Petals For Armor Magnets

A growing series of girlhood and what feels necessary: armour. Fashion and clothing has always been in my experience, viewed as something girly and vapid, when in reality it functions as an advanced language and armour plate for women particularly when we don it.

I made this work, titled 'The Rot Beneath the Gown,' as a representation of the costs involved in consumerism, fashion and consumption - the human costs, slave labour, historical exploitation, imperialism and death that persists to this day to feed the colonial need for hoarding resources, beauty and clothing to express class.

A visualization of who actually built the house and the hidden unpaid labour that built our country. There would be no capitalist economy without the labor of enslaved people on cotton plantations, funnelling money North and abroad. There would be no capitalist economy without the enslaved labor or indentured labor on tea plantations, cotton plantations, sugar cane fields.

How I imagine Athena could have looked like for me.

An early work but no less beloved, about what it feels like trying to carve out equal rights while others work hard to claw each gain back and tell us it's too soon, just wait, do it peacefully, don't make a fuss, play in respectability politics. All bullshit, set to Nina Simone's classic protest song, Mississippi Goddamn.

Giggle and snort and cackle and howl and chuckle and huff and puff and grin and blow the house down.

I made this as a part of a series to protest the overturning of Roe v Wade and the utter bullshit backwards ass pushes to take away every possible means of agency for women.

A growing series of girlhood and what feels necessary: armour. Fashion and clothing has always been in my experience, viewed as something girly and vapid, when in reality it functions as an advanced language and armour plate for women particularly when we don it.

I Just love how this turned out. It's amazing how little is needed in terms of imagery to make a complete piece of art, there's no torso or body, just a jacket, hands and crossed calves. Did you know sunflowers originated around 1000 BC in what's now known as Arizona & New Mexico, and were first cultivated as a food source? Then after discovering how to extract the oil for cooking, also used it ofr skin and hair, and the stalk would often be used as a building material. Well, now you do!

I love the trend of artists using flowers as faces, since how a flower is angled or droops expresses so much emotion. Bloom. Always.

This is a work I made about what toxic positivity feels like when you're in recovery. Always being told "let it go", "you have to forgive to move on", "you're holding on to the past" and other endless blaming statements under the guise of 'positivity.' Baby, you cry, rage, wail, destroy until you get the toxic sludge, grief, sorrow and rage out of your body. You become the nightmare that haunts you if it helps you heal. It's not your burden to carry, you do what you have to to put it down.

A black angel. That's it.

A body in repose, how magnificent.

I made this work as a reflection of what I am trying to manifest this year and what I wish for all of us: to bloom, to live in abundance and softness.

A schiaparelli dress sketch made by Dali in association with Mme. Schiaparelli. I love the drawer dress, I love the movement, the flower, and the showing off.

How fashion should feel - freeing, beautiful, an authentic expression of yourself.

This was one of my first collages I ever made. I still quite love them.

This is a work I made inspired by Van Gogh's starry nights meets fashion.

Descartes feat. gender. I think therefore I am, so therefore I dress therefore I am? Gender is a construct, certain perceived "mens" styles and colors were originally gender swapped and swapped again over the centuries. None of its real yall, free yourselves

Couture ft. India, just a pretty little collage that makes me feel happy and miss home.

Schiaparelli (the dress in this collage) is one of my absolute favorite designers, her innovation and absolute technical mastery in drafting & tailoring has been something that I absolutely am enamoured with. A little love letter of sorts.

I made this from a handful of portraits, all sliced and diced and then re-applied on top of each other. I love how it turned out. She's multifaceted, and it's a love letter to black women and that includes trans women.

What makes a face?

Butterfly Mind

I made this when all the propaganda was going around using asians as model minorities to beat black folks over the head with and divide us. Fuck no. I'm not your model minority, none of us are and we're not going to be divided by your bullshit.

Collage art I made inspired partly by Miles Davis Flamenco Blues... it has such a similar feeling to me, shades of blue.

Just a fun little collage of Alizay falling into situations and getting herself out of them.

Fashion & Life.

I made this because I love the proportions being out of balance but still somehow looking 'right.' Influenced by the Maasai people and their insane ability to jump up to 3' vertically, which I cannot do and frankly can barely jump 2" vertically.

A little fashion, a little Lagerfeld, a little dopamine dressing

A portrait of a lady, featuring Schiaparelli and florals. Isn't it crazy how using a floral for a face can be so expressive?

I will not compare others beauty to mine. -Hayley Williams Roses/Lotus/Violet/Iris | Petals For Armor