Tidying fanatic.

As an accomplished dancer and tennis player, because I do neither, so my loved ones would be very confused.

Isn’t it enough just to be remembered?

A good listener.

This process has also involved slowing down and refusing a certain amount of labor that has been imposed upon me as a Black woman in this country.

When I start a project, it’s a kind of investigation and curiosity at the beginning. I’m basically culling materials. I’m gathering. A lot of the work takes on a collage aesthetic. So I am thinking through an idea and then gathering all of the supporting documents. In some ways it’s essayistic. I’m attempting to put forth an idea or a thesis. There are assertions that are being made, and what can I use visually, whether it is 16 millimeter film from the past or things that I shoot myself, whether it’s interview that I go out and get, whether it’s me painting on film and creating some sort of abstraction that alludes to or gestures towards the assertion. It’s playtime at the beginning. It’s almost like a very active brainstorming that requires me to go out and find materials as well as make notes, as well as look at footage as well as read. It’s investigative curiosity at the beginning, this phase of questioning and garnering. And at the end it’s instinctual. It’s a sweet spot. There have been times where I’ve gone out and presented something thinking that it’s done and then brought it back. I’ve gotten audience reactions, brought it back, turned it up a little bit, and then it was done. Sometimes my finishing process requires me to see it with a large group of people.

One of my biggest disappointments: I used to take piano lessons as a young girl, and then I stopped, because I was having a really difficult year as a kid. My step father had died, and I didn't want to do anything -- so I just stopped taking lessons. And then I think back and I'm like, “Damn, I could have been Nina Simone!” Haha

So I’m listening, I’m watching, and I’m also reading while I’m making.

Yes, the Kuleshov effect. When you place one image next to another, meaning emerges. If you change one image, the meaning changes. They are these psychological landscapes that are being painted. So I find this technique and the various ways that montages can be assembled extremely helpful.

It requires me to be in prayer and meditation daily, or else I will literally spiral out. It’s something that I put at the forefront of my life.