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  • What She Said: I Was Suspended From School in My Final Year

    Navigating life as a woman in the world today is interesting. From Nigeria to Timbuktu, it’ll amaze you how similar all our experiences are. Every Wednesday, women the world over will share their experiences on everything from sex to politics right here. This is Zikoko’s What She Said.

    This week’s #ZikokoWhatSheSaid subject is @lethabohuma, a 23-year-old South African woman. She spills on how she flunked out of university without a plan for her future, turning passion into a career and managing imposter syndrome without a degree. 

    What’s something you could’ve sworn would never happen to you?

    Getting asked to leave varsity in my final year. In high school, I was the kid who was always top of the class, so I could’ve never imagined that 21-year-old me would be appealing to a school board for a chance to get her grades up in uni.

    That sounds tough

    Yeah. It wasn’t great being stuck at home while my friends were off graduating. But the most unexpected part of that transition was somehow building my career as a digital artist and ending up in Time Magazine barely two years after.

    Let’s backtrack a little. What led up to you getting sent out of uni?

    Girl, my first year in varsity was chaotic. Towards the end of high school, I got really good at maths and thought studying computer science was a good idea. I also loved drawing, so I assumed I’d learn how to use certain applications to draw. It made sense to me. But my faculty made me doubt the logical side of my brain.

    LOL. Isn’t school supposed to do the opposite?

    LOL. That wasn’t my reality. I didn’t expect to be doing so many different modules in both computer science and maths. I had such a hard time balancing both. I still get goosebumps thinking about those classes. There was absolutely no time for me to draw.

    Why was that important to you?

    Drawing made me feel less anxious. I can’t explain why I had anxiety as a kid, I just did. Especially in social settings like school. I got knots in my tummy from being around so many people.

    Maybe it had to do with having a single mum who had to work most of the time. And being left alone with my grandma after school from when I was six. In between her cups of tea and insulin shots, she mostly took naps. I got comfortable with being quiet. And drawing made it easier. 

    So how did you handle not having time for something that made you feel so zen?

    I tried to make friends. Varsity was the first time I actually wasn’t comfortable being alone. I was 18 and in a different city for the first time. I had a roommate I got along with, but I really needed to know if anyone else in my class was struggling as much as I was.

    But I didn’t make my first friend until after two months of classes. He was a weird guy.

    LOL. But you wanted to be friends?

    Everyone else in our class had formed cliques. We were basically the only people who didn’t quite fit into any. So we didn’t really have much of a choice by month two of the semester. 

    Basically, two weirdos. Gotcha!

    And we liked the same kind of music. But he left school because he couldn’t afford the fees for our next semester. I hated going back to being alone. But then, I got a boyfriend and that’s when my marks started to slip. 

    All these issues have included men.  

    LOL. Yeah, I spent way too much time with him. I practically followed him everywhere. During my lunch breaks, we’d be in my dorm room practising yoga or meditation. Of course, that always ended up cutting into my class time. 

    But then, we broke up that same year and my grades got worse. It didn’t help that we were in the same class. I needed some kind of escape, so I went back to drawing in my second year. 

    Wait. All that drama happened in just your first year?

    Girl, yes! LOL. 18 was a crazy and chaotic age for me. 

    LOL. So what led up to the suspension?

    Mehn, my mental health went down. I’m careful about how I talk about mental illness, but I think I was borderline depressed. I suddenly had such a negative view of my future. All I’d do was draw or sleep. Like, I was happy being a sad girl and turned it into a whole aesthetic.

    No one noticed?

    A couple of friends did, but I didn’t know how to explain things. When I started skipping classes, I had a few sessions with our campus therapist, but I didn’t feel better. In my final year, I stopped going. The only thing I attended were the digital art classes. I was basically self-sabotaging. And my final marks were terrible. I only took the option to appeal because I couldn’t imagine not finishing my degree. 

