RUTU MODAN is an Israeli comics artist, illustrator and an associate professor in the communication design department at the Bezalel Academy for Art and Design, Jerusalem. She was born in Tel-Aviv in 1966. In 1992, she graduated cum laude from the Department of Visual Communications at the Bezalel Academy of Art and Design in Jerusalem. She wrote and illustrated comic strips and stories on a regular basis for Israel’s leading daily newspapers, and was the co-editor of the Israeli Mad magazine version.

Rutu’s illustrations have been published in The New York Times, The New Yorker, Le Monde, and many others. Rutu is a cofounder and member of Actus Independent Comics, an internationally acclaimed collective and independent publishing house for alternative comics’ artists that was active in the international comics scene between 1995-2010. Her illustrated blog, Mixed Emotions appeared on the New York Times web site during 2007. The Death of the Terminal Patient, a weekly sequential comics was published in The New York Times Magazines and in The London Times in 2008. Rutu has illustrated many books for children, some of them were published in the USA by Houghton Mifflin (Where is? by Tamar Bergamn) and Boston and Candlewick Press NY (Dad Runs Away with the Circus by Etgar Keret). Her comics book for children Maya Makes a Mess, which she also wrote, was published in Israel in 2010 and was on the top best seller list for that year (children’s book category). The book was translated into English (Toon-Books, 2012), French (Actes Sud, 2013), and German (2013). In 2013, Rutu co-founded with her colleague Prof. Yirmi Pinkus, Noah’s Library, an independent edition, focusing on comic books for young readers.

Rutu has received several awards in Israel and abroad, including twice the gold medal and five times honorary mentions for the Best Illustrated Children’s Book Award, from the Israel Museum, the Design Scholarship from the Israel Ministry of Culture and honor listed for Illustration from IBBY. Since 2005, Rutu is a chosen artist of the Israel Cultural Excellence Foundation. In 2014, she received the Minister of Culture Art Scholarship. Rutu’s first graphic novel, Exit Wounds, was translated into twelve languages and won the Eisner Award in 2008 for Best New Album and the France Info Prize for 2008. Exit Wounds was also the winner of the Revelation Award at the international Comics Festival in Angoulême, 2008. Her second graphic novel, The Property, was published in 2013 and has already been translated into eight languages. The Property was awarded Best Book of the Year in Lucca Comics & Games Festival in 2013 and received the Special Prix du Jury at the International Comics Festival in Angoulême in 2014.