Conversations with Ayan: Creating Visual Art and Discussing Black Struggles in the Artistic World
February 25, 2022
“A couple of years ago when my parents first saw me painting and dedicating a lot of time to it, they were like: ‘What the heck are you doing?’ But now they know I do sell pieces, and I make some money off of it. So they don’t really say anything. Now they ask questions like: ‘Where is this going?’ or, ‘Is this being sold?’ Things like that. So now they’re kind of like, warmed to the idea of me making art and selling it. But there’s no pressure, because I do work full-time. So it’s not my whole life. That would be different. They would have been like: ‘You can’t do that.’ Which is crazy because I feel like a lot of millennials feel that deep down in our hearts we wanted a creative path; but then we just chose the most traditional type of schooling because that’s what we’re told. We’re told, you know, it’s going to give you a job, it’s going to give you stability. And it’s kind of a risk that a lot of people of colour can’t take; to just go down a creative path. But for me it’s still a hobby right now that provides me an escape that I could also make money on at the same time.
I’ll admit though; it is something I want to do full-time. How I get there? I don’t know. I’m just taking it one step at a time. But I love painting. I guess it’s just kind of meditative for me. I find it therapeutic more than anything. Sometimes when I have a vision in mind it stops being therapeutic. But for the most part, every time I come back to it, it’s because I have this feeling to paint something. I find it very meditative. And a lot of my art focuses on the Black experience.”
“When I first started painting, I remember going to the MoMA in like 2018. I don’t know if you know what the MoMA is, but it’s the Museum of Modern Art in New York. At the time I was painting because I had a lot of time off. I was working a part-time job and I painted on the side because I didn’t really have anything else to do. So I took a trip to New York and I went to the museum, and I think in that whole museum I saw one Kerry James Marshall piece of like, a Black person. And there was another artist named Faith Ringgold, who’s also an African American artist. But to me I just realized that out of the whole museum, and mind you, New York… New York is filled with a lot of African American people. But there were like, no pictures of Black people! There were a few Basquiat pieces. But there were no pictures of Black people and Black art. And that’s when I kind of was like, if I want to paint people, then obviously I’m going to paint people that look like me.
So then I just started to kind of focus on Black women and things that I was naturally drawn to, which at the time was, fashion, hair—because hair is a very important conversation in a lot of Black women’s lives. In the beginning it was a focus for me because I was very into ancient hairstyles from West, Central, and sometimes East Africa. I was into that because I enjoyed the shape. I thought it was very unique, and I thought it was something you don’t really see in visual art. You know? So that’s what gravitated me towards painting in terms of hair. And then it started to just become about afros and the way I wear my hair, or how Black women overall wear their hair. For me it was representational. Just beautifying the different types of hairstyles and to make sure that people connect to it once they see it. Or that they’re kind of educated on the different types of hairstyles that originate from Western, Central, and Eastern Africa.
But now I’ve mainly focused the paintings I make on women that look like me—kind of like my culture, my heritage, Somali women. It’s a longer process because I have to find some reference photos and then I have to make sure that it’s authentic to what I want to say. So my art just started to become more figurative and representational, more so because I find it important to make sure that if we have art on a wall, I feel like it should represent you, and people that look like you.”
“Not seeing a lot of Black artists displayed in the MoMA pissed me off! And then the pieces were very… Just very charged. It was a Kerry James Marshall piece made in like 2015 of a Black officer. And then the Faith Ringgold piece was of…basically about a race war between Black and white people. It was about racism. Both pieces were about racism. So, it’s like, why is the conversation even about racism, but Picasso or Matisse can just make art about people just sitting on a couch, you know? Like, just humanizing white bodies. Whereas if you see a Black body in a museum, there has to be a big conversation around it when Black people are human too. They also lounge around in nice dresses and enjoy nice couches. It’s like they’re saying: ‘When we want to have you in a museum and talk about you, it has to be about topics that we can discuss, like racism. We can’t view you outside of that. It’s the only time you have a seat at the table. And don’t get me wrong, Kerry James Marshall is an amazing artist; and he’s one of the first artists to just paint Black people in everyday life settings. So think about that. For them to choose that one piece out of all the art that he’s made throughout his life? I was like, that’s crazy.
So considering that, my art is about very particular things. I feel like we have to be very mindful when we discuss things like race in art. Race is definitely a part of every Black person’s life. But I didn’t want it to become, in a sense, what my art is about. I don’t want it to be about the struggle and suffering of Black people, you know? And I think my paintings kind of play a role in disrupting the emphasis on suffering and pain. I just want to make paintings that represent everyday life. It doesn’t have to have a deeper meaning. It’s more so emotion based and just about humanizing the Black experience.”