    And that didn’t work out

    Yeah. They asked me to stay home to reflect, and then, apply for a digital art degree instead. I knew it was their way of saying, “Bye, girl”.

    How did your mum and grandma take it?

    They both thought I needed the year off. To me, I was like “Hell no”. I was turning 21 and didn’t know what to do or how to do it. But I didn’t have a choice. I’d completely lost hope in my future.

    How did you get through that phase?

    Mostly sleeping and listening to depressing music. I practically spent the first three months stuck at home doing nothing. Partly because it was 2020 and there was a pandemic. But I also didn’t have any friends because we lived in a new neighbourhood that was predominantly white and extremely quiet. Plus, there was nothing to watch on TV. 

    I eventually got sick of my own bullshit and started to draw more often. Getting into it as a routine helped. It was the only thing that made me feel good.

    So things got better?

    Yeah. Since I didn’t have anyone to share my drawings with, I posted everything online. People picked up on it in about four months and started asking for my commission rates. By 2021, brands were reaching out as well. And that was my “Oh my gosh” moment. 

    And your degree?

    I decided to take a six-month course on digital art at a college close by. I didn’t need another four years of varsity. 

    You went from completely losing hope in your future to getting paid for your passion. How did that feel?

    It was good creating something I actually cared about. With every piece I drew, I felt more like myself again. The hard part was my social anxiety evolving into imposter syndrome. Like when Time Magazine reached out to feature one of my pieces in 2021. It was one of my proudest moments.

    But?

    I felt out of my league. I’d been drawing professionally for barely two years. In my mind, getting featured in a global magazine was an achievement I didn’t think would happen until I was 60, not 23. 

    So you felt too young?

    Yeah. But somehow, I also felt like I was running out of time. Time Magazine featured a 12-year-old artist the same year. So in my head, I was too old and behind on what I should’ve achieved at 23. It’s crazy.

    How do you manage these feelings of “imposter syndrome”?

    I never had a solid plan for my life, so I’m fully aware that getting these opportunities after everything that happened means I’m doing something right. And while I understand that I need help as I grow, I’ve watched my mum and grandma figure everything out on their own. I know I’ll be okay too.

    Any regrets? 

    None. I only wish I focused on art much sooner. Getting asked to leave school was exactly what I needed to leave my comfort zone. I would’ve continued to play it safe if I hadn’t.

    Illustration by: Lethabo Huma

    If you’d like to be my next subject on #WhatSheSaid, click here to tell me why

    Ortega

    , ,
  • He Donated $500K+ Worth of ETH to Support an Art and Dance Academy. How Did He Do It and Why?

    If you could pick one thing to do for the next 10 years, what would it be? That one dream. Many of us don’t dream of labour. But for Owo Anietie, his 10-year-old self was sure it was art. 

    His dream started with selling one drawing to school friends for ₦30. 17 years later, Owo Anietie donated $500K+ worth of Ethereum (ETH) to build a free art and dance academy in Ikorodu. My one question: How? 

    As told to Steffi O.

    In the beginning, was the art

    Things like maths never made sense to me. Two plus two equals four. Well, why can’t it be ten? When I asked my maths teacher this, he’d laugh. I felt stupid.

    In Primary 4, art showed up. It was something I could connect to. It was realistic. It was about self-expression, and I didn’t need to question that. 

    I started drawing to pull out the stories I heard at home into something I could touch. I grew up in a large compound in Uyo, and most nights ended with stories. Sometimes, they were folktales about the tortoise and the bird or war stories. I soaked up everything. At school, I’d tear out pages from my book to draw anything I could picture.  My classmates hailing me was all the validation I needed. I felt like I was really good.

    My first sale, learning from mentors and a new love

    I can’t remember most of what I drew, but when I was 10, the first significant thing I sold was a drawing of naira notes. I placed them on paper and traced out ₦10, ₦20 and ₦100 notes. By the time I coloured them in, they looked real. Real enough for my classmates to pay me ₦30 and attempt to use the drawing to buy suya. They weren’t successful, but I wasn’t giving them back that ₦30. 

