Speaker 1: This episode is sponsored by FX's Fleischman Is in Trouble,
Speaker 1: starring Jesse Eisenberg, Claire Danes, Lizzie Kaplan, and Adam Brodie.
Speaker 1: The strama tells the story of recently divorced Toby Fleischmann,
Speaker 1: who dies into the world of app based dating with
Speaker 1: the kind of success he never had in his youth.
Speaker 1: Then his ex wife disappears, leaving him with their two
Speaker 1: children and no hint of her return effectus. Fleischman Is
Speaker 1: in Trouble, streaming November seventeenth only on Hulu. Good morning, peeps,
Speaker 1: and welcome to wikate FP Daily with Meet your Girl
Speaker 1: Danielle Moody recording Not So Live from La Folks. I
Speaker 1: want to give a round up of the bullshit that
Speaker 1: has transpired this week. You know, I spoke about this
Speaker 1: yesterday and I said that they are a myriad of
Speaker 1: people who want us to be satisfied with incremental change,
Speaker 1: who are making pronouncements about what in fact is inside
Speaker 1: of the Build Back Better Plan and the fact that
Speaker 1: it was dramatically cut in half because of two senators
Speaker 1: who are so in the pocket of corporations and the
Speaker 1: wealthy that they don't see the needs of three hundred
Speaker 1: and thirty some odd million Americans that they don't care
Speaker 1: about the needs of three hundred and thirty some one
Speaker 1: million Americans. I think that one of the greatest tragedies
Speaker 1: of the last I don't know, eighteen nineteen months at
Speaker 1: this point of COVID is not just the deaths. That
Speaker 1: obviously is a major tragedy. Over seven hundred thousand Americans
Speaker 1: have perished. The other greatest tragedy that I see unfolding
Speaker 1: right now is our government's inability to use what we
Speaker 1: learned about broken systems, broken agencies and use this chance,
Speaker 1: this opportunity under the Biden administration to create massive progressive
Speaker 1: overhaul of our country. If there was nothing else that
Speaker 1: we learned during this global health pandemic, it's that our
Speaker 1: schools don't have the right infrastructure, That there are some
Speaker 1: schools that have had hvacts from decades ago. Right, that
Speaker 1: our children across this country we're breathing in polluted air
Speaker 1: before COVID, Right that there were no air purifiers. That's
Speaker 1: just the basics. That there were children across the country
Speaker 1: who we knew didn't have access to broadband, right making
Speaker 1: it narrowly impossible to be able to keep up with
Speaker 1: their counterparts who may be better off economically. We knew
Speaker 1: that that childcare costs in this country are out of control,
Speaker 1: forcing parents and caregivers to have to make critical decisions
Speaker 1: between whether or not they're going to be able to
Speaker 1: pay for a mortgage or their rent and also pay
Speaker 1: for childcare, which in some states like the one that
Speaker 1: I live in in New York and the one that
Speaker 1: I'm currently in right now in California, have some of
Speaker 1: the highest childcare costs in the country, where you are
Speaker 1: looking at maybe three four five thousand dollars a month
Speaker 1: right if you have more than one child that requires care.
Speaker 1: That we've had no real investment in universal pre K
Speaker 1: and all of these things that the pandemic illuminated for us.
Speaker 1: What are some of the other things that we've seen,
Speaker 1: The historic amount of storms, the intensity of those storms, fires, hurricanes, tornadoes,
Speaker 1: and how they cost billions upon billions of dollars in repair.
Speaker 1: And so to not look at these really critical times
Speaker 1: that we are living in and not look at where
Speaker 1: the opportunity lies for us to improve upon broken systems,
Speaker 1: and instead decide that either we're just going to continue
Speaker 1: to kick the can down the road or be happy
Speaker 1: with the crumbs that we are given. You know, I
Speaker 1: was never one of those people that believed that government
Speaker 1: was broken, right, obviously, because I've spent my entire professional
Speaker 1: career working in and around the federal government, right, whether
Speaker 1: I was working on Capitol Hill or as a lobbyist,
Speaker 1: or as a advisor on policy, or working in media
Speaker 1: speaking on the issues that are plaguing our country. But
Speaker 1: I always felt like, well, well, given more information, with
Speaker 1: more people galvanized, right, more citizens paying attention and demanding better,
Speaker 1: that we would get better. Right. So that was the
Speaker 1: whole premise behind starting woke AF in the first place.
Speaker 1: It was like, well, if more people had been conscious
Speaker 1: right to the bullshit in twenty fifteen and twenty sixteen,
Speaker 1: then maybe we wouldn't have gotten a Donald Trump. Maybe
Speaker 1: trumps m wouldn't have been able to take hold and
Speaker 1: spread like a cancer across this country in the way
Speaker 1: that it has. But the reality is is that when
Speaker 1: I sit back and I look around now, and I
Speaker 1: think about how it has been ten months since the
Speaker 1: Biden administration entered into power, and I keep asking everyone
Speaker 1: that I come into contact with from various walks of life.
