Why the art I make; The Imperative.

Why the art I make?

People have always called my music different for so many reasons. Sometimes its too intense, too depressing, sounds too “white and western” or just generally isn’t an identifiable sound resembling all the other music going on in Uganda at this time. This has always made me uncomfortable because I am a very self-conscious person. However, with self- consciousness for me has come the desire to understand those responses and even more primarily, why my art is the way it is. I like to believe it is because of the influences of my favorite artists, the ones who proverbially taught me “how to see the world” through art. As a child, they were the truth tellers that shared their lives and the “seriousness” of it. Writers like Charles Dickens, Jane Austen didn’t write their novels just for the sake of entertainment.

I fell in love with words because of that. I fell in love with musicians and singers that I felt were about a similar thing for the same reason like Switchfoot and their lead singer and songwriter, Jon Foreman, or Joy Williams from the recently disbanded Civil wars duo. Even when it came to Coldplay and Chris Martin, John Mayer, and yes even Taylor Swift. I love philosophy and they are my philosophers.

You read the news, or read their blog, or watch an interview with them sharing their lives and then you saw that in their songs and album art and genres and styles of sound. I believe in telling art the same way. I believe art is a story when it comes to me, expressing it for the relevance of a type of influence to those that listen to it, and as well to myself that shares it.

I don’t foresee or plan on a shift in my sound and subject matter for the very reason that there would be a lot that I’d have to unlearn. I haven’t the time or desire necessarily at the moment to relearn because I am at the moment content in this rationale for expression. Maybe I shouldn’t. Maybe there’s things I should be considering and changing about my art and how different it is.

How I stay true to myself and that truth, is in the conviction and belief that comes from a random and peculiar truth for me, and it is this. I believe that art is made to be heard and expressed to others, yes, but not before it is for the artist. Art is first and foremost made for the artist. The content of art is the experiences and perceptions of the artist. So somehow, somewhere, in the choice of wording, in the runs or vocal techniques that are particular to that one artist, there is a bit of the artist in the art they present.

In the same way, I see this truth come to life with the art I make. There is a reason I’m writing the song- maybe I’m heart broken, or wondering about this subject or the other. The expression of that is for me first as person processing that situation through the art, and which is why I would write the song. Then I share it that others may see what I see and give their views, or enjoy this beat and vibe or other thing that I enjoyed, or see something else that I hadn’t.

I feel that is why art for me is beautiful, among some other reasons. I feel that is one of the more salient points or relevance of art. I appreciate that rationale and that contributes to me continuing to make the art I am making. When I write the sad song, it makes me feel better. I’m hoping that since the sad song has made me feel better, maybe if you as someone else needs to, it can also make you feel better too.

Words are the crux of the art I make for me as a person and even more as a woman, giving voice to the things that are so hard to voice, or for me words articulate that which would be so hard to articulate, if not in fact, for the words as a means and form of translation. I feel I understand myself with words. I feel I understand others more with words. I feel other understand me more, with words, and words in art form such as songwriting; especially songwriting.

As a child I liked watching TV a lot. My mother was never too amused by that. If you were found watching too much TV, she sent you to read a book. A punishment of sorts. But then, it became interesting when the words I heard on TV, were found in th books. There’s a different way I heard them there. My mother also read to us as kids, a lot. So even before school and during school, at home and in this way, words were around because I loved watching TV and would be sent to read instead as punishment.

I continued to read the books just to be able to write the summary required as homework in primary school. Sometimes I borrowed the same book consecutively to write the same summary but that wasn’t very smart. In the end anyway, I started reading. Nancy Drew, Sweet Valley High, Hardy Boys, Enid Blyton and her many books, Charles Dickens and his, and there I was learning the use of words. Around P.6, it suddenly became “cool” to read, and the bigger the book, the cooler you were, So Harry Potter volumes and The Lord of the Rings among others like Animorphs, Goosebumps and what not.

Reading became a social method of conformity. Reading became a social method of conformity, in primary school.With this exposure, feelings and articulacy of those feelings as read and understood from the characters in the book became tied to words, in such a supreme way for me. Even as a young woman, growing and understanding the complexity, intricacy and strength of emotion in me was and continually, is helped by words.