    I didn’t take art seriously until I was 14. I was in SS 1, and we’d finally gotten an art teacher, who taught me about Nigerian art history like the Nok Terracotta in Benin. After that, I learnt how to use colours and create vivid paintings from two other art teachers. I think of them as mentors. Each phase of mentorship in secondary school founded what my skills eventually became.

    Discovering animation and getting into side hustles

    As my art progressed, I wanted to try new things. I was intrigued by science and wanted to understand things like gravity, how the earth was made, and the history of mankind. Documentaries like The Story of Us with Morgan Freeman answered some of those questions. Physics classes helped with the rest. I was also curious about how to merge science with art. Science-fiction cartoons became interesting. I was watching shows like Avatar, and it felt like the animators created a whole new universe. I wondered if I could do the same with art — animation was a fairly new concept to me. 

    Dominik Umoren was my last mentor. He taught me the closest thing to graphics design in 2012: screenprinting. It involved using a stencil to draw designs on banners and t-shirts. The process was stressful, but I was making money as a 17-year-old artist, so I had no complaints. In exchange for the lessons, I helped out with jobs and errands. 

    On one of my errands, I saw a poster advertising animation classes. It took me back to watching Avatar. There was a number on the poster, so I called. I met up with the guy, and he was hyped about making a movie together. We talked for hours. But it ended like that. Our first link-up was the last time I ever saw him. After that, I put the pipe dream of animation in my back pocket. 

    I needed to plan for uni. I didn’t trust that I could earn enough with art, so I studied building technology as a good backup plan. If art ever flopped, I’d dust my certificate and move. I kept up with art as a side hustle.

    My first major break on Facebook

    I’d been designing banners and t-shirts for four years. I posted my designs on Facebook to get clients, and in 2013 I got lucky. An author from Lagos messaged me. She needed digital illustrations for a book. I had zero experience, but why would I turn down ₦50k? I took the job. 

    I spent one month figuring out how to design with my laptop. I used a mouse to design 46 illustrations. It was the most difficult thing I’d ever done, but it was the starting point of the career that led me to NFTs.

    The first thing that influenced my trajectory was ASUU. After my first paid illustration in 2013, I kept freelancing as a graphic designer while schooling. It was stressful, but my consolation was graduating in five years. LOL. 

    ASUU had other plans. In 2018, ASUU went on strike. I can’t remember how many strikes had happened before then, but I was over ASUU’s stress. The same year, I decided to move to Lagos.

    Life on the real streets

    Before I moved to Lagos, I got a job offer from Anakle. They reached out to me on Twitter, but I couldn’t take their offer because of school. This time, nothing was holding me back. The salary wasn’t great, but it was better than dealing with ASUU’s unending strike.

    While I worked at Anakle, I was catching flights back to Uyo for my final year project.  ASUU had finally called off the strike in early 2019, but I wasn’t quitting my job. Shuttling back and forth for a year was tough. But my consolation was finally being able to work as a motion graphic designer. I finally collected the degree in 2020.

    The beginning of NFTs

    At the peak of the pandemic, international artists talked a lot more about NFTs, using the term “crypto art”. It meant I could add my artwork to a platform that made it impossible for anyone to steal it and earn crypto in exchange for each sale. I was hooked.

    Twitter was filled with conversations about artists earning thousands of dollars from crypto art, but I noticed something:  all the people talking about NFTs in 2020 were American. “Where are the Africans?” I thought. 

    I put out a tweet asking why Africans weren’t getting in on crypto art, and it was crickets. No comments or retweets. 

    I began to think of ways we could also benefit from crypto art. I had no clue about Osinachi or Lethabo Huma who’d been into NFTs since 2019. It seemed like a dead conversation for African artists. So I spent the rest of 2020 researching.

