this is a rag doll i made for my daughter years ago. it is now laying somewhere on teh bottom of her toybox. it used to have a dress. simple. when i was little i had a ragdoll that my mother made for me and i took it with me everywhere. this is my way of recreating that memory. a doll your mother sewed by hand.

This is a papermache dollhouse i made for my daughter years ago. it has since been purged in the transition from apartment to apartment as one does when they move. it was supposed to be our dream house. i am such a fan of papermache because it is one of those tools where i feel anything is possible. it is very liberating. plus, you get to be messy. that old school method of creating still amazes me.

okay, so earlier this year, my dad brought me into the studio to record one of my poems over one of his tracks. my poem 'speakers' was transformed into something new as i was instructed to really think about what the words i wrote meant to me so i could read with conviction. i was surprised by how detached i had felt from my own words as i read my piece though the mic with headphones plugging my ears so i could follow the beat of the music. my dad told me that most people have trouble following the rhythm however my problem was not that - it was putting emotion behinds my lines. after recording for a couple hours we packed our stuff and went home. that night Eko was born. we listened to the track and he realized that we needed about a minute and a half of new material to fill in the gap of space that now blessed the end of the track. i was again instructed this time half jokingly he suggested i take drama lessons.
i went to work thinking about the sensation of being in the recording studio and the power of reading over music. i took heed of the words my father gave me. i needed to speak with knowledge of my words. i also needed to extend my poem. i began to write and sent my rambling to my dad. it was done.
we returned to the studio weeks later. and that night, i walked away with more confidence, still needing more work. i am a work in progress but always making strives at improving. i will find the confident spoken word artist that is hiding in me and when she is released, you better watch out because i will be fierce.

this is an old sketch from when i was in college. never finished it. thats what happens a lot in college. you get a model for a few hours and wind up with half complete work.... lol.



This is another sketch that is only partially complete. . .

i have kept a journal/diary since i was in 3rd grade. up until a few months ago, i had mountains of them, filled from beginning to end with loose pages stuffed in between and excepts pasted and tagged to the sheets. i documented every moment of my life from the good and encompassed all of the bad. i did not discriminate nor eliminate which topics i discussed. i wrote for the moment. whatever was on my mind was instantaneously scribbled in ink and packed away for storage. when i moved in june of this year, i was overwhelmed by the mounds of books that i had accumilated throughout the years. i flipped through page after page and laughed at the memories and cried through the tough times.
when i die, all these words that i felt were too sacred to share with others will be left for the discretion of someone who is not me to either share or purge. i decided that was not okay with me. those were all my private moments. feelings i did not feel safe to share with others and therefore, one evening i spent hour after hours shredding page after page, laughter and tears, young and old experiences and rid my apartment of all my journals.
"you shouldn't have done that, your going to regret it" people kept telling me. i will never regret it. i can not control when my life will end but i can control my legacy and therefore the words that people remember me by i want to be left in the words of my poetry. my poems outline my life as well but in a different way. this is what i feel safe sharing with the world and therefore remorse would only have existed had i not taken the reins of my death and let my memory be mine. my art and my writing are the tools for which God provided me to guide me through life and i hope that i leave inspiring footprints on those who come in contact with me because i know i am influenced tremendously by all that cross my path. even those that cause me pain. they make me appreciate the good. trust, i feel blessed for those beautiful souls that bring good to my life.

dance of the elephants
20x24 acrylic on canvas

this painting was also exhibited on September 2, 2008 as part of a group art show located at the 6th street community center, called the end of the end of summer wine and cheese exhibition'

Eyes
20x24 acrylic on canvas

this was displayed in a group artshow september 2, 2008 @ 6th street community center in L.E.S. New York

This week peacock feathers have been appears in so many places around me and i felt it would be fitting to share this painting that was done." Peacocks are known as ‘the bird of 100 eyes'.The ‘eyes’ became a favourite mythic metaphor as all-seeing witnesses to hidden transgressions.The concept found its way into religious belief as the symbol of beatific vision. In the ancient myths of Egypt, Greece, and Rome, the Peacock feather was a symbol of the ‘evil eye’". ironically i also wore a necklace this week with the evil eye symbol on it.
when i got a tattoo of a peacock on my body, it was added due to the mention of a peacock being a symbol of a change in life circumstances. this tattoo was the only one i did not design myself. i just explained to the tattoo artist what i wanted and let him work his magic with the image i had in my head. it was a first experience trusting someone with placing art on my body that i did not create myself. trust is the operative word because my tattoos are so closely connected to who i am and what i have been through in life.



i can not fit all of the peacock on one photo so i have broken it down into two pics

This is another tattoo i designed for the inside of my left arm. Elephants are a symbol of power, strength and royalty. They embody strength and power, especially power of the libido. Why clouds you ask? because of their size, color, shape, elephants and clouds have been linked together.

c)2001
Boa
sold

nude
acrylic on cardboard

The Entity
20x24 Acrylic on Canvas


The Embrace
20x24 Acrylic on Canvas


These two pieces were part of the series but were not part of the gallery exhibition.

