Aria VillafrancaBFA 2017

Aria Villafranca is a transgender comic artist and editor from Ewa Beach, Hawai'i. She graduated from James Campbell High School in 2010, and graduated from the University of Hawai'I at Mānoa in 2017 with a BFA in Studio Art, and a concentration in Drawing. During her studies, her work focused on exploring narrative and space, utilizing large surfaces to tell a story, particularly using science fiction as a way to reflect on contemporary social issues. She has had public murals on display at the University of Hawai'I at Mānoa, Honolulu Museum of Art - Spalding House, and Hub Coworking Hawaii.

In 2018, she decided to follow her passion for comics, and pursued an MFA in Sequential Art at the Savannah College of Art and Design, graduating in the Spring of 2021. While she completed her studies, she discovered an interest in the editorial side of comics, and went on to become a founding member of the student editor collective Level Ground Comics. As their first Head Editor, she oversaw their first successful crowdfunded anthology, A Taste of Home: A Cooking Anthology.

In 2020 she accepted an internship at WEBTOON Entertainment, the world's largest digital comics platform which boasts 82 million monthly active users, and is now an Editor at the company. She currently collaborates with creators from all over the world to produce serialized scroll-comics in a variety of genres. Some titles she has worked on include School Bus Graveyard, Of Swamp & Sea, Nomads, and Sable Curse.

In addition to editing, Aria has written articles for online comic review sites such as The Indie Toaster and SOLRAD. She has also had illustrations published in the 99% Chance of Magic anthology from Heartspark Press, produced COVID safety comics for the Washington State Department of Health, and worked as the lead illustrator for Night Kitchen Interactive's award-winning online exhibition Under One Flag, in partnership with the Filipino Veterans Recognition and Education Project.

Currently, she is a founding member of the Utot Komiks Collective and produces short comics with them, outside of her editorial duties with WEBTOON.