'Are You Willing to Die For The Cause?' (2023).
Chris Oliveros is a Canadian comic creator, illustrator and publisher, best-known as founder of the Montréal publishing house Drawn & Quarterly. Since the start in 1989, the company has become one of the leading publishers of alternative, artistic and literary comics around the world, spearheaded by its flagship anthology magazine of the same name. As a comic creator himself, Oliveros created the graphic novels 'The Envelope Manufacturer' (2016) and 'Are You Willing to Die For The Cause?' (2023).
Early life
Chris Oliveros was born in 1966 in Montreal and grew up in the nearby suburb of Chomedey, Laval. After high school in Montreal, he moved to New York in 1984, where he attended The Art Students League. By age 20, in 1986, Oliveros returned to Montreal, where he pursued a Liberal Arts program at Dawson College.
Editorial cartoon by Chris Oliveros from the first issue of Drawn & Quarterly (April 1990).
Drawn & Quarterly
During his last semester at Dawson College in 1989, Chris Oliveros started the comic publishing company Drawn & Quarterly, based in the Mile End neighborhood of Montreal. Inspired by Art Spiegelman and Françoise Mouly's <a href="/magazines/raw.htm">RAW</a> magazine, he borrowed 2,000 dollars from his father to produce the first issue of the anthology magazine Drawn & Quarterly, which appeared in April 1990. Until December 1992, a total ten issues appeared, containing work by a new wave of international alternative cartoonists. New series of the Drawn & Quarterly title appeared in the periods 1994-1997 (six issues) and 2000-2003 (3 issues), followed by the Drawn & Quarterly Showcase series (5 isuses, 2003-2008), which offered greater visibility to upcoming creators.
While initially focused on short stories, Oliveros quickly opened his doors to longer narratives, which he released as comic books and graphic novels. One of the very first cartoonists he met in the early 1990s was Julie Doucet, who coincidentally also lived in Montreal, where she had recently started self-publishing her mini-comic 'Dirty Plotte'. As she was looking for a publisher, Drawn & Quarterly picked up her work. At that time, the American cartoonist Joe Matt was also living in Montreal, which led him to be published by Drawn & Quarterly too. Within months, Oliveros met the Toronto cartoonists Chester Brown and Seth, and together this group formed the core of the early years of Drawn & Quarterly.
'Life After Three Card Monte', comic story by Chris Oliveros for the first issue of Drawn & Quarterly (April 1990).
Influential publishing house
In the following years, Drawn & Quarterly expanded its catalog with translated editions of European and Japanese comics, as well as imprints for non-comics art books (Petit Livre) and children's books (Enfant). Among its further notable authors have been the North Americans Adrian Tomine, Lynda Barry, Nick Drnaso, Kate Beaton, Aminder Dhaliwal, Ebony Flowers, Joe Sacco and Chris Ware, as well as international authors like Tove Jansson (Finland), Guy Delisle (France), Tom Gauld (UK), Astrid Lindgren (Sweden), Yoshiharu Tsuge (Japan), Rutu Modan (Israel), Shigeru Mizuki (Japan), Keum Suk Gendry-Kim (South Korea) and Zuo Ma (China). With its dedication to high production values, editorial integrity and artistic autonomy, Drawn & Quarterly became one of the leading publishing houses of alternative comics worldwide, along with Fantagraphics in Seattle, Washington. Since 2004, the company has also operated the book stores La Librairie D+Q and La Petite Librairie D+Q in the Mile End neighborhood of Montreal. Besides selling graphic novels, prose literature, non-fiction, poetry and fine art books, the stores also hosts events with cartoonists and novelists.
Second issue of 'The Envelope Manufacturer' (2006).
Comic creator
While mostly known as a publisher, Oliveros has also created a handful of comics himself. During the 1990s, he had a couple of short stories published, one in the first issue of his own Drawn & Quarterly magazine ('Life After Three Card Monte', 1990), and another one in issue #15 of the Real Stuff title by Fantagraphics ('Your Hands', 1993, in collaboration with Bernie Mireault). In July 1998, Oliveros released the first issue of 'The Envelope Manufacturer', a comic book documenting the hardships and gradual disintegration of the career of an independent small business owner. While intended as a trilogy, only two issues appeared, the second one in March 2006.
In 2015, Chris Oliveros stepped down as publisher from Drawn & Quarterly in order to focus on my own cartooning work. His replacement was the company's publicist Peggy Burns, with creative director Tom Devlin becoming executive editor. Shortly after leaving D&Q, Oliveros self-published a redrawn and full version of 'The Envelope Manufacturer' (2016). Although receiving positive reviews, the artist has later disowned the work.
By 2023, what he sees as his first "real" book was published by Drawn & Quarterly: 'Are You Willing to Die For The Cause?'. A French-language translation, 'Mourir Pour la Cause', was published at the same time by Les Éditions Pow Pow. The book focuses on the exploits of the Front de Libération du Québec, a series of revolutionary groups in the 1960s that tried by various means to overthrow the Canadian government. In 2024, the book was nominated for an Eisner Award and was the winner of the Bédélys Award for best comics album in Quebec. In addition, it was a "Sélection Officielle" at the 2025 International Comic Strip Festival in Angoulême, France.
'Are You Willing to Die For The Cause?' (2023).