I also believe women are great feelers. That’s why we may be in some ways, more suited to take care of homes and children and husbands, or why some of us are said to cry a lot. In so many ways, consciously and subconsciously that emotion and its volatility, is viewed as a weakness solely. But for me, with art it is a strength. I feel the strength of that femininity especially through art and the art of females like Maya Angelou, Chimamande Ngozie and Nina Simone. There’s a woman strength that comes alive for me in art in my life and that way.

I am the first born daughter of a ministering family called to pastoral service, so I grew up in the church and was drawn to music by the influence of my parents to begin with. My mother loves music and singing as well as my father. My father plays instruments too. Another influence musically was Disney and all the cartoons they made that were musicals, that I watched over and over again and fell in love with. The song wasn’t just entertainment in the points of the story. They were part of the story and its continuation.
Even with the music sung at church, from a young age I was taught by exposure the significance of the content of what you sung. I just felt it was always about the words and what they communicated, how they made you feel and think. So if the villain was singing in the Disney cartoon, the words and the music were organized to strike fear and a dread in you watching the villain sing the song. There was also probably the revelation of a diabolical master plan in the chorus somewhere and I received that, because of how it was packaged- with the music and the song. Or even when they princess and the prince or whatever fell in love and sung a song, all I could think about was my wedding day. I liked that music and the words in music could do that. I wrote songs and sung them and picked up a few instruments along the way to do just that.

When I joined Law school in 2013, I only personally continued with the music in small and accidental ways like singing backing up vocals for my friends, or singing a cover or two at the Law Society fun nights, apart from singing and serving with the worship team in church that I’d been doing since I was a teen. I was also writing with a few friends that were putting music out there. Eventually in 2016, I released an Ep “Chaotic Heart” of some songs I had written through that particular season and had the benevolent help of other musician friends. After I graduated from law school, I worked on my second EP “Bronte” and gained some traction for that.

Bronte. Stands for some of my absolute favorite authors; Charlotte and Emily Bronte, as well as from the literal translation of the word from Greek to mean Thunder.
In the time that I curated the EP BRONTE, I was feeling lost with regard to identity. I just felt as an artist, more of the stuff that came out of me sounded a lot like the West. I literally had a cultural identity crisis in a time I was just dealing with the aftermath of a general identity crisis. My favorite artists and writers and language wasn’t my own. It wasn’t Rukiga and it wasn’t Luganda from the tribes of my father and mother respectively and I just felt lost with and within my art. The comments from friends and people that listened to my art about how “white” and “western” I sound, even while said jokingly sometimes, were just strong testament to how out of touch with my own culture I was, as revealed through the art I made. In a weird way it was tough for me. I blamed random things like colonization and the cultural hegemony of the West for that, because if we hadn’t been colonized there probably would have been a “NaBronte” who would have written books and I would be obsessed with them.

It was generally a hard time in my life for me over-achingly concerned with identity and how lost I felt being unable to describe or decide on that identity. The BRONTE EP had five songs that all in a way hinted on some of the content of that time. I as well wrote blog posts to go with explaining and making that struggle for me more clear and expounded upon.

The conclusive lesson was that “Every seed has to die, to grow.” To find myself and define my identity, I needed to lose some of “me” too and accept other things about myself as a person and my cultural history that included colonialism and the ongoing Western cultural hegimony. I had to die to live. Like, I learnt that there was a relevance to that hard time in my life and because it was a form of art, I believed and felt that it should be named BRONTE in respect to my favorite authors that in a way now symbolise that lost identity, but also the responsibility I have to get more in touch with my own culture.

Concerning its Greek translation, the metaphor I use for that time and phase is the germination of a seed, where it has to die, to grow. So I titled it Bronte, to symbolize the lesson that all I was going through at the time was loud and intense and scary too, but it was more helpful that harmful in a way.

When I make and record projects, I want the people listening to take the message of Hope. I want people to think about the decision to hope that they have. I want people to feel they have hope around them. Yes, hope in the cliché way it sounds and all.
Hope for me and therefore maybe for others, it is a movement and a motion that can get us through the inevitable kinks of the human story. It isn’t just this magic wand or way of thinking that makes things better automatically. It takes practices and change and balls and so much work. I feel it is that thing that gets you through, whether things turn out for the better or not because it dares you to move like all you’ve been through never happened before. That’s super powerful in my opinion. I like that making the choice to hope can do that. In any case apart from hope, we are despairing. That doesn’t get anything done. That doesn’t even give you reason to live sometimes. There is great productivity and inspiration that comes from truly convincing people and yourself that something can be done, or that you/we could do better. I believe that anything that can be done or should be done, begins with the choice and decision to hope that it can be and should be done. That’s were everything begins for me and it is what I give to people in my art the most. I hope it’s what they get out of my art the most.