Speaker 1: Do you feel better? There is not a person that
Speaker 1: I am coming across that says yes, I do. So
Speaker 1: what does that mean about people thoughts and feelings about
Speaker 1: how our federal government is working for us. It means
Speaker 1: that more people are feeling let down, disappointed, angry with
Speaker 1: the ways in which they're seeing this political theater play
Speaker 1: out around this legislation and others. I mean, it was
Speaker 1: just over the summer when Corey Booker was holding a
Speaker 1: microphone saying, well, after eight months of quote unquote good
Speaker 1: faith negotiations with Republican Tim Scott, we're not getting any
Speaker 1: police reform, regardless of the fact that as a country
Speaker 1: and as the world watch George Floyd have his last breath,
Speaker 1: hath his life squeezed out of his body by a
Speaker 1: police officer. And before George Floyd, and after George Floyd,
Speaker 1: too many black and brown people have been killed by police.
Speaker 1: But over the summer, our political leaders walked in front
Speaker 1: of cameras and threw up their hands. Then it has
Speaker 1: been the same situation with voting rights, which in my opinion,
Speaker 1: should have been the first thing outside of the rollout
Speaker 1: for vaccines, should have been the first thing big initiative
Speaker 1: that this administration was taking on following the death of
Speaker 1: fucking John Lewis. It is not enough to put people's
Speaker 1: names on legislation that you have no fucking intention or
Speaker 1: strategy to pass. Oh, the George Floyd Policing Act, Yeah,
Speaker 1: and it's as dead as George Floyd is. The John
Speaker 1: Lewis Voting Rights Act, wonderful marker, but that's dead in
Speaker 1: the water too. But at the same time that two
Speaker 1: are these important pieces of legislation that would begin to
Speaker 1: reshape and reimagine broken systems. Then they want to turn
Speaker 1: around and pass Juneteenth legislation and then at the same
Speaker 1: time make Juneteenth a federal holiday. But guess what, you
Speaker 1: can't teach it and damn near half of the schools
Speaker 1: in this country because they now have bands on actual,
Speaker 1: real and inclusive and comprehensive American history otherwise known as
Speaker 1: critical race theory. So when I look around right now
Speaker 1: and I'm sitting back and I'm thinking to myself, is
Speaker 1: government broken? Like? Are we just done? Because we realize
Speaker 1: just how ineffective our political leaders are because they are
Speaker 1: so bought and sold by the people who fill their
Speaker 1: political coffers. If citizens United had never happened, Right if
Speaker 1: that bullshit Supreme Court didn't decide that we could just
Speaker 1: have an influx of money into our political system. Do
Speaker 1: you think that Kirsten's cinema would have found herself across
Speaker 1: the pond when major negotiations would happen because her constituents
Speaker 1: eyes would have been on her and what she was doing.
Speaker 1: But she's not beholden to them, so she could care less.
Speaker 1: Minnie saw her presiding over the Senate in a denim jacket,
Speaker 1: flipping her hair like she's some teenage girl trying to
Speaker 1: get the attention of some boy or girl in their class.
Speaker 1: That's how serious she looked. So without deep accountability, and
Speaker 1: dare I say actual fear of what your constituents will do,
Speaker 1: namely voting you out, then what are you actually doing?
Speaker 1: Where is the where is your get up and go?
Speaker 1: You have none? I told you yesterday there's not one
Speaker 1: billionaire in West Virginia. But right now Joe Mansion doesn't
Speaker 1: want a billionaire tax because it's the billionaires that feed
Speaker 1: his energy company that are his shareholders. Forty years, this
Speaker 1: man has been representing a very destitute state in this
Speaker 1: country for forty years which tells you a couple of things. Either,
Speaker 1: the people are so desperate and so unable to put
Speaker 1: food on their table to go and pick up and
Speaker 1: fill prescription drug medications because they don't have enough money.
