TQPoC, cooking plant-based food, singing IN queer, and watching cinema. Xelestiál is committed to combatting mainstream media through her personal identity, visual art, and poetry. Her work has been featured at The Huntington Museum, the Getty Museum, and on Rest For Resistance. Follow Eve on Instagram @nonbinarymami.
Dominic Cinnamon Bradley (they/them) is a Brooklyn-based Black disabled queer artist reared in the crunk-era “Dirty South.” Dominic is a visual artist, writer, and performer who has been involved in some form of mental health work for the past fifteen years. They have contributed to Rest for Resistance since 2017.
Dom Chatterjee (they/he) is the founder and editor-in-chief behind the work, as well as the voice of the QTPoC Mental Health facebook page . They are a Tamil/Bengali Asian and a Dutch-American with roots going back to Nieuw Amsterdam. With a collection of “confusing” identities, they began peer support in order to find “folks like them” and found instead a global community of outcasts who are passionate about the link between social justice and shared wellbeing. Outside the work, Dom thrives on being an editor-of-all-trades, an aerial arts enthusiast, and a loner whose best friend is a cat.
Find more about the Rest for Resistance team on our website. You can also follow us on Instagram, Twitter & Facebook .