HELO: The Crisis Story Magazine
New York, NY 10025
United States
Helo
Worlds Collide and Co-Exist
Artwork | Vanessa Chakour, Oct-Nov 2009
Vanessa talks with HELO about her work here and a Q & A below the artwork. Buy prints and learn about Vanessa's rights activism and music-oriented art at www.VanessaChakour.com.
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Vanessa Chakour’s artwork deftly combines her experiences in the realm of music, activism and boxing. In addition to making politically charged portraits of artists and icons, she creates kinetic drawings that function as culturally aware streams of consciousness. Her unique style of ‘Visual Verse’ was born out of need for unedited release and self-expression and reaches deep within through stream-of-consciousness writing to empty her mind and reveal innate truth beneath the surface.
Vanessa devoted many years of her life to boxing and has both fought and trained fighters for recreation and competition using boxing as a vehicle for increased awareness and inner and outer strength. She has coordinated concerts/events and created programs to raise awareness and funds for various causes. Some of her most noted work includes being the facilitator for the HOPE an event to preserve Tibetan Culture with His Holiness, Dalai Lama, in addition her instrumental role in resurrecting the Stop The Violence Movement with legendary Hip Hop activist/MC KRS One.
She is an Athlete Ambassador with Right To Play has spoken at the United Nations on their behalf. Vanessa is a Co-Director at Full Spectrum (fsexperience.com): A Convergence of Artists, Activists, Explorers & Thinkers, and advisor to many initiatives involving activism and awareness through art, music and sport.
Vanessa is the founder of ART, ACTION, AWARENESS (artactionawareness.org) an organization dedicated to building the self-esteem and activism of young people by supporting their artistic and athletic interests and talents. She is working on new collections and collaborating with various artists for upcoming, multi-sensory exhibitions. She is based in Brooklyn, NY. Agora Fine Art Gallery in Chelsea, New York City said this about her work:
"Vanessa Chakour's kinetic drawings are about freedom: freedom to think, freedom to feel, freedom to remember, freedom to meditate, freedom to explore and freedom to move forward. The colors in her paintings move in and out of each other, echoing the way psychedelic rock swells, crescendos and explodes into a sea of sounds. Text, historical figures, cityscapes, and abstracted shapes all openly interact in Chakour's work, at once reacting to the injustices of recent history and the lively kinesthesia of daily life."
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Pandora's Box.
Illusion.
Decisions.
Soar.
Fall.
Spirit Fire I.
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HELO: Hi Vanessa. How did your style evolve?
Vanessa: My abstract style evolved as a way to get rid of all the unnecessary contents of my mind. One day I realized the obvious: that my best writing and drawing were in my sketchbook. Raw, real, immediate and unedited... as opposed to a more contrived, deliberate piece that may lack some of the emotion and intensity. So, I started using my 'art' as my journal. I decided to get a large piece of board and write. I woke up and wrote... and wrote... non-stop, stream-of-consciousness in different directions and colors. My piece 'Look' is what came of it. Since then I've done the same thing with images which is what you'll see in this series. Most of my pieces begin with writing.
HELO: What is the common emotional or political origin in this series we'll see here?
Vanessa: Every piece is a portrait. Every piece contains immediate and uncovered layers of thought, emotion, pain... The beauty of art is that we can communicate without words. Instead we communicate with color, with shapes, with lines... We are all the same on the inside and I like to refer to my art and the process of it as turning inside out. The process is the piece itself and my aim through my abstract pieces is to reach and communicate my most authentic self. A constant process, of course....
HELO: Where will you go from here in terms of forging art work related to your activism or witness of crisis?
Vanessa: Whether my art directly speaks to an issue or is simply an honest release or abstract interpretation of the cultural landscape, I want it to connect. My abstract work may not as obviously address an issue, but it's my hope that it suggests a quest for freedom through unloading turbulence and speaks to the human condition. Some pieces like 'Look' or 'Fly On' (Hendrix in his lyrics) that are done entirely in words I'll use to address particular issues. Growing up in a family of musicians, music is a huge part of my work. Lyrics, sounds... I want to celebrate musicians who have influenced me, who have become part of my inner dialogue and soundtrack. Musicians whose lyrics inspire and have used their lyrics to spark social dialogue and change. I also plan to use that style to tell untold stories and provide a voice to some that may otherwise be voiceless.
Vanessa Chakour is a fine artist and activist based in NYC. Orders of prints can be found at Vanessachakour.com or by emailing vanessa@vanessachakour.com. Tell her HELO sent you.
Thanks Vanessa!
HELO: The Crisis Story Magazine
New York, NY 10025
United States
Helo
