iiinova — where your digital self keeps evolving

🅱🅰🅱💰 @illomati.com · 24/09/2026

i love making little books 'u' got a freshly printed batch of my meeting-internet-friends-from-the-neopets-roleplay-message-boards-irl comic, with a fancy new cover 💅 that I'll have at @milkcomicfest.bsky.social this saturday! come find me! 📖🐄

photo of a stack of self-printed, stapled comics titled "you meet in a moonlit clearing....". The cover features a glowing CRT computer in a dark mossy wood surrounded by fireflies. a pair of hands nervously hovers over the keyboard.

photo of an inside page of "you meet in a moonlit clearing....", printed in magenta ink on lime green paper. The comic page features a spread of one of the main characters decked out in spiky hair and goth J-Rock garb rocking out, while proclaiming "MUSIC IS MY LIFE!!"

a photo of a closeup on another page of the comic, featuring the other main character - a nervous and injured fae who is lost in the woods. a snippet of the comic panel of the fae's interior thoughts reads: "At least try to use your wits while you still have them!"

a photo of the back cover of the comic - a mirror to the front cover, it depicts the goth mage's computer terminal surrounded by wax candles and her homunculus pet. Her hands are poised lightly clasped in front of the keyboard, in a manner which suggests she is in control of the situation and pleased with it.

at the top of the back cover are accolades for the comic:

"i was screaming throughout this whole comic" - kris mukai, commuter

"isn't this truly the duality of man? a sexy neopet rp persona and a teen j-rock nerd? ... highly recommend that everyone should read this" - sloane leong, prism stalker

"this spoke to me in a lot of different ways... i just love this comic a lot" - leslie hung, snotgirl

WINNER - best autobio comic - 2022 salt & honey minicomics awards

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🅱🅰🅱💰 @illomati.com · 19/08/2026

Comics tabling post! I will be tabling at @milkcomicfest.bsky.social, Pretty Good Fest and Comic Arts LA later this year - come say hello and get some comics! 🐊

A digital illustration of a sleek menu laid on top of a fancy silver table setting with dark red tablecloth, serving as an announcement flyer for where I will be doing comics tabling at later this year. The menu reads: "illomati - chef du comics - Barbara Benas - 2026 - fall tabling events - MILK - Milwaukee .... September 26th - Pretty Good Fest - Chicago .... October 24th - Comic Arts LA - Los Angeles .... December 12-13th. There is an ambiguous red stain on the bottom of the menu.

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🅱🅰🅱💰 @illomati.com · 22/06/2026

One of my favorite things is seeing all the different ways artists draw delectable food, and Cook like your Ancestors is a jaw-droppingly gorgeous example of that--i want to gnaw on the pages lol. snag a copy while you can!!

photo of an illustration from Cook Like Your Ancestors, depicting a bright and colorful dish of Asinan Bogor

photo of an illustration from Cook Like Your Ancestors, depicting a bright and colorful dish of Samla Curry

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🅱🅰🅱💰 @illomati.com · 06/03/2026

The Stinky Gentlemen are Awake

Photo of a row of hard neck garlic shoots coming up in my yard

Photo of my large son Vinny. He is an orange and white tabby, and actually smells quite lovely

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🅱🅰🅱💰 @illomati.com · 23/11/2025

I am tired but I will never say no to treating myself to future garlic

Photo of a row of 49 garlic cloves freshly planted in a dirt trench in a narrow garden bed in my yard. They will go to sleep and wake up in the spring to become garlic bulbs 👋

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🅱🅰🅱💰 @illomati.com · 19/11/2025

meetings are the best for drawing

photo of a day planner open to Nov 18-19 pages that has been filled with sketches of my character Suzette from my comic Bottom's Up! She is drawn in various chef's knife-action poses

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🅱🅰🅱💰 @illomati.com · 04/11/2025

finally finished this giant honker 😤

photo of my hand holding up a hefty paperback library copy of Jonathan Strange & Mr Norrel by Susanna Clarke, clocking in at a sweat-inducing 846 pages. Its substantial shadow is cast over my cat son Vinny who is dozing in the background. The book was very good

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🅱🅰🅱💰 @illomati.com · 26/10/2025

traversed a great distance to see @realgdt.bsky.social 's Frankenstein in the cuntiest theater imaginable, Five Stars

photo of the outside marquee of the Paramount theater in Kankakee, IL

photo of the inside of the main auditorium, built in 1931. Built in "movie palace" art deco style with cherry red walls, green and silver decorative detailing on the ceiling, and detailed golden wall sconces and edgework. also multiple dainty little chandeliers because why not

photo of the inside of the main auditorium, view of the screen from the center of the room

photo of the exit doors from the inside of the main auditorium. more art deco styling of the doorway facade featuring golden sun rays emanating from the glowing exit sign, a lot of intricate fancy detailing on the border, and two flower petal-shaped stained glass window panes on each door that are fitted with iridescent rainbow colored stained glass. like, oh my fucking god