Hope isn’t something I can necessarily describe singularly because it’s different things for different people. However I’d like to think along the lines that hope is “that thing that gets you through.” It could be through a really great time or through the worst, but it gets you through.

Personally, I write most of the time to get through things, and understand them, and endure them and just generally encourage myself about them. That’s what the music does for me. In sharing it with others, I am hoping that it does the same thing for them if it can. Not with telling them that everything is going to be alright necessarily, because I as well personally wouldn’t be the kind of person to receive a “Kumbaya” approach to dealing with stuff. But, I encourage myself with describing the pain and grief and confusion and naming the questions I have abut things that go on in my life.

In some psychological and emotional way, I connect with that more and I think others do sometimes, as all the pain and nastiness is almost somewhat contained and losing its power, with the ability to understand it or call it out through artistic expression. That’s probably why sad songs make me feel better. And yes, I write mostly sad and serious songs. But it’s mostly that I may have “a hope” that whatever I’m growing through may be defeated in a way by calling it out. I write to call out and inspire the joy in life and the beauty of the structure to the seriousness of living for myself and for other that would feel it applies to them. I find hope in processes and arrangements like that which is probably why I am a musician as well.

It doesn’t come easy at all to share my work and I’m always concerned about how people will receive it. It’s kind of a decision I made for this year in the realization that I need to step out more as an artist. So posting covers of some of my favorite songs, beginning the aUgandanArtist blog have been some of the ways I am trying to step out more in that sense. It has always been comfortable posting covers and such because of the expectation that it would be just friends and family that would see the videos and comment on them and what not.

Do I ever worry that people are going to look beyond the craft and focus on my sex(uality) instead?

All. the. damn. time.

I’m a personality that is scared of boxes and confined spaces of thinking and perception because of the fear of being misunderstood. I don’t want to be looked at, at because I am a female, there are expectations that come to my art and to myself because I am a female because, more likely than not, those expectations aren’t based on the knowledge and understanding of myself. What may work for the other female, may not work for me. I fear being subjected to that confinement simply because sociologically it’s easier to bundle up things together.

I am a woman and I am proud of what I can bring to society with who I am and the roles I can fill in because of who I am. But I’d like to enjoy that based on the understanding of my individuality even while I am a woman. That makes the spotlight more scary for me, because I wouldn’t know how to control that perception of myself there and especially with the requirements that come from the expectations.

At the same time, I am inspired to free up the space in those boxes for others to thrive, which is one of the conviction I have that keeps me making the art and putting it out there, even with how different and “unexpected” it is. Maybe with what I’m doing I can free up the ideological space for a female artist to be something different, for myself and for any other female artist. I think in the end its a really beautiful thing when you think about female artists like Lauren Hill and even Missy Elliot that did that for themselves and for others in their own society and social contexts, and even right now with young female artists like Alessia Cara and Yara Shahidi.

I have known most of my brief life that there is something about art and the man, but something completely else when it came to art and the woman; not just because I am both, but also because I have seen a thing that cannot be unseen in my mind- other women in the arts. In many ways, a woman is different from the man and that seeps into the understanding of the generic emotional and internal infrastructure of both as shaped by culture and other influences.

For all women went through, whether a blessing or struggle, the great emotional energies that were either a Tsunami of direction and determination, or a nuclear implosion of surging fury and brokenness, showed what was already there in a different kind of way- strength.

I celebrate the artistic matriarch. The nature of the matriarch, is also rooted in the deep understanding of the strength of a woman to struggle and persevere in such a difficult way, for the sake of those she loves, including herself. She understands and responds to the mess in herself and around her, differently from the man and that’s the thing. So, I am celebrating the good I see in the marriage of the matriarch and her involvement in art. I am celebrating the female leader, leading and guiding with her art, not tearing down by it. am celebrating the matriarchs that choose to build with the strength, and not put down with it.

Simply surmised, I see what makes them a woman through their art, but I also see what makes the art what it is- and it is a woman. So I celebrate that that come to light in female creativity as expressed through art.

