Nneka Jones al­ways had an as­tound­ing love for colour and spe­cial at­ten­tion to de­tail. She ad­mits that the Trin­bag­on­ian cul­ture has al­ways been promi­nent through­out her artis­tic jour­ney. The artist was nev­er one to ac­cept medi­oc­rity, not on­ly in art, but al­so in her every­day life and has al­ways been will­ing to take on a chal­lenge. This led her to take the risk of leav­ing be­hind her fam­i­ly and friends to trav­el the world in pur­suit of both shar­ing and gain­ing ver­sa­tile ex­pe­ri­ences that would en­hance her artistry.

The 22-year-old artist is cur­rent­ly pur­su­ing a Bach­e­lor of Fine Arts at the Uni­ver­si­ty of Tam­pa with a Mar­ket­ing mi­nor and is ex­pect­ed to grad­u­ate in May 2020. Nneka is fas­ci­nat­ed with con­tem­po­rary por­trai­ture and how that mar­ries with mixed me­dia art­work. This is high­light­ed in her re­cent cre­ations us­ing the tech­nique of hand em­broi­dery to cre­ate works that mim­ic the re­al­ism of an oil paint­ing as well as the use of con­doms to com­ment on so­cial is­sues of sex­u­al abuse. The WE Mag team got the op­por­tu­ni­ty to chat with Nneka about her work as an artist and her very unique and in­tri­cate pieces that she us­es to high­light so­cial is­sues. Here’s what Nneka shared with us in an in­ter­view:

What are you work­ing on at present, what is keep­ing you ex­cit­ed?

Cur­rent­ly, I am en­rolled in an in­de­pen­dent study course where I am giv­en a pri­vate stu­dio space, as well as the free­dom to cre­ate a body of work in prepa­ra­tion for my grad­u­a­tion show in 2020. This space has not on­ly al­lowed me to re­flect on my past works and how I can im­prove them, but has al­so chal­lenged me to cre­ate art­work that not on­ly fills the walls of my stu­dio but speaks vol­umes be­yond this struc­ture.

I am there­fore work­ing si­mul­ta­ne­ous­ly to de­vel­op a se­ries of art­works that fea­ture two bod­ies of work, ex­plor­ing dif­fer­ent me­dia. The se­ries em­pha­sizes the theme of “Tar­gets” where I use sym­bol­ism and ma­te­ri­als to com­ment on so­cial and po­lit­i­cal in­jus­tices that ex­ist in so­ci­ety to­day. These “tar­gets” re­fer to vic­tims that have been abused sex­u­al­ly, men­tal­ly, phys­i­cal­ly, emo­tion­al­ly, et cetera.

I use ma­te­ri­als such as con­doms and em­broi­dery thread that cre­ate in­ter­est­ing tex­tures, ma­nip­u­lat­ing them so that the view­er does not no­tice them at first. The con­dom paint­ings range from small­er sizes of 30” x 40” to larg­er sizes of 48”x 60” with over 300 con­doms ad­hered to each piece. These are used to high­light vic­tims of sex­u­al abuse and force view­ers and mem­bers of so­ci­ety to speak about such in­jus­tices. In ad­di­tion to the con­doms, I al­so use em­broi­dery thread to hand sew por­traits of young girls who are usu­al­ly the “tar­get” for sex traf­fick­ing scams and oth­er forms of sex­u­al abuse, along with emo­tion­al and men­tal abuse.

I am ex­cit­ed to see how my se­ries will evolve and the emo­tions that I evoke from the view­ers who in­ter­act with it.

What is your ul­ti­mate goal or biggest dream for your fu­ture?

I want to con­tin­ue mak­ing art for­ev­er. I do not ever want to stop; whether that means I will be a full-time artist, a gallery own­er, a cu­ra­tor or all in one, I just know that my pur­pose is to cre­ate art and be in an en­vi­ron­ment where I can ap­pre­ci­ate it.

I would love to con­tin­ue es­tab­lish­ing my­self as an artist and my brand, ArtY­ouHun­gry, so that ul­ti­mate­ly, I can have a gallery space and stu­dio space that I can call my own but al­so cre­ate a plat­form for oth­er artists who share the same am­bi­tions, where they can ex­hib­it, in­stall and/ or per­form.

Why do you do what you do?

I be­lieve there are so many is­sues that ex­ist in so­ci­ety that peo­ple are ei­ther too afraid to speak about or are com­plete­ly obliv­i­ous to the fact that they ex­ist. My art­work serves as a tool for com­mu­ni­ca­tion and a space for in­ter­pre­ta­tion, ques­tions and analy­sis. Its pur­pose is to raise aware­ness, to speak and to give life and at­ten­tion where it is need­ed.

I do not want to make art that is sim­ply just aes­thet­i­cal­ly pleas­ing. I want to high­light in­jus­tices that are over­looked and show­case things that are taboo. This has helped vic­tims feel more com­fort­able about open­ing up re­gard­ing their ex­pe­ri­ences which can po­ten­tial­ly save the life of some­one else or en­cour­age some­one else to speak out.

Do you have any ad­vice for young women who may want to pur­sue art?

It is so easy as a young per­son to be in­flu­enced and per­suad­ed by the thoughts and opin­ions of oth­ers. While this is some­times help­ful, and can even save you a lot of time and mon­ey, it is im­por­tant to take the time to lis­ten to your own voice and take risks based on your own pas­sion.

Al­ways re­mind your­self of your pur­pose when you feel as though you are get­ting lost in the opin­ions of oth­ers. I con­stant­ly re­mind my­self that my pas­sion dri­ves my pur­pose and I try my best to take every op­por­tu­ni­ty that comes my way. This will not on­ly help you “boss up” and boost your en­tre­pre­neur­ial skills as a cre­ative but is ex­cel­lent for net­work­ing con­nec­tions in the art and busi­ness world.