Speaker 1: They're so busy and underwater with their day to day
Speaker 1: that they don't have the attention to wonder what is
Speaker 1: my senator actually fucking doing for me? And I think
Speaker 1: on both Democrats and Republican sides, that that's the way
Speaker 1: they fucking want it. Keep people in despair, keep them
Speaker 1: in dysfunction, so that then they're not paying enough attention
Speaker 1: to know that you are literally picking their pockets, that
Speaker 1: you are literally doing nothing that you took an oath
Speaker 1: to do. I said yesterday it is time, I believe,
Speaker 1: for us to move away from our focus on the
Speaker 1: presidency and on Congress, not to not vote. That's not
Speaker 1: what I'm saying, but I'm saying the fact is is
Speaker 1: that the federal level ain't where things are at. It
Speaker 1: is at the state and local level. And you know
Speaker 1: who knows that fucking Republicans who are running for everything
Speaker 1: from dog catcher to school board to city council to
Speaker 1: state representatives because they know that they have no policies
Speaker 1: that anybody gives a shit about, and as a matter
Speaker 1: of fact, they know they don't need them, because when
Speaker 1: you're the party of no, no one is looking to
Speaker 1: you to offer a damn thing. They're just looking for
Speaker 1: you to roll back the clock so that you can
Speaker 1: feel better about your racism, so that you can feel
Speaker 1: accepted in taking off your hood and letting people know
Speaker 1: how you really feel. But the question that I continue
Speaker 1: to ask is, if we know that to be true,
Speaker 1: those of us who have the ability to be tapped in,
Speaker 1: then why aren't we messaging that. How is it that
Speaker 1: our government can be so ineffectual and these people hold
Speaker 1: jobs for fucking decades and do absolutely nothing. It's why
Speaker 1: I ask myself at the end of every week and
Speaker 1: midweek and at the beginning of every week, what am
Speaker 1: I doing? Because I want to actually be of service?
Speaker 1: Because unlike our representatives right now, federal representatives, I want
Speaker 1: to be of service. I want to help people be better,
Speaker 1: do better, think clearer, understand their power and wield it
Speaker 1: in a strategic manner. I try and inform as many
Speaker 1: people as possible. This is one of the reasons why
Speaker 1: we're going to be doing full video of the show,
Speaker 1: but then offering the audio for free because I said,
Speaker 1: I need to reach more people. I need to do
Speaker 1: what I can do in my little corner of the universe,
Speaker 1: because our democracy is slipping away, and it's not even slipping,
Speaker 1: it's being pushed over a cliff. And the people that
Speaker 1: we call on to represent us and be our voices
Speaker 1: are the ones that are silent right now, with their
Speaker 1: hands in their pockets, looking everywhere but at us. And
Speaker 1: it's time that we start looking at each other and
Speaker 1: ourselves and saying what is next? If this is broken
Speaker 1: and we can't reimagine where we go with this current system,
Speaker 1: then what do we do with it? Coming up next, friends,
Speaker 1: is my conversation with a brilliant, brilliant Nigerian British artist, DeCicco.
Speaker 1: We have a deep conversation about his understanding of blackness
Speaker 1: and how he uses his understanding and his depth of
Speaker 1: knowledge and his Nigerian roots to create some of the
Speaker 1: most beautiful pieces I've ever seen. And if you are
Speaker 1: on Instagram, look up a Sicco asi Ko and look
Speaker 1: at his work. As we get into this conversation about art,
Speaker 1: about beauty, about blackness, and about purpose, folks, I am
Speaker 1: really excited to welcome to woke f for the very
Speaker 1: first time, an artist that I came upon on Instagram
Speaker 1: when I decided that I was no longer interested in
Speaker 1: just following politicos and no longer interested in misery and
Speaker 1: wanted to fill my feed with beauty. A Sicco is
Speaker 1: an incredible artist that encapsulates the beauty of blackness and
Speaker 1: the ordination and the spirituality and the royalty. That's what
Speaker 1: those are all of the words, uh that come to
Speaker 1: my mind when I see your work. And so I
Speaker 1: just want to start off with one appreciating you because
Speaker 1: in a time when still regardless of what part of
Speaker 1: the Black diaspora you come from, you still are not
Speaker 1: inundated with black beauty. You still are not inundated with
Speaker 1: black success um and and excellence and innovation um in
Speaker 1: a way that we should be in the in the
Speaker 1: twenty first century. So I want to first ask you,
Speaker 1: you know, about being about the label artist and what
Speaker 1: that what that means to you and why you've chosen
Speaker 1: um the subjects that you have. Okay, thank you so much,
Speaker 1: Daniel for allowing to talk. It's always good to talk
Speaker 1: about the work and always a share ideas. So for
Speaker 1: me things, so my stories are strange. One. I so
Speaker 1: I didn't start out as an artist, and that's an
Speaker 1: interesting word artist. I think I'm a human being navigating
Speaker 1: is the life and navigating who he is and how
Speaker 1: he fits in the world. And then art is my
Speaker 1: form of expression, my way to talk to the world,
Speaker 1: my way to talk about the things that inspire me,
Speaker 1: but also talk about the things that kissed me off
Speaker 1: and talk about the things that I love, but then
Speaker 1: the things that I want to shout about. And so
Speaker 1: artists kind of my way to express and to talk
Speaker 1: about those things. So the word artist has kind of
Speaker 1: come with that whole. With that whole, I guess paradise.