The struggle to stay culturally correct and yet progressively move forward into the future is one of the never resolving themes of my life. Just with the knowledge that Uganda culturally has a musical distinction aesthetically with our traditional music and as well with the afro pop and urban East African sounds pioneered by the more known musicians on the scene with the likes of Swangz Avenue and at a time more prominently, Eagles production and another well known musicians in the country, I have always kind of felt lost as an artist because of how much most of the music I do doesn’t necessarily have ties or resemblance to those major music articulations in our country at this time. That is coupled with the knowledge of successful Ugandan artists in the diaspora like Micheal Kiwanuka that have experienced a growth in influence with their music by getting in touch with the rest of the world.

So with the personal decisions and considerations I have as an artist, I have come to the conclusion that we live in a globalized world right now. Everything is mixing because everything touches. Cultural experiences are being exchanged and modified and taken on by other cultures and there is this inevitable hybridity that seeps into the arts therefore, just by virtue of the history of Uganda by colonization as well as the cultural hegemony by the West that is asserted because of the system and trends of globalization. So every one or most people back home listen to American Top 40 and there is a taxi with a lil’ Wayne or Bob Marley poster somewhere somehow.

I feel Uganda is everything because of this at the moment and so it’s not necessarily an “either-or” situation, but more of a “both and” thing. There are artists right now that express the would be considered culturally correct musical aesthetics articular to Uganda. There an is an artist that mix it up like Qwela band and there are artists like me who are asked why our music sounds so Taylor Swift like. I feel it about maintaining an accepting, intricate balance. We must remain in touch with who we are culturally, but we must see the variations of that inherent identity because of globalization and cater for that too.

I’d like for people who encounter my art to perceive me as I am, because I am just like so many others wanting the same things – in all my humanity, fallibility, desperation, hope and especially in all my desire and potential to do the best I can do with life for myself and those around me. I’d like people to relate to me as a person. That’s so important for me. I’d like for my art to express the ambivalent simplicity and simultaneous complexity of “being human.” I’d like to encourage and inspire myself and others with all that entails. I’d like to share the things I believe and why I believe them; the things I hope for and how we may achieve them. I’d like people to realize that in all that, I’m just another person trying to figure stuff out. I’d like people to realize that when they see me, through my art, that I am just another human like them.

I would like that perception of myself in my art because, it is a perception I have had of other artists that have inspired me to be the artist I am today. I know the power and influence of that kind of honesty and vulnerability upon myself and upon many others. The words and the message shared in those pockets and spaces of transparency, stay with you in a way that is indelible. You can’t “unsee” that kind of art, you can’t “unhear” its message either, because through its nature you saw yourself in the words and message of another person. That’s some majorly inspiring stuff, I think.

I feel it is super easy to curate a standard/image/person that isn’t attainable, or isn’t real with art as artists sometimes. In the end, you suffer, your art suffers and because of that, the people that encounter your art suffer in a way too. When you look at the inconsistencies between the art and the artist, the artist is sometimes either some sort of “god” that you will never be, or an unfamiliar alien that you can never understand. In moments like that I feel, one of the relevances of art for me, which is influence, is underutilized, only because I think it would be more powerful to influence people to be who they are, or who they actually could be. I also believe in the suggestible principle, that “art is made up of the artist.”

I feel art is the experiences, the ideas and perspectives, the questions, the answers, the voice and workmanship of the artist, who is a person. That’s how you see the person in the message; the artist in the art. In the expression of their art, I think it’s more powerful to tell the story of your own life and what you see through your eyes, in the world and in community as truthfully as possible. We are individual persons, but with similar fundamentals that make the experiences shared within art and the language of art, a universal one. All that matters in that moment is that, I understand what the artist is saying.

Therefore, I want people to see me as I am. I am black. I am African from a country that was colonized by a European country. My culture as expressed in what I say, the language I use, and the way I think through my art is therefore is characteristically hybrid. I want people to understand the blessings and struggles that come from that. I am female and that means different things in my own African culture and in a global context, and that has its blessings and struggles too. If and as I sing about that, I would like people to understand that because they relate to it. I feel that will help them more, to see another person like them or around them.

In some ways I wonder why Music? Why not plays, painting of some otehr form of art? The thing though is Music kind of chose me more than I chose it but I guess the same reasons would apply as conclusively, I am in the end, a musician. Those reasons would be various with consideration to upbringing and education, but I feel most of them reside with consideration to personality, or who I am as a person. I say so because had my upbringing and education been different, I probably would still been doing music right now.

