“ I believe my ancestors are with me as I walk through life. They're within all of us.”

Q1: You are actually not from here! You are a long way from New Orleans— What brought you to the East Bay?

I was born in Chicago and raised in New Orleans. 

Before making the decision to finally leave, I was at the end of my ropes in Louisiana. I was 24-years-old, on the verge of homelessness and living out of my car. I didn't really have a steady income at the time and one day my car got towed. I stayed with a friend for two weeks and one of my friends who just got out of the army hit me up and knew I was talking about wanting to leave and move to California, so he asked, “You down to leave tomorrow?” Which is kind of crazy, but I took a leap of faith and I came out here with literally $200, a suitcase full of canvases and I was like I gotta make it work.

Q2: What happened next? You got to Oakland and found a place for $200?

$200 was gas money! No, I immediately started selling my art in Berkeley on the streets with no where to stay. I started off selling cardboard paintings and two days into being in Berkeley I met one of my best friends to this day, who saw me on the street and invited me to his brother’s house. He said, “There's no reason for a black artist to be out on the street — you can just crash on my couch.”

Within the first week, I met so many people through them and within that first month, they had a canvas competition. From that single canvas competition, I literally met like everyone I know now like Rachel Wolf, Timothy B, and Natty Rebel. And from there, my network and community just grew because I was out all the time. My thing was and still is to be as consistent and present in as many places as I can. Like, the more people see my art, the more I’m able to grow as an artist.  

Q3: What pushes your particular style of art?

I call it a subconscious stream. It’s influenced by languages, hieroglyphics, and cave drawings. My style started off as an abstract form because I wanted to define an abstract style without me having to think about it too much. Sometimes the creative process can get diluted when trying to sculpt a specific subject matter. The linework in my style just came out naturally and became my therapy. My inspiration comes from everyday life; from the people around me to simple conversations I have. I typically make a piece and don’t define it or make sense of it until afterwards. Sometimes, I'll even just leave it to interpretation, because I like to see how other people perceive and interpret art to open another door of communication. Moments like that allow space for that other person or other people to show me something about myself that I didn't even know or recognize and vice versa. Being an artist, I feel like I'm literally a bridge of the past, present, and the future — a direct link to my ancestors. So a lot of the time, I don't try to define the meaning behind my art. I see it as a gift that was given to me to give to the world. 

Apart from my artwork, I've started the process of developing a new language. It doesn't translate to English rather more-so sounds. It’s a mixture of sound healing and visual healing. I'm still in the very early stages. 

Q4: Do you have support from your family when it comes to your artistry?

Not really, I'm probably the most unconventional person within my entire family unit. I’m a first generation artist, and the first generation to drop out of college and not enroll in the army, or have a job that my family approves of. 

Early on, I remember talking to my parents about wanting to be an artist and it was never an aspiration of mine that was supported. My dad felt that artists didn’t make money until they were dead. He advised me to do something more promising and I did — I went to school to be an engineer for two years and ended up dropping out due to depression. After that he stopped supporting me, so I worked as many different jobs as I could to support myself.

Before I moved to California, I told myself that I wanted to get lost and find myself, you know — and the best way I could do that was to put myself into a place that I had never been and I did just that.

Q5: Being here for two years, how have you experienced the impacts of gentrification and how has it been for you as a full time artist?

Aside from the people who were long term residents or natives telling me how different Oakland was just a couple years ago — for me, selling my work in many places and meeting so many new people, I witnessed the ongoing changes.  

For example,  I would sell at Lake Merritt which was very much a poppin place. I met a lot of people out there and made a lot of great connections and sold a lot of work. On the same end, there was this underlying tension with folks who had just moved to Oakland; who seen this bustling community of folks, primarily black folks, congregating and they wanted to change that -- I experienced firsthand people calling the police about this or complaining about noise to change the flow of what already is. There’s this privilege vibe like they deserved this space more. 

Many people who originally occupied the spaces around Lake Merritt, Downtown Oakland, and even some of the Berkeley area had to move to East Oakland or the deep East and that was just a wild parallel to New Orleans that’s been going through the very same thing. Many people had to move to East New Orleans because people were getting pushed from Uptown and Downtown to the outskirts of the city.

Long term wise, I don't see myself here. I do see myself building a strong foundation to have something to come back to here in Oakland and also in New Orleans, but for the most part, I want to travel more. I've never been outside the country and I want to change that. 

The journey as an artist is never easy. It's pretty glorified because people think you’re living the dream but it’s a hustle. I’m thankful because New Orleans bred that in me — to hustle. If you truly have faith in what you want to do, you can do it. There's nobody stopping you except for yourself — pour into yourself and what is meant for you will be yours.

Q6: We Are Our Ancestors is branded throughout your social media platforms,  can you tell us more about what it means?

We are Our Ancestors means we are the full embodiment of our lineage. All the answers we seek and call upon are within us. A compilation of experiences, perspectives, and stories make up the very existence we presently reside in. 

It stemmed from the quote, “we are our ancestors wildest dreams.” The quote made me feel a bit detached — like we're not parallels of life, but I believe we are aligned and my ancestors are with me as I walk through life. They're within all of us. That's why you can call upon them, call power to them, ask them for answers — which are already within you because you are your ancestors. You've lived the lives of your ancestors through their knowledge — their wisdom that has now been passed down to you. We can move in power without having to prove ourselves or seek validation because we already are so powerful.