Speaker 1: But I didn't start up as an artist. That I
Speaker 1: started out. You know, I've got a Nigerian parents, So
Speaker 1: I started out as a I have a master's degree
Speaker 1: in biotraumatics and I'm a chemist, um, you know, trained
Speaker 1: in university and I worked in the pharmacy pop industry
Speaker 1: for you know, quite a couple of years and then.
Speaker 1: But I was always interested in art and it was
Speaker 1: something that fed my soul. You know. My dad was
Speaker 1: a collector and he had worked all around, and I
Speaker 1: was also interested in European arts. So a lot of
Speaker 1: these things kind of fed me. And then I think
Speaker 1: when it was time and when my work had developed,
Speaker 1: I took that progression to become I guess the word
Speaker 1: is full time artist. So it's been an interesting journey,
Speaker 1: but I find for me it's a way to talk
Speaker 1: about the things that I want to talk about. It
Speaker 1: it's my journey understanding blackness. You know, I didn't just
Speaker 1: all the world blackness till I moved to the UK.
Speaker 1: It was in the UK that I found out I
Speaker 1: was black. In Nigeria, where I lived till I was
Speaker 1: about sixteen seventeen, I didn't think I was black. I
Speaker 1: just thought I was I was just a guy. And
Speaker 1: then I came to kind of found out was black.
Speaker 1: And then so when I grew older, those other things
Speaker 1: I started to talk about through my work to celebrate
Speaker 1: my blackness, but also to um talk about the things
Speaker 1: that was there in your journey, which is so interesting, right,
Speaker 1: I think that we all enter into I'm a child
Speaker 1: of immigrants to the United States myself. My family is
Speaker 1: from Jamaica, and you know, there is always this idea
Speaker 1: that there's only certain track that you can go into, right,
Speaker 1: because your family wants you to have great success, and
Speaker 1: great success means finance, financial stability. Right. What was the
Speaker 1: tipping point moment or was there a tipping point moment
Speaker 1: for you when you are you have your masters and
Speaker 1: you're working in pharmaceuticals and a chemist and you're just like, so,
Speaker 1: I don't want to do this anymore, or this is
Speaker 1: not allowing me to really express my full self. I
Speaker 1: still feel like I'm shelving a part of myself. Was
Speaker 1: there a moment or a series of moments that led
Speaker 1: to you saying this is what this is who I
Speaker 1: want to be or how I want to express myself
Speaker 1: full time? So that's an interesting question. There was no
Speaker 1: definitive moment. There wasn't some sort of Eureka explosion about
Speaker 1: this is the time. And I think, you know, as
Speaker 1: as we get older, we have to be smart about
Speaker 1: the about the sort of steps we take. And for me,
Speaker 1: it was actually a gradual thing. And I was in
Speaker 1: no rush because I actually did it once where I
Speaker 1: did quit everything and I said, you know, I'm going
Speaker 1: to be a full time market to quit my job,
Speaker 1: and you know, I'd saved some money, and it didn't.
Speaker 1: But I know why I didn't work because I wasn't
Speaker 1: the artist that I am now. I wasn't fully leaned
Speaker 1: into who I'm supposed to be as a person. I
Speaker 1: don't fully activated that part of myself. And it was
Speaker 1: when I started, when I went through a self discovery
Speaker 1: journey of knowing that actually I just shouldn't be making
Speaker 1: the work for other people. I should be making work
Speaker 1: about my journey. And then and in some ways that
Speaker 1: was a transition from being a photographer to being an
Speaker 1: artist where the work has more meaning and it has
Speaker 1: more debt to it. So there wasn't that definitive moments,
Speaker 1: and for some people there is, but I didn't have
Speaker 1: the luxury of that. You know, I'm married, and you
Speaker 1: know I can't just there are two people involved in
Speaker 1: that equation, so I can't just jump everything and just say, hey,
Speaker 1: you know what, We're going to go and live on
Speaker 1: somebody's couch right now and be a what what's the word, uh,
Speaker 1: struggling artist And the Nigerian narrative. Nigerians don't do struggling,
Speaker 1: you know, um not have any money in their profits
Speaker 1: kind of art that it doesn't work in our narratives,
Speaker 1: and those are some of the things I picked from
Speaker 1: my parents, as much as it was challenging to express
Speaker 1: to them, this is what I do. I've learned a
Speaker 1: lot of things about how to take the family, of
Speaker 1: how to be responsible, of how to build a life.
Speaker 1: And I learned that those bits from them. So I'm
Speaker 1: a balance between both of those worlds and I've learned
Speaker 1: to navigate them well over the past couple of years.