    My first NFT sale: A mix of the past and present

    In 2020, I spent time studying Benin art. I was obsessed with details like the Benin Ivory mask the Oba wore during special ceremonies. The mask was looted around the same period India experienced the bubonic plague in 1897. The plague didn’t get to Africa, but it was interesting to see similar timelines. I wanted to create a version of what the Benin mask would look like during the pandemic. That was the birth of Masked; a merge of the past and present.

    I put Masked up and asked my colleagues at Anakle to share it with as many people as possible. I told my guy I was ready to quit my job if I sold the mask, which was a joke but also wasn’t a joke. 24 hours later, Masked sold for 0.5 ETH (approximately $600). I was stoked. The collector mentioned that he had been following me for years and was waiting for me to get on the NFT space. Beyond the money, that was my sign to keep going.

    My next sale was another rendition of Benin art — the Seeker — and Anthony Azekwoh bought it for twice as much. Things shot up from there. Before August 2021, I’d sold 40 NFTs. I thought that was dope. I had no clue September would be the highlight of my NFT career.

    RELATED: I Had to Bet on Myself and Make It Work — Man Like Anthony Azekwoh

    Journeying to the future of art

    Before September, I’d played around with the concept of futuristic African art — 3045 to be precise. I called the idea Afrodroids. When I shared the first piece in April, I expected it to sell fast. Three months later, I didn’t get a buyer. I felt bad. I thought people would be fascinated by the idea of re-imagining African stories in the future. Clearly, they weren’t. I shelved the project. 

    While I was rethinking the strategy for Afrodroids, people reached out to me to work on Profile Pictures (PFP) projects. These were projects that I would work with other artists to launch. Other projects like CrytoPunks and Bored Ape Yatch had been doing well, and NFT enthusiasts were keen on connecting to start their own projects too. I wasn’t interested, so I never looked into it. I preferred working on one-on-one art — limited individual pieces. I liked the idea of creating only originals.

    I finally listened to an offer when I understood the value of multiple people owning a piece of African art. There’d be more exposure to African stories, but the guy was asking for a large percentage of the profits. It didn’t make sense to say yes. I could easily make the same money myself, so I shunned the offer.

    A few weeks after, I reached out to my guys to start our own version of PFP with Afrodroids. The first Afrodroid took a while to sell, but I trusted that people would see the vision. I just knew it would sell out. 

    Building 12,000 art pieces in three weeks

    I was riding on the fact that nothing like Afrodroids existed in Africa. In a few days, I built a solid team. They were artists experienced with designing characters for PFPs. I had friends in Australia, Hong Kong, the USA and London working with me tirelessly. We started in August and aimed to launch in three weeks.

    We needed people to believe 3045 was real. To prepare, I consumed materials on culture and technology. First, I studied the origin stories of Africans. Things like the emergence of Oduduwa in Yoruba culture, the start of the Ashanti tribe in Ghana, ancient female warriors of Dahomey. I wanted the art pieces to look as close to their origins as possible.

    Giving back to the African Community

    Before we hit the NFT market, my team searched for an art-based institution to fund. The goal was to have 20% of our smart contract given to the institution once Afrodroids stormed the market. 

    We’d searched for a few months before my team stumbled on a tweet by Seyi Oduwole, the founder of Dream Catchers Academy. She was venting about the struggles they faced. Things were so bad that the girls were drinking black tea without milk. The teabags were cheaper than Milo, but what child is happy drinking Lipton? It was a no brainer. We had to help her girls. 

    Once we connected with Seyi, we synced the Dream Catchers account to the social contract. No one knew how much they’d get out of the project, but whatever the amount, the girls at Dream Catchers would get the help they deserved.

    The big bang and the dance academy

    On September 1st 2021, 12,000 Afrodroids were ready. We called our first set the OG Afrodroids — they’d be the first of three sets. Each robot was modelled after the Nsibidi language originating from Eastern and Southern Nigeria. The culture involved using ideographics to communicate, and the OG robots were created to do the same. I designed the robots with symbols like question marks, exclamation marks and X and X inscriptions to indicate death. 