“My favorite painting is of this woman, and she’s dressed in this cultural dress, it’s called a Niqab. The painting’s called ‘Running in the Dark,’ and basically represents a few women in my life. It is an ode to immigrant mothers who travel to countries or lands they’re unfamiliar with, and somehow make it to the light. So, the sun is meant to signify light. It’s a guiding light, and it’s her moving towards a direction of positivity. It represents the immigrant mother’s struggle and how she kind of makes it to the light throughout the dark and unknown times.
The inspiration behind it? I just saw a photo that a Sudanese photographer took, and I really liked the actual photograph of the woman. I had it in my head for a few months, and I knew I kind of wanted to make a piece around it. So, one day I just started painting and then I was able to create the background, and then the sun, and then just the image itself. And by the end of the painting a meaning came out of it.
A lot of my paintings are personal to me. This one definitely was. So, I didn’t want to give it away so freely. It takes time and a lot of effort to paint. But at the end of the day, I would like for it to sit in someone else’s home, so I ended up selling it. I just want my art to be enjoyed by people because I do spend a lot of time on it right now. But I would like for it to organically just, find homes. And I make my art more so for Black people to be honest, so they can see themselves and think, yeah that’s me and my brother, or sister, or my mom.
Social media helps with the exposure for my art. But with posting in it on social media or selling them in general, it’s always hard for someone to create something and then put it out there. No matter what, that feeling will never change because it’s very vulnerable. You’re kind of letting people into your world. And as a human reaction it’s kind of like, you don’t want to. You want to shield yourself from the opinions of others. But it gets easier after a while.”
“I think colourism is very prominent in visual art. So it’s important for me to vary the types of skin tones that are in my art as well, because I don’t want it to look just my shade. But it’s more so for any person—any Black woman I guess—to see my art and be like: ‘Yeah, that kind of just looks like me.’
I’d say underrepresentation of Black women in art is also a problem. But if you’re really into art, you can find paintings of Black women. But then it’s a question of how they’re depicted as well. So, we have this whole story of representation, but the question is what’s the type of representation you’re seeing, you know? Is it hypersexualized? Is it from the male gaze? Why is this being portrayed a particular way? Who’s supposed to be viewing the art? And then, I think there are a few barriers in the artistic realm for Black artists. I guess it depends on the type of art and what you want to do, because for Black people in general, first there’s the barrier of does your art even speak to a larger audience? Because when people come across Black people in media, it’s like, can they even relate to it? And then there’s just the general barrier of it’s cost. It’s an expensive hobby. And for most Black people, or coming from immigrant families, when you want to think about livelihood and having a future, you can’t really turn to the arts. So, there’s that barrier as well.
There’s also a lack of support for Black artists. I don’t consider myself a professional artist but I follow the lives of a lot of professional artists, and it’s been hard for people to get that support. It’s hard to get grants, scholarships, and the education they need to pursue these things if they want to. But in a sense, I do see that Black art is valued within the Black community. So, in that sense, they do get the support that they need, even if it’s not necessarily from the general public. And I think the need for support from the general public depends. Like, in visual art, you could definitely be a full-time artist just by having a few collectors that like and support your work. But for you to break into the general institutions, like galleries or museums, that’s a lot harder because they’re historically white.
And I feel like this is connected to a greater issue in the Black community. For me, when it comes to Black History Month, even with 2020 and everything that happened, I was kind of at that point where I just didn’t want to see Black suffering all the time. I feel like sometimes we’re so focused on the pain and suffering. And then I feel like our focus on the pain and suffering often overshadows everything in the conversation. It is important, but like, it gets exhausting! And then you get in a space where you’re just suffering from burnout—where you’re so inundated with this news all the time, and it becomes depressing. And then you just want to avoid it. And then you feel guilty where you’re like, well, I can’t avoid it. I need to use my voice. I need to participate. I’m always caught in that cycle. It’s hard to balance it all. Because I have that sense of guilt when trying to disconnect.
But I try to do my best with it. And I try to do the best I can in my circle when these topics come up between me and my loved ones, or people around me. Whether that’s at work or at home, or my friends. I try to be an active participant. I try to listen and educate where I can, and give my voice where I can. But that’s all I can do, and just learn. And when I say that’s all I can do, I’m thinking about racism in general. Just violence against Black people, I don’t feel like we can stop it. And by that, I mean I feel like racism isn’t going anywhere. So, the best I can do is contribute to the conversation through change within my circle or people that I come across.
I kind of went off track. But in terms of painting, I don’t know where I see myself. I know I do see myself doing something creative because that’s just something that I love. I have a feeling in my heart, and I know that sounds so corny, but I have always been drawn to fashion or visual art. So, I kind of feel like I’ll end up in either space.”
- Check out Ayan’s website: www.ayanmuse.com
- Follow Ayan on Instagram: @ayanmuseum