Speaker 1: What was it about moving to the UK that had
Speaker 1: you really begin to understand your blackness in the perspective
Speaker 1: of other people's view of you? Right? Because you understood
Speaker 1: yourself in one context living in Nigeria being around people
Speaker 1: who who look like you, right, who are in all
Speaker 1: sorts of positions of power, right from prime ministers and
Speaker 1: presidents and you know, nurses and doctors and all of
Speaker 1: these different things. How did you understand then your black
Speaker 1: or begin to understand your blackness through what I'm assuming
Speaker 1: is the white gaze, right is through white people's is
Speaker 1: through white people's eyes as a post through your own.
Speaker 1: How did that come about? So this is so late.
Speaker 1: So first, living in Nigeria, there's a lot of imports
Speaker 1: of Western culture. So from TVs to film, so you
Speaker 1: in some way do you start to see a reflection
Speaker 1: of what other people feel black people are. Um, you know,
Speaker 1: so the narrative is a gang banger or or or
Speaker 1: drug dealer or or or he's he's the person that's
Speaker 1: always going to get killed before you know, the film
Speaker 1: gets anyway, before we get halfway through the film, you
Speaker 1: get killed, which is interesting because black people have this
Speaker 1: amazing self preservation. So if there was a real life situation,
Speaker 1: the black people are definitely not going to get killed first.
Speaker 1: So I don't understand how the how it goes like
Speaker 1: that film. Um, but so I started to see through
Speaker 1: this influx or Western culture, you start to get an
Speaker 1: idea of how you're going to be view But it
Speaker 1: didn't prepare me for when I actually moved to be
Speaker 1: kid because I moved at about sixteen seventeen. But also
Speaker 1: in some subconscious way, I don't think I appreciate it
Speaker 1: being black. I just kind of went, you know, I'm
Speaker 1: just a human being, just I'm kids, I'm living my life.
Speaker 1: But it was because of the stuff I'd been fed.
Speaker 1: So I moved to the UK, and then there was
Speaker 1: this whole thing of how people approached me, how people
Speaker 1: pronounced my name, how they thought that. You know, we
Speaker 1: swung from tree in Africa and we didn't have any technology.
Speaker 1: And this is always the interesting one. We speak a
Speaker 1: really good influition for a Nigerian, for an African. Oh,
Speaker 1: I've heard that one like a thousand and many times.
Speaker 1: It's not even a thing. It's actually not a thing.
Speaker 1: And sometimes I will cheekily reply, um, we speak better
Speaker 1: English than you. You know how to use consonance, verbs
Speaker 1: and proverbs well in a sentence. I'll respond like that
Speaker 1: in a sort of cheeky way. Um. So you start
Speaker 1: to get an idea that you are different because of
Speaker 1: the color of the skin. And I didn't fully appreciate
Speaker 1: that until I started to get as I started to
Speaker 1: get older. So I lived in Brixton when I first
Speaker 1: lived to the UK. Brixton is likened to Brooklyn. It's
Speaker 1: an area that we redeveloped. A lot of black people,
Speaker 1: you know from the Caribbean, lived in Brixton, but it's
Speaker 1: gone through a gentification and now that's not casting. Um.
Speaker 1: So I lived it, and I was surrounded by a few,
Speaker 1: quite a few black people. But once you step out
Speaker 1: of Brixton. We start to see how people view you
Speaker 1: and how they how they you know, Bucher your name
Speaker 1: and not in a I don't understand how to pronouncing him,
Speaker 1: but in a sort of derogatory way, right, I don't.
Speaker 1: I'm not even gonna trouble myself to and extend myself
Speaker 1: because you're not deserving of even the proper pronunciation. Oh yes, exactly.
Speaker 1: And and you see these sorts of things are there's
Speaker 1: a certain sort of superiority. Um, you know, I've come
Speaker 1: to live in your country, I come to school here.