    Sometimes, I used beams of light for expressions — blue when they’re numb, or yellow when they’re angry. The OG Afrodroids were a cultural mix. Their beads were drawn from  South African fashion with caps and earrings inspired by East Africans. 

    I knew the world needed time to ease into the idea of African stories in the future. So I wasn’t surprised Afrodroids sold out 11 minutes after it was dropped. Each Afrodroid sold for 0.08 ETH ($100), and 20% went to Seyi’s dream to build a new school for Dream Catchers. Her academy also owns 25% of the secondary royalties from the Afrodroid project.

    Beyond telling African stories, giving back financially is important to me. My mum was a single parent taking care of three kids, and she had a lot of responsibilities. When I got to uni, I wanted to take off some of the load she had to bear. Without art, it wouldn’t have been possible. That’s why I believe in the vision of Dream Catchers. I want kids to have the same privilege to earn through their own dreams.

    I’m glad Afrodroids is ushering in the next generation of artists that will lead Africa to the global stage. Dream Catchers Academy is only the beginning.

    Here’s everything Seyi Oluyole dreams of for Dream Catchers Academy: 

    What She Said: “Dance Gave Me Hope for a Future Again”

    What’s next for Owo Anietie?

    I’ve drawn every day since January 2021. I see myself as an athlete who trains every single day to remain in their best form. 50 years from now, I’ll still be sharing African stories from the future. Afrodroids is only the beginning. 

    Ortega

    , ,
  • I Had to Bet on Myself and Make It Work — Man Like Anthony Azekwoh
    What does it mean to be a man? Surely, it’s not one thing. It’s a series of little moments that add up. Man Like is a weekly Zikoko series documenting these moments to see how it adds up. It’s a series for men by men, talking about men’s issues. We try to understand what it means to “be a man” from the perspective of the subject of the week.

    In 2020, Anthony Azekwoh’s life changed forever when his painting, The Red Man, became a viral sensation taking over social media and capturing the attention of the global art community. At 21 years old, Anthony has established himself as one of the biggest digital artists on the continent, selling out copies of his work worldwide and leading the conversation surrounding African art on the global NFT space. But with this success comes a lot of pressure, doubt and fear of being a “one-hit wonder”. 

    [newsletter]

    In this episode of Man Like, he talks about dropping out of university despite his parents’ disapproval, surviving his first heartbreak, and how he tried but failed to recreate the magic of his most popular painting, The Red Man.

    Tell me about what it was like growing up? 

    I’d say I had a very quiet and uneventful childhood. I’m the eldest of three kids, we lived in Surulere, my school was on the same street as my house and we had a lot of family living around. It was a contained experience. 

    The only highlight I can think of was the time I got hit by a motorcycle when I was eight. 

    Omo, what happened? 

    So, there are two versions of this story. My version is that I was coming back from school with my mum and younger sister, and then this motorcycle came out of nowhere and hit me. The second version is from an uncle who lived on our street. He claims I ran towards the motorcycle, which I believe may have been possible, but I don’t want to believe it. LOL. I was rushed to the hospital, and they patched me up. After that, life continued and I’m here today. 

    I’m sorry, man. You talk about your university experiences on your blog. How did your time in Covenant University influence you?

    CU was hell. That place tested my physical and mental health. The rules were endless. From simple things like banning phones and jeans to using chapel attendance as a substitute for class attendance, they deliberately made life difficult when it didn’t need to be so.  The hardest part was knowing all they were putting us through was unnecessary and not being able to do anything about it. 

    Going there, I realised the only person I could trust with my life choices is me. I shouldn’t have attended the school or studied the course I did. Parents and authority figures are great, but they can be wrong sometimes. You need to stand up for yourself when necessary; Nigerian elders should be checked once in a while. 

    I’m dead. Have you ever had to stand up to an older person? 

