Sister's Worth Celebrating - Marissa Arterberry

Sister's Worth Celebrating is a monthly column by Personal Empowerment Coach, Lacey C. Clark!, of sisters who are giving back to the community and celebrate healing with their work. This month Lacey! interviews Marissa Arterberry, Visual Artist and Author based in Oakland, CA.

Interview by Lacey C. Clark!

1. What makes your heart smile?

So many things! A warm sunny day, a fridge full of fruits and veggies, getting up early in the morning to paint, a good art exhibit, being anywhere near the equator, dance class…there are many aspects of life that make me happy.

2. You are a visual artist, I love the vibrancy of your work. I feel the passion for what you do in the colors you choose. Do you call yourself a visual artist and if so what does that title mean to you?

I do consider myself a visual artist. It means many things. The main thing is, if you really want to know what’s going on with me, where my heart and mind are, take a look at my paintings. I pour a lot of myself into them, and it’s my way of expressing who I am.

3. I wrote a work/book journal called Celebrate HER Now! Where I talk about how self-love is a solution raising the vibration of peace, joy, harmony for communities...Our Young Women of Hip-Hop Generation...Ourselves. What does the term "celebrating myself" mean to you? Have you celebrated yourself? If so how? If not, do you think celebrating yourself is important?

Celebrating ourselves is so important! The main reasons I focused my work on Black women was because I wasn’t seeing enough celebration of who we are and how far we’ve come. I got sick of seeing images of sad, angry, or unloved sisters. And I knew those images were sinking in, because the same things I was seeing in the media, I was seeing on the street. So many of us are happy and whole, but that isn’t the image that gets projected.

I celebrate myself by listening to my heart and doing what I’m called to do. Whether it is to work on a particular painting, go for a walk in nature, or clear old stuff out of my physical/mental space, I listen to myself. We each have our own prescription for happiness and it’s in our hearts. If we take a moment to turn off the tv, radio, etc. and just listen to ourselves, the path of light and beauty is right there in front of us.

4. Do you think it is important for women to celebrate themselves to be better models for our teen girls? Why or why not?

Yes, definitely. Our young women have to understand that happiness is possible and within their reach, and we grownups must lead by example. If your niece/cousin/daughter sees you taking time for yourself, whether it’s prayer time or a bubble bath, sees you loving your body rather than complaining about it, you’re setting a wonderful example. When our girls are brought up by women who celebrate themselves and are fulfilled, they develop positive coping mechanisms. If there’s a problem, they have a way to deal with it that isn’t destructive to their self esteem.

5. Are you connected to teen girls in any way? If so how?

At the moment the only teen girl I’m really connected to is my beautiful niece Haley. She’s fifteen, and is a very dedicated and promising young dancer. It’s amazing to watch her grow into this very smart, capable young woman. Her spirit shines through most when she’s onstage dancing, and the smile never leaves her face! It’s so important for teen girls to have a creative outlet, someplace where they can express their creativity and energy. Because then no matter what happens in life, these young women have something that keeps them rooted within themselves, and reminds them that anything is possible.

6. What was your most challenging experience in your girlhood and how did you over come it or how are you overcoming it?

For me the most challenging experience was accepting myself when no one else did. I grew up in a city with a fairly small Black population, and I just didn’t fit in with the other Black kids at my school. They were listening to Tupac and I was listening to the Beatles. They were wearing Tommy Hilfiger and I got all my clothes at thrift shops. That should have been fine, but I was teased by them constantly. They told me I was trying to be White, that I wasn’t proud of who I was. They just wouldn’t leave me alone. What finally stopped it was when I chopped off my perm and started wearing a close-cropped natural and African clothing. They left me alone after that, I guess I “out-blacked” them, which I found quite hilarious. And when I went away to college in San Francisco, I found an amazing community of more open minded Black folks who accepted me in all my differential splendor. I also began collecting the stories and photos of girls who went through the same thing I did, which I one day hope to publish.

7. Is art healing?

It certainly is. For me it starts with color. I find colors very healing. I dress myself in certain colors, or focus on them in nature for their healing qualities. For instance, red is a very happy and exuberant color, while white is for purification, and green is for healing. The same thing applies to making art. I’ll stand in front of a blank canvas and think, “What am I in need of today? How am I feeling?” And I’ll try to visualize a woman who feels the same way. What does she look like? What kind of setting is she in? What colors is she surrounded by? And by the end, I have a painting of someone who feels the way I do, or who is someone I’m striving to be. It’s very freeing. On a canvas or paper, these women can be who they are, and do anything. And by creating these images, I feel like I can do anything too.