Speaker 1: I'm a British citident. You know I was born here
Speaker 1: when I was a kid. But I've come to school
Speaker 1: here and you know i'd got back. Um, but there's
Speaker 1: a certain level of superiority to how people view you,
Speaker 1: and that comes across in the way they speak. So
Speaker 1: all of these things were things that I kind of
Speaker 1: took in and absorbed. And um, there's a certain level
Speaker 1: of being a Nigerian where I'll push back and say no,
Speaker 1: you can't talk to me like that, or you can't
Speaker 1: you can't behave like behave like that to me. But
Speaker 1: the challenges there is still a taken on with human
Speaker 1: beings and they will still be There's levels of build
Speaker 1: up and in some ways can cause trauma. And those
Speaker 1: are the sorts of things that affect you know, me
Speaker 1: as a person and affect a lot of you know,
Speaker 1: Nigerians or Black people or Black British people who live here. Um,
Speaker 1: so that that whole thing had kind of been simmering
Speaker 1: under the surface. So for me, when I started to create,
Speaker 1: I found an avenue to speak about black people in
Speaker 1: positive life. More so women. M I my narrative has
Speaker 1: been you know, my mother was quite a strong, powerful
Speaker 1: and Nigerian woman, and she kind of shaped my ideas
Speaker 1: of womanhood. And then my my dad's sisters as well
Speaker 1: were quite powerful. And then you know, growing up in me,
Speaker 1: I've met all these beautiful, amazing women, married to an
Speaker 1: amazing woman, and so all of these different things that
Speaker 1: kind of start to shape my my narratives of women,
Speaker 1: and that feeds into my work. And then one of
Speaker 1: the challenges is whenever I go back to Nigeria, I
Speaker 1: see how women are treated them. Women are treats to
Speaker 1: their second part citizens and some of these things that
Speaker 1: come from colonial narratives which have fed into our culture
Speaker 1: and to women are treated, you know, unfairly. So I
Speaker 1: want to edify women with my work as well and
Speaker 1: show that women are beautiful. Black women are amazing, you know,
Speaker 1: they are the pillars of the community and of the society.
Speaker 1: If women were gone and the sort of contributions they
Speaker 1: you know, contribute to our societies, if those weren't there,
Speaker 1: societies will crumble. And people might not fully agree with that,
Speaker 1: but it's to be able to frumble because at the
Speaker 1: grassroots women are really important, you know, holding its time together.
Speaker 1: I mean, I could not agree more. And it is
Speaker 1: always shocking to me. Women make up you know, half
Speaker 1: of the world, right I'm in I'm in the United States.
Speaker 1: We make up over half of the population in the
Speaker 1: United States, and yet when you look at who is
Speaker 1: in power and who has power, the numbers are paltry
Speaker 1: in comparison to the actually you know, to the actual
Speaker 1: demographics of of women in this country and around the world.
Speaker 1: And I mean, you know, there are so many campaigns
Speaker 1: that have been that have been done about letting women
Speaker 1: learn and letting women you know, lead, and doing all
Speaker 1: of these things because at the essence of it, you know,
Speaker 1: women are essential, right and not just essential in the
Speaker 1: way in how patriarchy wants to see us as essential,
Speaker 1: which is just as producers, right, we manufacture maybe's and
Speaker 1: so that is our sole purpose. Um it is so
Speaker 1: much there, It's so much more expansive than that. Um
Speaker 1: there is. And I am not an artist, but I
Speaker 1: appreciate art. And the thing that I appreciate, particularly around
Speaker 1: some of the pieces that I've seen with you, is
Speaker 1: the way that the blackness comes through. It is the lighting,
Speaker 1: it is the depth, like the like the only thing
Speaker 1: that I can think of is richness. It is, I mean,
Speaker 1: it is I've never I've never seen anything like it.
Speaker 1: And I want to talk to you about that, about
Speaker 1: this this richness and in the lines and the you know,
Speaker 1: there's a particular series and forgive me because the name
Speaker 1: of it is not coming to me, but it is
Speaker 1: a particular series. And the women are in a range
Speaker 1: of what looks like warrior attire and there and it
Speaker 1: is like this expression of femininity of power. But again
Speaker 1: there is it's the skin and the coloring looks like
Speaker 1: I could reach through and just grab it. Can you
Speaker 1: speak about that? And like that, the technique and and
Speaker 1: and the and the thoughtfulness behind it yeah, of course.
Speaker 1: So for me, it's skin is important. Um, it's texture,
Speaker 1: how it reflects light. Um, those things, especially with black skins,
Speaker 1: just how that looks. It's focus riches and you know,
Speaker 1: I mean in the UK we don't get that much
Speaker 1: sun here, which is not great. But in in in
Speaker 1: or whenever I travel in a hot climate, you just
Speaker 1: see how the sun bounces off and there's a there's
Speaker 1: a shine. You know, our skin is beautiful and it's
Speaker 1: just amazing to see. And for me, I want to
Speaker 1: photograph that. And it's not just photographing it from a
Speaker 1: from a I mean, this is how I saw it.
Speaker 1: It's also about this is how I feel about it.
