Carol Lynch

Carol Lynch an artist, writer, producer, passionate gardener and ukelele player - died February 12, 2026, in Albany, New York, after a recent cancer diagnosis. She embodied a rare combination of mischievous humor, spirituality, creativity, energetic activism, and curiosity.

She was born Carole Sobocinski and spent her early years in Detroit, where some of her fondest memories were of trips to its storied art museum. When her family moved to a lakeside home north of the city, in Chesterfield Township, she attended Anchor Bay Schools. There, in the late-1960s era of social upheaval, she co-founded the high school underground newspaper, which showcased her early writing and editing skills as well as a social consciousness that would blossom later as an underground cartoonist. High school was also a time for early successes in activism; among them, protest marches in Detroit and helping convince the New Baltimore town council to establish a youth center.

After graduation, she attended Wayne State University in Detroit. One of her first jobs was in the promotions department of the city's talk radio station, WXYT.

In the 1980s and 1990s, as underground comics reached their zenith, Carole Sobocinski wrote, inked and published her path to the center of the movement. Her small press mini-comics included the Zabawny series (1986-1988), She-RAW (1997) and Con City Comix (1987). Working for publishing powerhouses in the field, Kitchen Sink Press, Fantagraphics and the Comics Journal, she contributed comics and columns. Both as employee and as a freelancer, she contributed to numerous publications, including Grateful Dead Comix. She was an artist for the Garbage Pail Kids cards that came with Topps Chewing Gum, and her work can be found in the issues of American Splendor, conceived by friend and comics icon Harvey Pekar.

Her work took her to Wisconsin, Massachusetts, the Pacific Northwest, and Chicago, where she married fellow underground cartoonist Jay Lynch. An error on the marriage certificate dropped the "e" in her given name; she kept the spelling, as Carol Lynch.

At the urging of their friend, Pulitzer Prize-winning cartoonist Art Spiegelman, the couple moved to the Binghampton, New York, area. In the early 2000s, they collaborated on a series of fine art paintings under the name Kringo. The couple divorced after 20 years, Carol moved to Albany, and Jay passed away in 2017. It was in Albany she began producing work under the name "ArtQueen."

Even while cartooning and writing, she always produced fine art - sculpture, painting, drawing and mixed media. Subject matter and styles evolved along with her readings and interests: urban landscapes, tributes to indigenous people's works, Eastern religions, portraits, and watercolors of flora and fauna. Some of her last artworks celebrate her love of the ukelele. Self-taught, she collected the instruments and treasured them for the fun they embodied. She created, produced, and hosted an audio livestream on DLive that celebrated the ukelele.

She was a lifelong book lover and writer; for years she participated in National Novel Writing Month.

Carol's affinity for nature found an outlet late in her life in natural gardening. Her backyard was filled with native plants that nurtured wildlife and healing herbs. Her beloved cats and dogs were companions there. She found spiritual inspiration there, too; long appreciative of the beliefs of indigenous Americans, she also believed deeply in her first religion, Catholicism, and often gave bibles to friends.

This extraordinary woman will be remembered with joy by her numerous friends around the world.

Interment for Carol will be Monday February 23rd in Oakwood Cemetery in Troy at 9am.