I am an introverted and introspective personality. I think more than I say and feel more than I act or do. With that and the intensity of thought and feeling, I have always needed to say or express to sometimes truly understand the muddle of internal process in myself and therefore, in some way, understand myself. I have also always needed to say or express because of the “sight” I feel I have through the lenses of thought and feeling. That sight gives me something different to say and I feel that’s why I say it; because I understand the usefulness or importance of that contribution for myself and my community through my perception, even as I benefit from others around me that have different perceptions that arrive at different, yet useful perspectives on life and living.
With some of those characteristics of my personality, has come the dependence on the articulations of other people’s emotions and thoughts to understand my own and “see the world.”

Therefore as a child and to date, I was always drawn to books and was obsessed with reading them. They were a perfect collection of thought and feeling. The kind of the books and authors I was drawn to, were those that delved deeply and seriously into their characters, and the characters I was drawn to were those that were difficult to understand. Probably because I found it hard to understand myself. I saw bits of things I could relate to with the stories I read, and that greatly influenced the growing perceptions of myself an the world. In the end, I fell in love with words and started writing what I could when I could. I fell in love with words that told deep and serious stories of peoples. Words that painted pictures or eras, and society and critiqued both in social commentary. I probably fell in love with music for the same thing.
Melodies were notes, and sometimes, they said something even deeper that I felt and understood. I listened to music to feel and understanding feelings. But it was always because of the words. Its till kind of is really all about the words. As a teenager, eventually I begun using words and melody to write songs expressing the muddle and intricacy of the thoughts and feelings. I picked up a few instruments along the way to help the process and ever since, that’s all I’ve been doing.

Even while music, influenced my personality more in this way because I spent weekdays in my head and weekends in my heart, Its one of the media I use because my art is my story. What I express fundamentally in the end, are my thoughts and feelings. Art is expression by thinking and feeling species but because of that, I also strongly believe that music as a particular art form, appeals distinctively to the mind with what is said, and to the heart through the melodic ways, what is said is arranged. I therefore believe there is no greater way of influencing a thinking and feeling species than by causing them to think and feel. With music and within the artistic process entailed, reveals and considers what we know about ourselves and how that causes us to feel and think.

We feel we need to understand who we are as well and the things that make us who we are. We are disturbed by the inconsistencies revealed, and are restless until there is an explanation. The means to the understanding of ourselves takes many forms but also, art and a rather specific contribution when it comes to music when you look at our culture and society today. That’s also why music is one of the media of influence I use.

As a Ugandan artist, it is important for me to use my art because culturally we are a musical people. Music is such a huge part of the way of life for most Ugandans.
Traditionally and historically, music was a way to encode history and pass it on. It was a way to teach children life lessons and instill a moral standard within society. It was even a method of retribution for those considered immoral and those who acted as such, as songs of ridicule were made up to mock them and shame them for their actions. Uganda is made of over 53 tribes, with some that are more tied to other when placed into ethnic groups. However, even then, across most, if not all tribes and the cultures practiced by those tribes is the characteristics of collectivism and a collectivist culture. The men spent time together hunting or whatever.

The women cooked food and farmed together. The children not old enough to do either played together. Music was a centric element of that time spent together. There were songs sung together an men hunted and women cooked and farmed and as the children played especially because of it relevance in passing on history and life morals determined by society.

In the more traditional and rural parts of the country, the way of life still encompasses these practices more accurately to the traditional and historical expressions of music in culture. However, the more urban regions that include the capital city, Kampala where I born and raised, continue with the centricity of music, albeit in modified ways now because of the cosmopolitan nature of society in urban areas, and with an impressed modernity because of the effects of colonization and globalization. Music is still centric because of our history and the parts of our culture that have survived in the urban areas and regions.

Its relevancies are still the same and even more impactful collectively. For example weddings, births, and thanksgivings were always collective celebrations with and through singing, music and dancing. We still do that on such occasions, although not as traditionally as we used to. Songs were sung at funerals. We still sing at funerals even today. Also, right no and historically. Ugandans are just naturally celebratory. There’s always a reason to party and have some music playing.