Speaker 1: This is how that black skin makes me feel. It's howful,
Speaker 1: it's beautiful, it's something to do celebrate. It might not
Speaker 1: be prevalent in media, but this is how I see
Speaker 1: black people. This is how I see black women. And
Speaker 1: I photographed there and I thought, and I try as
Speaker 1: much as I can to um show complexity, because there
Speaker 1: is a complexity there. To show strength, to show vulnerability,
Speaker 1: to show um all these different emotions that we carry
Speaker 1: as as a black race. And those for me are
Speaker 1: the ways because technique is great um in terms of
Speaker 1: showing me things, but it's more how does that make
Speaker 1: me feel? And how do I photograph that? Or how
Speaker 1: do I make that in a photograph? And I think
Speaker 1: that's kind of how I approach when I'm photographing women.
Speaker 1: So in some cases, I want to show their strength.
Speaker 1: In some places I want to show their vulnerability. Depends
Speaker 1: on the stories. I did a body of work called Conversations,
Speaker 1: and it was about FGM female genitalium, new relations cultural practice,
Speaker 1: which still happens in Nigeria and in parts of Africa,
Speaker 1: And for me, I wanted to show the vulnerability, but
Speaker 1: I just didn't want to show the vulnerability of what
Speaker 1: women go through with these acts of violence committed against them.
Speaker 1: I also wanted to make sure that those women or
Speaker 1: whoever I was photographing still had a level of dignity
Speaker 1: and grace which black women exhibits. You know, they uh,
Speaker 1: you know, black women go through a lot, and you know,
Speaker 1: it's a sad thing. I think that at the bottom
Speaker 1: of fooching when you look at to raise them a gender,
Speaker 1: so they they go through all this stuff, but then
Speaker 1: they still hold their heads high and they are still
Speaker 1: powerful in the midst of how they are treated, portrayed
Speaker 1: in in in our society. So for me, I want
Speaker 1: to be able to show aspects of that complexity. And
Speaker 1: so in that work conversations I spoke to women who've
Speaker 1: been through this, who've been cuvert in the in their teams,
Speaker 1: and I wanted to show so I used all these
Speaker 1: conversations that I had with them to make the work
Speaker 1: um And you know, the work came about because I'd
Speaker 1: never heard of it. So as a man sitting in
Speaker 1: a place of privilege, nothing I've ever happened to me
Speaker 1: like that and hearing that, so my thought, this is
Speaker 1: not even something I thought happened in my culture and
Speaker 1: cultured something I love and I want to put most
Speaker 1: So for me, it was important to talk about that,
Speaker 1: which is something you know that should stop. You know,
Speaker 1: as cultures, as we evolved as human beings, our cultures
Speaker 1: evolved and things need to some things need to be
Speaker 1: edited out. We need to know that happened, but those
Speaker 1: things need to be removed from our cultive society. So
Speaker 1: for me, it's it's that whole thing. I want to
Speaker 1: show the beauty and entify who we are with black people.
Speaker 1: I mean, it's just your work is so extraordinary an
Speaker 1: a word came into my head. I kept trying to
Speaker 1: express to friends when I would send your page to
Speaker 1: them and say, look at look at this art, like
Speaker 1: look like you know, and I kept trying to like
Speaker 1: articulate what the what it reminded me of And it
Speaker 1: is the way that you create the depth of texture
Speaker 1: of skin. It's like looking at the most fertile soil
Speaker 1: that you've ever seen. It is so rich and so
Speaker 1: black and so and like where life is coming from.
Speaker 1: It's and and that is It's like it's the it's
Speaker 1: the texturedness of of like the most fertile soil is
Speaker 1: how like is how I see it when when I
Speaker 1: when I look at your art, um you know. Last
Speaker 1: question for you is the world as a whole is
Speaker 1: in such turmoil right now, um racial reckonings happening in
Speaker 1: the United States as well as UM in the UK
Speaker 1: and just around the globe right the idea of pervasive
Speaker 1: white supremacy and how it has been how we have
Speaker 1: been inductrinated in so many ways. How do how do
Speaker 1: you come to understand how art can help articulate that reality,
Speaker 1: that pain, that frustration, Like how do you go about
Speaker 1: thinking about encapsulating than this now that we're in in
Speaker 1: your in your work. Hmm, that's good question. Um. I
Speaker 1: think the should be a level of authenticity and that's
Speaker 1: one of the things that I try to show because
Speaker 1: I'm in this world. I'm my work is inspired by
Speaker 1: African heritage, but also my British heritage. I've spent more
Speaker 1: my life here than when I was than when I
Speaker 1: lived in my year, so I've grown up here, thank you.
Speaker 1: But I think it's and I've seen this as a
Speaker 1: way within the black community, there is a very strong
Speaker 1: move to talk about the things that we are going through.