    I do that all the time — I did it with my school. I wrote and published essays about my experience, and they didn’t take it lightly. They ended up suspending me twice. I did the same with my parents. I sat them down to have an important talk about letting me live my life. It was scary, but necessary.

    This question is for millenials: tell us how this conversation with your parents went. 

    They were hellbent on me becoming a chemical engineer, but I had been struggling with the course for five years and was over it. They didn’t listen. This same course had given me high blood pressure. I couldn’t eat or sleep, and I had tremors in both of my hands. I finally sat them down and  told them I was leaving for my sanity. 

    How did they react? 

    Mehn. I ended up running away and staying with a friend for a while until my mum came to pick me up for a meeting with my dad. They still maintained their stance, so I moved again. This time, I stayed in a hotel for about five weeks. 

    That time was hectic. I had other family members roasting me left, right and centre. Then I had to deal with a heartbreak and plan an exhibition around the same time as well. It was a tough time I won’t lie, but it was necessary for me and my family so we could eventually find a way to evolve our relationship. 

    We later got to the point where we all just calmed down, and my parents were like, “Okay, we don’t understand what you’re doing, but if this is what it has to be, then fine.” I think we just had to finally communicate effectively to move forward. 

    Whew! So you mentioned a heartbreak situation earlier, what was that about? 

    Well…

    I can sense the drama. 

    Over the years, I’d always said I couldn’t afford love or relationships because of work, school and just being busy. But the truth is, I was scared of being vulnerable. Anyway, I made the mistake of falling in love with someone I was in a situationship with. 

    Oh no. 

    Very big oh no. There are some things I never want to hear again, especially lines like, “Let’s see where it goes”. 

    It didn’t end the way I wanted because I don’t think they were on the same page as me. I also didn’t see the situation as clearly as I should have because I was deep in love. 

    Aww. How did this heartbreak affect your outlook on love and relationships? 

    My eyes opened and I became anti-everything love. With everything I was going through, the heartbreak took the longest, and I’ll say it hurt the most. It felt like someone punched me. I could’ve sworn it would be both of us to the end. Funny thing is, Omah Lay’s Understand became my jam because that was my life. I didn’t know I could care that much. To get over it, I spent time with my friends and by myself. It was important to reevaluate my self-worth.

    But now, I know it’s part of life. Sometimes, things don’t work out, but I can’t let that stop me. Waking up every day is a risk, yet we do it. Accepting heartbreak doesn’t mean I failed at love or a relationship. For the future of my romantic relationships, I’m letting life take the wheel. 

    Love that. In Nigeria, education is how people measure chance for success. Did you have doubts or fears about dropping out? 

    I weighed my options. The fear of living a miserable life doing a job I hated in a field I hated was bigger than any other fear. I know how easy it is to let the years pass because I had done that in university, and I didn’t want to make the same mistake again. To be fair, I had started to slowly establish myself as an artist and was making some money at the time. A part of me felt like If I didn’t take that step, I wouldn’t even have a future to begin with. I had to bet on myself and make it work. 

    Talking about things that worked out, your work, The Red Man, became this viral moment in 2020, how did that happen? 

    It’s crazy because I was just fucking around with this art thing and then one day I became an artist. The Red Man was one of those rare moments where I decided to work on something for myself, away from all the works that influenced me. I wasn’t trying to be like any of my art idols; it was something fun for me. I posted it online the next day, and the pain became this huge thing. 

    I wasn’t even looking at art as a career path. I had done smaller commissioned work and album covers, but I didn’t look at it as a potential primary source of income. 

    Mad. How did the love for The Red Man move from verbal appreciation to people wanting to buy copies? 

    It happened the same week. I was very blessed because most times people appreciate your work on Twitter and that’s it. But this time, I had people asking me for print copies. I fucked around, made some, and they sold out over and over. I then had to make my website and make everything a serious business.

    Mad. This NFT thing you’re doing, tell us about it. 