Because music historically and even today in different ways is still such a part of our culture, it makes it one of the most effective tools of influence as more people are likely to come into contact with it. It’s a tool that will tell people a story and infer lessons that people can take away from those stories and ingrain into their own lives. It is a major cultural and societal influence therefore. In some ways it is such a depiction of the state and structure and nature of our society and culture as Uganda, that as well makes it a great tool to call out those things about our society that need to change, or to commend things that are going right in society. While Uganda is a collectivist society, messages and morals traditionally, and even today are communicated through personal experiences; through the story of one character or through the voice of one persona. As I am more of a personal writer, that method of articulation for my art fits well, I think. I think this is why it is important for me to use my art and especially my music; music is very centric to our way of life and culture.

I am using it in this way, to do the thing it has always done, with some slight changes because of the kind of society we are now culturally- more hybrid than pure and singular culture we were centuries ago. I’m using my art to create human mirrors where my country can see themselves. I know when we see ourselves we will be forced to feel and think, to explain our feelings and make conclusions about our thoughts. I believe and dream that maybe art can be a mover that equips and inspires us as Ugandans, to do what is inherently is entrenched within us; to think and feel with our words, dance and our music and especially our stories. In this we will find healing, we will know truth. We will find encouragement and identity. We will for the first time, give to the world a part of ourselves and not a regurgitation showcased in the consequences of neocolonialism. This is what I hope to use my art for.

With my music and writing, there are so many things I would like to bring awareness to; the beauty of art and the woman, the importance of being true to yourself, the importance of believing in yourself, the responsibilities that might come with that for the inspiration and the encouragement of others, the presence of so much artistic Ugandan potential, sensitization to the so many amazing Ugandan artists that are there and no one knows or cares about; and these are just a few of the many things.

However, over archingly there are two major things that all that, and much more can fit into. I want to bring awareness to how important it is for us to be “ourselves”, to be Ugandan, and delve into that, and I hope to do that using art. I would like for us as a country to talk more about our art as it currently exists in our culture; the role it plays but also, the role it could play. I’d like us to look back and look forward, with what it has done and with what it could do for us. We are a different and developing Uganda; its easy to forget what we truly are and get really easy to get confused in the process with the greater nuances of cultural imperialism more salient than ever, coupled with the realization of the post colonial nation that we are now. With all this going on, I feel it is pertinent to keep the question “who are we?” in our minds. Sadly, I don’t think it is one we are asking as much as we should be. But I believe art and its message can keep the question in the minds of many to the object that it may be answered and something practical may be done about those answers.

For my country, one of the consequent issues that stems from my country and myself being in this place, is the culture that most artists like myself wish to sing and write and dance and act in, is one that first of all does not purely exist anymore. It is weird in some ways to be a Ugandan singing in English and one releasing music that sounds ore like Katy Perry. It has been difficult for me and many other artists and professionals. That struggle seeps into so much more that isn’t compatible with who we really are deep down culturally, from our education systems, to our healthcare and especially to our governance.

That’s final in some ways, but not in all. I want us to be curious about who we were more therefore; I believe we will understand who we are now better. We can begin the encouragement of that curiosity through art.

Another issue is that our culture has, whether knowingly or not, abandoned the application of the thinking process of the human mind, in the presentation of art in some ways, and in some places, more than others. The art sometimes doesn’t address the real and serious things and issues of life and living anymore. All it is now is merely entertainment. You must laugh and you must dance, but you must not think when you hear music. Yes, some art is great this way, but for it to be solely reduced to this purpose destroys some of the other influences on life and living it can have, even more strongly.
So, I want to bring awareness to the beauty of us, with the knowledge of us.

I also want to bring awareness to the strength and influence of art for us as a country. I would like us to remember why music was so central to us. It taught us. It was social commentary. It chastised and encouraged us culturally and that changed society for the better many times. I believe even now, it can do the same if we as a country would be more open to receiving art that was specifically made for us to think deeper and feel more strongly.

What keeps me going is this; I know drive is dynamic and changes with circumstance and so much more. Right now, its just how discontent I am with a lot around me. To exist contentedly and fulfilled I have to change a lot for myself. I feel in so many ways I am not who I could be or was made to be, because of various impediments. Art is one of the more fluid ways I voice that discontentment and encourage its change. Not just selfishly for myself but maybe for others that feel the same way or would like the same thing to happen for them and in our society. The need for change and the possibility of change drive me.

This is why I make the art I make and why I must keep on making it.

Why the art you make?