Speaker 1: It is very important to talk about the narrative of
Speaker 1: who we are. And I feel people are, you know,
Speaker 1: artists are being very authentic to who they are and
Speaker 1: talking about the injustice they feel or what they see
Speaker 1: on the news or what they see in society. I
Speaker 1: created a body work called the Black Life Matters, and
Speaker 1: it was after George Floyd's passing in the summer of
Speaker 1: last year, and you know, just seeing that happened made
Speaker 1: me come front my issues as well with racism, and
Speaker 1: you know, just hearing all the news cycles. I mean,
Speaker 1: you you are very much you watch the news and
Speaker 1: you are in the news cycles, and you understand that
Speaker 1: if you take everything on board, you can just wake
Speaker 1: up real every day and just exactly it affects. And
Speaker 1: so what I find and what I feel am blessed
Speaker 1: with is as an artist to use my work to
Speaker 1: as a form of therapy for myself, but also to
Speaker 1: be able to speak to the world about being black
Speaker 1: living in the UK or being black living from you know,
Speaker 1: conversations that can be friends. And I think we need
Speaker 1: to be authentic and also emphatic to each other because
Speaker 1: we all have this just one plan. This is it.
Speaker 1: There's no other, there's no so we have to work together.
Speaker 1: And as an artist, mind is to contribute who I
Speaker 1: am as an artist, to be able to talk in
Speaker 1: spaces about my journey, because I feel like the more
Speaker 1: we get to understand each other, the more we get
Speaker 1: to understand where we're coming from, then we are a
Speaker 1: bit more open to hear each other's journey, to get
Speaker 1: each other's competitions. I mean, as you know, just being
Speaker 1: online can be quite a crazy place. Um. You know,
Speaker 1: I can put up a body of work and some
Speaker 1: people just come from and you know, and they have
Speaker 1: their opinions. But I feel I wish we were a
Speaker 1: bit more open to each other and to listen to
Speaker 1: each other and not be so fast to say, oh,
Speaker 1: your cancel or your cancel. It's we need to There's
Speaker 1: there's a lot of growing that we all need to
Speaker 1: do together people. And so for me, my work is
Speaker 1: to be able to talk about my experience, to be
Speaker 1: able to share a bit of my world, and you know,
Speaker 1: I hope in the hope that you know a bit
Speaker 1: about me and we can have conversations. We can sit
Speaker 1: down and not fight, but have conversations. We might not agree,
Speaker 1: and we're not supposed to. All of the six seven
Speaker 1: billion people, we're not going to agree, but we do
Speaker 1: it with dignity, and we do it with great and
Speaker 1: we do it with empathy. And that's what I hope
Speaker 1: in some place, in some way my work will will
Speaker 1: bring to the world and um, you know, it will
Speaker 1: be a legacy thing. My work is not just about me,
Speaker 1: also for people who are going through what I do
Speaker 1: or an igerency've moved here to then understand what it
Speaker 1: is and to understand the space of women in society
Speaker 1: so beautiful I can't express to you how gorgeous and
Speaker 1: powerful and honest your work is, UM, and I am
Speaker 1: just so fortunate for the opportunity that I stumbled upon
Speaker 1: it and then was able to get into conversation with you.
Speaker 1: It's it's surpassed my my expectations so much. Thank you
Speaker 1: very much. UM. Is it will your I justum quickly
Speaker 1: for those who would love to see your your work?
Speaker 1: Does it? Will you? Do you show in the States?
Speaker 1: Do you have a show in the States coming? Or um?
Speaker 1: A virtual virtual? Oh oh and not at the moment,
Speaker 1: but people can stay stay follow me on Instagram there
Speaker 1: is I'm always announced new things. UM. I have a
Speaker 1: gallery I work with and the great so hopefully we'll
Speaker 1: be showing some more. But I was, I was very
Speaker 1: fortunate this year we did h The images from A
Speaker 1: Black Lives Matters were moving around the US, so they
Speaker 1: showed the New York Planter somewhere I think, and this
Speaker 1: was the work about you know where I was working
Speaker 1: flum the British and American flag and it was about
Speaker 1: that period when George Floyd's cost Yeah, yeah, I felt
Speaker 1: about the institution. So that work did move around the
Speaker 1: US during I think, Yes, it was the song earlier
Speaker 1: on some of this year it shows great um but
Speaker 1: um I there are a few things in the pipelon,
Speaker 1: so hopefully the next year they will be in. But yeah,
Speaker 1: looking forward to sharing new work. I will have my
Speaker 1: ice field because I would just love the opportunity to
Speaker 1: see the work in person um and hopefully you would
Speaker 1: be able to meet you in person as well. A
Speaker 1: SICCO thank you so very much for your time and
Speaker 1: for your talent. Just really appreciate you. Thank you so much,
Speaker 1: thanks for your opportunity. That is it for me, dear
Speaker 1: friends today on woke a f as always Power to
Speaker 1: the people and to all the people. Power, get woke
Speaker 1: and stay woke as fuck.