The Union
20x24 Acrylic on Canvas


the Creation
20x24 Acrylic on Canvas


Plenty of Room on the Couch
Eastern District Group Art Show
Curated by Jesse Denning
June 26 - July 19 2009

i have been attending open mics around the city for about a year and a half now. it was a sincere surprise to me, to experience how much i love being on stage. i feel like a whole different person. "I feel like i am at home", i once told a fellow poet, Phyllis Talley, who had featured one night at Cornelia Street Cafe. she is one of my most favorite spoken word poets i have been privy to watch. i had walked over to praise her for her writing one evening, but in turn received high admiration for my body of work. she had seen me read on numerous occasions and that night she spoke to me to tell me how much she loved my work. i felt so blessed. like i won the lottery.we had spoken before but this time was different. maybe it was because this time i was approaching her as well.
this time was different for me because i was considering the fact and the acknowledgment that people recognized me as a person and my writing - not only from what i read that evening but my work over the various months as a collective whole.
i have read at a few Open Mics : Cornelia Street Cafe, Nightingale, Vox Pop, Nuyorican. Even held a one woman open mic at my sisters apartment one evening. i will tell you all more about my experiences at these venues as time progresses.

Vox Pop Open Mic
Brooklyn NY
10/4/09

this evening, i read three new poems i wrote. i even brought my daughter for the first time to witness me on stage. she is the one who took the photographs above.

here is one of the poems i read tonight. i used that technique that you learn in grade school where they make you spell out a word vertically and then start each sentence of the poem with the letters of that word. this is my poem c) 2009


Rape Survivor



Road to recovery is a hard one

Accepting the fact that life handed me stacks

Piles of questions doomed to be unanswered

Endless words circulating through my head



Sounds of the evening replayed and scratched out

Utter destruction pillaged through fingertips

Ravaged in the strokes of his hands

Vindictive motives pressed into me with each moan

I don’t want this cycle of events left in transit

Violence mapped on the rocky path to happiness

Order restored through healing prayers and strife

Relentless efforts to reclaim the me buried within

the jack and jill series

this installation is from my senior show at pratt institute december 2002. it was set up to look like a kindegarten classroom, complete with clock and the split dual color wall. it was a commentary of men and womens interactions
the chalkboards displayed my poetry which were based mainly on relationships.
the woodenblocks each had a different slang word of male and female genitalia.
the flashcards objectified different situations that could arise as a result from men and women interacting and picking different objects that i associated with each subject - the topics included rape, motherhood, catcalls, aids
the construction paper drawing represented dual roles that men and women play such as the woman ironing as she is giving her husband/lover a handjob

Are tattoos art? People look at me and ask me if i am a tattoo artist because i say i design my tattoos. Even more ludacris to me is the infamous "did you tattoo yourself?". No, i can not see behind me or twist my arms in anyway to legibly put a proper tattoo in any of the places i am inked. i am an artist. that is the only tangible explanation i can provide that seems to encompass why i put my art on my body. i choose to tattoo myself for the same reasons i create art on canvas. i want to visually express something. my art is usually a commentary on a situation. you will see this more as you delve into the different stories behind my artwork. the same goes for my tattoos. each piece represents a distinct moment in my life which had a strong impact on the person i am today. i am very big on symbols. i try not to incorporate an image unless the meaning behind the symbol has some significant relevance to the topic at hand.
the tattoo you see below was done at two different points in my life...a year apart from one another. the dragon, the original image is a symbol of strength.
The butterflies which are seen blank here, have since been colored in shades of pink, so they blend more and don't stand out. Butterflies, a symbol of the soul being carried from earth to heaven....and then the cherry blossoms, a symbol of change....
the other symbols - the sunflower, the lotus, the sun, the flames - all important but not the main focus.
so are tattoos art? of course. how could they not be.

c)2001

probably should have take better care of this over the years but after you move a few times and take it off the stretchers, it gets pummeled as you can see.

c)2003
Sold
artwork commissioned by Leonard Mesquitta

c) 2009
Sold
painting commissioned by Nishani Pierre Louis of her daughter Hayden