LEAH BRIEVA
Exploring identity through multimedia art compositions.
Basement: How would you describe yourself as an artist?
Leah: I have grown to have a very strong sense of self, and it is definitely important for me to communicate my identity, style, and experience in my art. I am very reflective and my work tends to have narrative themes that are communicated with visuals that are often more illustrative and graphic. I think my use of color, shape, and mark making is usually what makes my style of art stand out as my own. My work is usually focused on my experiences and sharing narratives that are often not discussed.
Healing bebe Leah, 24”x30”, oil on canvas
Basement: What narratives do you hope come across with your pieces? Leah: In most of my work I am communicating my experiences as a young woman of color, navigating identity, issues with mental health, among other things. While I am really just sharing my own narrative, I know it is an underrepresented one that a lot of people can identify with, and it is a hope of mine that some folks can see themselves represented in my work.
Basement: What inspires you and your art?
Leah: I definitely pull a lot from my own experiences, primarily my experiences with the navigation of both identity and emotion. Art has allowed me to both work through things I might have trouble processing in other formats and communicate things I might have trouble sharing in other formats. Often I am just trying to create whatever piece I need to create in order to understand something more reflectively or communicate something I need to get off my chest. But of course, other times inspiration strikes when I am just trying to have fun with a piece and experiment with new techniques and styles. So, my thematic inspiration sources primarily from my own experiences, and my visual inspiration can come from anywhere really, but mostly just from my own personal style and what I like to see. If you boil it down, my inspiration for art really just comes from however I feel like I need to express myself that day.
Basement: Your work has evolved over time into such a distinct style- what has been your journey to refining your style and technique?
Leah: My style started to become a lot more defined once I brought my own experiences and narrative into it. When I began to know myself and my identities better, it started to show through in my work.
(I definitely think before that shift happened, my art just didn’t have a lot of voice in it, and it wasn’t really me at all, which makes sense because I didn’t even have a sense of who I was yet.)
Basement: You’re currently working on a comic book- tell me a little bit about that project!
Leah: Even though my style has changed a lot over time and taken on so many different looks before I found my current voice, I think that my style has always been pretty illustrative. The way I approach a drawing is really character driven and narrative driven, and I think somehow this relates to the fact that often times I am more drawn to stylistic figures. I took the Cartooning class at ETHS during my sophomore year, and after that I just had a small teeny lil shadow of a thought at the back of my head wanting to make a comic. Anyway, the comic I am making is a space adventure/love story about two girls of color fallin in love and navigating their superpowers. I definitely had a huge lack of representation of my identities growing up, (and there’s still not a lot nowadays,) so being able to tell a story centered around these underrepresented narratives is another thing that really makes me excited about this project!
10, digital collage, 2020
Basement: Has growing up in the Chicagoland area influenced your art and experiences as an artist?
Leah: I think it has in a lot of ways I can’t recognize, but there are two things that first come to mind. Growing up in Evanston has definitely had an influence on the development of my identity, and I think if I lived anywhere else and my sense of self had stunted or grown in any other way, my art and my approach to art would be wildly different. The other thing that I immediately thought of was teachers- Mr. Heite and Ms. Seibold are two teachers that are super important to me specifically in relation to art. If I lived anywhere else I wouldn’t have had these teachers guiding me. Mr. Heite was my kindergarten teacher and he was really intentional about nurturing art in the classroom. He taught us about art history and really gave us every opportunity to incorporate art in our learning. Ms. Seibold is my AP Studio Art teacher and I have had her for two other art classes during high school. She’s super supportive and really just knows how to guide each of her individual students in a way that is best for them. She is always teaching new techniques and constantly pushes me to be better. Anyway, I would be a very different artist if I hadn’t had these teachers, and I wouldn’t have been able to have them if I didn’t live in Evanston.
Basement: What is unique about being an artist in this generation?
Leah: The internet is the first thing that sticks out to me because social media has had a huge influence on my experience as an artist. It has provided me a platform for me to share my art and gain more exposure than I’d have without the internet. It has given me more control over the presentation of my work and how I represent myself as an artist. And it has also given me the opportunity to connect with other artists and visions that aren’t included in some of the more exclusive places art is exhibited.
Obviously social media can foster a lot of negative effects, but these are some of the positives that have helped me become a more confident, empowered artist. Yeah.