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🅱🅰🅱💰 @illomati.com · 01/10/2025

this lucky lad just won a trip to Mexico

photo of a green monarch butterfly chrysalis attached to some white plastic siding (different one than last time) - Monarchs typically live only around two weeks, but those that hatch in late fall are able to live for up to 6 months in order to make the migration to Mexico for the winter. apparently their bodies instinctually determine this by temperature and the angle of the sun in the sky

close up of the same monarch chrysalis, its gold pigment "diadem" markings visible

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🅱🅰🅱💰 @illomati.com · 13/09/2025

was able to get a beauty shot of him before he flew away to finish drying off in a tree 👋

photo of a male monarch butterfly perched on a bamboo pole and spreading his wings

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🅱🅰🅱💰 @illomati.com · 06/08/2025

i actually do not want to animate this, but my brain keeps insisting that "it will look cool." like, please fuck off

screenshot from an animation project file showing a rough drawing of a scalloped and tasseled austrian curtain segment

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🅱🅰🅱💰 @illomati.com · 23/07/2025

i still love this ant archeologist character i designed for a comic that i will make someday

digitally colored pencil sketch of a gregarious and snappily-yet-practically dressed anthropomorphic ant archeologist in two poses - one where she is possibly enthusiastically gabbing about the progress of a dig site and another - of her body poised and alert, but her gaze and contemplation elsewhere

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🅱🅰🅱💰 @illomati.com · 10/07/2025

wishing everyone already growing an inadvisable amount of basil a very merry pesto season

photo of an actual pile, a veritable mound of basil that will become pesto soon

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🅱🅰🅱💰 @illomati.com · 21/06/2025

a pyrrhic victory bc my other elderly cat is now sick... but celebrating Vinny's 6 months being FIP free nonetheless 💪😌 every day he teaches me how to love life and be chill as hell

photo of my suave and popular orange and white cat son Vincent, who is loafing very handsomely in a patch of dappled sunlight. He is better than everyone but humble about it

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🅱🅰🅱💰 @illomati.com · 05/06/2025

T posing to remind myself that i am an animator

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🅱🅰🅱💰 @illomati.com · 22/05/2025

a friend graciously went and got a better picture of my @silversprocket.net book in the staff picks section at the Strand in NYC!! still starstruck by this 🥺😭💕

photo of my comic "Bottom's Up!" in the staff picks: graphic novels section at The Strand, the largest bookstore in NYC

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🅱🅰🅱💰 @illomati.com · 17/05/2025

updates from the stalk market

photo of a closeup of a blue flag iris bloom

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🅱🅰🅱💰 @illomati.com · 16/05/2025

my brain apparently has an unconscious bias for left hands

loose digital sketches drawn in flash of clawed hands subsequently arranged grouped by left or right hand - 10 left hands versus 3 right

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🅱🅰🅱💰 @illomati.com · 08/05/2025

it's my boys! my two dancing bumpus boys

picture of my two large cat sons Vinny (orange kind) and Mandy (black kind) engaged in a mildly sensual licking embrace

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🅱🅰🅱💰 @illomati.com · 03/05/2025

always love to see the 'Bible for understanding why everything about the US sucks and is broken' mentioned

screenshot from the quoted article on the AI-instigated jobs crisis which reads: "I've been rereading the late anthropologist David Graeber's Bullshit Jobs, which persuasively makes the case that the corporate world is happy to nurture inefficient or wasteful jobs if they somehow serve the managerial class or flatter elites-while encouraging the public to harbor animosity at those who do rewarding work or work that clearly benefits society. I think we can expect Al to accelerate this phenomenon, and to help generate echelons of new dubious jobs- prompt engineers, product marketers, etc-as it erodes conditions for artists and public servants."

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🅱🅰🅱💰 @illomati.com · 29/04/2025

maybe look into orthopedic shoes for chefs/line cooks! an ex of mine was a chef and would get them from the medical supply store. they all sorta look like this

a photo of a pair of black orthopedic shoes for line cooks

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🅱🅰🅱💰 @illomati.com · 22/04/2025

he aint thinkin a damn thing

digitally colored pencil sketch of a nonspecific animal character with short bunny-like ears, heavy-rimmed glasses, a sensible windbreaker and some stuff for dinner from the bodega in a plastic bag. he has one finger lightly resting over his mouth and his eyes skewed towards the ground as if in a significant state of pondering--but nay, he is not. his head is empty

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🅱🅰🅱💰 @illomati.com · 11/04/2025

everywhere i look i only see lines going up

photo of a long row of green garlic shoots growing in my yard

photo of tightly curled hosta shoots springing up from the dirt

photo of the tops of tall hackberry trees beginning to leaf out against a clear bright blue sky

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