    The NFT thing also happened at the end of 2020. I remember this white man DMed me on Instagram asking if I was interested in exploring NFTs, and I was a bit hesitant because I felt something shady was about to happen. 

    I was wrong. He worked with an NFT platform and talked to me about crypto and NFTs. As I said, this was 2020, so in my head, I was like, “Omo, I don’t have money for crypto”. But I went with it and ended up planning my first NFT drop for 2021. 

    I had no idea what I was doing, but I just went with the flow. I didn’t want to waste an opportunity placed in front of me. Ten minutes into the NFT drop, someone messaged me on Twitter saying, “Congrats for selling out”. My first thought was maybe he was referring to print copies of my art, but apparently, we had sold out our NFTs. Everything worked out. 

    Funds! I’m curious to know, what does it feel like to have accomplished so much at 21? 

    I’d be lying if I said it was fun. A lot has happened and it’s all been back to back. Imagine you wake up in 2020 and you have all these papers to sign and shipments to coordinate and you just turned 20. Then 2021 came with its headaches. I dropped out of university and had to organise three events. As a human being, it’s a lot to go through at once. People look at me and expect that after all of this, my life would be solid and so I find it difficult to admit that it’s stressful. It’s just… there’s always something. 

    That sounds so tough. I hope it gets better. How are your parents reacting to all of this?

    This came out of the blues for me and I was the one it happened to, so you can imagine how confused they must be right now. In 2020 they saw me bringing all these paintings and then watched everything blow up. They both came for my exhibition, and I know it’s been interesting for them to watch in real-time. 

    What was the first thing you bought when you hammered?  

    Bro, I went to the supermarket and bought barbeque sauce and some groceries. LOL. In my house, my mum is the community manager, and we can’t just take or use anything anyhow, so for me, it was mad just getting to buy my own groceries. I look at my siblings like, “You guys have to use the family barbeque sauce? Eyah”. 

    I’ve always wondered if you’ve ever felt pressure to top or recreate The Red Man? 

    Do you know the deathless collection? 

    No. I don’t think so. 

    Exactly. LOL. I tried to get it back and trace my steps, but the more I tried, the more I failed. It’s like making art from a place of pride or trying to please everyone else; you just end up failing. I kept failing, and then one day I removed everyone from my mental workspace. I said fuck everyone! I needed to do something for myself and so I decided to paint a guy from a story I had read about: the African Samurai, Yasuke. When it dropped,it  went viral again. 

    Step 1 to success: Fuck everyone. Got it 

    LOL. It felt good to know I wasn’t a one painting wonder, but after that, I started thinking: “Maybe these are the only two paintings that would blow.” 

    My life is a constant circle of good things happening and me wondering if it’d be the last time.

    This question is for the fans: why do your paintings always look upset?

    I honestly don’t know. Maybe I’m upset. LOL. But these are questions I’m going to have to ask my therapist in the future. I think people look interesting when they’re not smiling. I won’t say they’re upset; I’ll just say they’re in-between emotions. They could be happy or distraught, who knows? But now that you’ve pointed it out, I’ll have to look into it. 

    This question is for fellow creatives: the whole hobby becoming a work thing, how does it work for you? 

    I’m trying to get back to a place where I did this for fun, but the deeper you go into this business, the harder it gets. My mum is the best cook I know, and I remember asking why she didn’t consider opening a restaurant and she said, “When money and work gets involved, it complicates everything.” I didn’t get it when I was younger, but now that it’s happened to me, I understand what she was saying. Something I did for the love of it has become the thing that provides food on my table.I’m constantly thinking about how to brand ideas and profitably communicate them. 

    I feel you. Looking forward to anything this 2022?

    I have a couple of work projects lined up, but the most important thing for me this year is to take a break. I do this thing where I say I’m taking a break, then somehow I get dragged back in. This time, I’m going to walk away from everything for a substantial amount of time. I have said and done enough, and it’s time to relax before I burnout. 

    I’m rooting for you.

    Conrad Johnson-Omodiagbe

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