8. What is the most celebratory and most challenging aspect about being a woman?

What I understand about being a woman is that it’s a very powerful thing. We create life! We are very sacred and intuitive beings. We are healers, educators, and we give life balance. And when we’re living life at our highest vibration, wow. There’s so much good we can do. Now that I understand that power, I understand my responsibility to be the best me I can be, because it touches everything and everyone around me. The challenging part is living in a world where a patriarchal system has tried to harness women’s power for the wrong purposes, such as consumer commercialism. We’re taught that if we exploit our bodies for profit or the pleasure of others, that makes us powerful. But it’s just the opposite. It causes us to feel inadequate, it brings us terrible things like sexually transmitted diseases and eating disorders. These are all side effects of women wanting to step into their natural power roles and having that energy channeled in the wrong direction. Just to put it out there, a book that really helped me understand more about the beauty and power of womanhood is Sacred Woman by Queen Afua. I turn to it any time I have a problem.

9. How would you describe yourself in five words?

Sacred. African. Painter. Loving. Woman.

10. How would you describe your ART in three words?

Sacred. African. Women.

11. Tell us about Soulgodess.com. What is your mission with the site?

Well Soulgoddess is my umbrella for everything I do. It started with me painting, writing, selling t-shirts, and soliciting submissions for a book. As my mother would say, I had “too many irons in the fire”. So naturally, everything did okay but didn’t live up to what I’d intended it to be. Focus is an important quality to have in life, and my focus was in too many places. I got burnt out, and I had to sit quietly with myself for a minute. I asked myself, “What would you be doing if you couldn’t do anything else?” And the answer was paint. So I took a step back from everything else to hone my craft and work out some new ideas. That clarity of focus has made a huge difference. I know a lot of folks are looking at me like, “what happened?” But at the end of the day, this is what I’m happiest doing, and I’m confident I’ll come back to the rest. I’m not in a rush anymore.

12. Tell us about one of your favorite piece of work and why it’s your favorite!

It’s very hard to pick a favorite, because each piece represents a different phase of my life’s journey. I’d say the piece that most captures my imagination at the moment is my mixed media portrait of Azmera, the heroine of an epic fairytale I’m working on. She travels backwards through history to heal her people. I like this piece because I took a lot of chances with it. I would sit with it for days or weeks, and let it “breathe” until the next phase of my vision for it appeared. love it because I put a lot of thought into it, and it’s exciting to see this character go from a page in my sketchbook to big, beautiful color!

13. You have upcoming book tell us about that?

The book is tentatively titled, Girlblue: Black Womanhood Reexamined. It was inspired by a conversation between myself and two other “strange” Black girls. We were lamenting about our high school years, how it felt to be an outcast and have no one we could relate to. Someone said, “if only we had all gone to the same school!”

The book was my way of letting girls know that just because they’re different doesn’t mean they’re alone. Where ever they are, they can open this book and see someone just like them, who went through the same thing and came out smiling.

14. What do you want people to walk away with when they encounter your creations?

I would love for everything I create to be the catalyst for change in someone’s life. If someone’s having a bad day or feeling blue, I’d like them to look at something I painted, or wrote, or compiled, and be healed in some way. Or maybe it inspires them to create something of their own, or look at the world differently. With everything I put out, I think the underlying message is, “See? There is another way.” I want folks to feel that, and know they can go out and do anything!

Ashe' Thank You Miss Marissa!

Keep Celebrating Yourself! Keep Celebrating your Art! The world needs you!

Marissa Arterberry is a Visual Artist living in Oakland, California. She has become known for her acid-bright depictions of women of African descent. Marissa graduated from San Francisco State University in 2007 with a B.A. in Painting. She has shown work at the San Jose Jazz Festival, the San Francisco Women’s Building and Stanford University. In her free time, Marissa dedicates herself to African and Brazilian dance, eating lots of fruits and vegetables, and taking long walks. She is always on the lookout for fresh squeezed orange juice.

Her contact is: www.soulgoddess.com
http://www.myspace.com/soulgoddess_art