We caught up with the brilliant and insightful Farida Mazlan a few weeks ago and have shared our conversation below.

Farida, appreciate you joining us today. We’d love to hear about a project that you’ve worked on that’s meant a lot to you.

My partner and I started Destroy Art as a way to support and nurture the artists we love – the Elders, our friends, and the upcoming underground artists who find it hard to be represented in the ungiving art world. Through this effort, we connected with some obscure heroes of punk art and design, one of which is John Yates (artist name: Stealworks).

John Yates has over 200 pages on Discogs of his contribution to the art and design world, and one day he sent us a design he recreated for an alternate Black Panther Party logo. We decided to reach out to any original members of the Black Panther Party still working in Oakland (home of the BPP), and found some Elders who immediately commended us for asking consent, and our want to support their livelihoods.

Fast forward to a few months later, as we developed an entire apparel line to support the Black Panther Party Alumni Legacy Network (BPPALN), Shepard Fairey reached out to us after purchasing one of our designs, and offered to remix a portrait he made of BPP co-founder Bobby Seale as a donation to our initiative. We produced a limited edition run of prints with a local
punk rock printer, and raised enough funds to support the Elders and their projects for an entire year!

This meant the world to us as through our punk roots, we were able to give back to some pioneers of a real revolution in the history of civil rights, and now are honored to feel a familial bond with the Panther Elders as we continue to aid their work in educating, and improving living conditions for various communities in the Bay Area.

As always, we appreciate you sharing your insights and we’ve got a few more questions for you, but before we get to all of that can you take a minute to introduce yourself and give our readers some of your back background and context?

I’m Farida Mazlan, the co-founder and curator of Destroy Art, an international punk rock art management agency, and platform for punk and underground art. We recently partnered with famed collage artist Winston Smith to open a physical community art space Fallout SF, located in the counterculture neighborhood of North Beach, San Francisco.

I attended various art schools and colleges in my home country (Malaysia), but felt restricted by highly rigid rules of expression which led me to leave the country at 25 years old to begin traveling, and working in various creative sectors in non-profit organizations and art /music festivals throughout Asia and Europe. I eventually became certified in Art Writing, Independent Curating and attended Art Business classes, but kept returning to California for various projects, eventually meeting my partner who aligned with our love for punk rock, art, and working with other like-minded creatives.

With Destroy Art, we provide a platform for representing, supporting and empowering the DIY punk and underground artist community through exhibition-making, collaborative art strategies, and custom designed manufacturing of prints, clothing and merchandise. Since our conception in 2020, we have grown to support close to 40 different artists, self-published 2 art magazines, 2 books and host a multitude of events, exhibitions, workshops and film screenings at our art space in San Francisco.

We are proud to create an all-inclusive space and opportunities for underground artists that struggle to find ample representation or support, and provide an educational approach to the many facets of punk culture, expressions and activism.

We’d love to hear a story of resilience from your journey.

Like many other full-time creatives, I grew up in an environment that was not particularly encouraging for a career in art, with teachers condemning my experimental methods of creating artwork, and a rather disinterested yet somewhat supportive family that had me carve my own path as a creative. After being told in art school that I should ‘go to the West as anarchist artists cannot thrive here’, I began traveling and found ways to support my artist friends through organizing art galleries in music festivals in over 15 countries, but struggled much through years of unbalanced, abusive business partnerships.

This lead me to return to my home country and begin managing a successful contemporary art gallery for 3 years, experiencing great displacement and loss again through a damaging relationship with an irresponsible, absent director. I felt the comfort of purpose through working in the fine art representation sector, and went back out to the world to work my way to continue studying Art Business and Curating to build back my confidence and assurance to better support my peers.

Despite any successes or failures, I think the pursuit for knowledge and growth does not ever stop, and I plan for my next certification to be in International Art Law, while I continue working within artistic communities to keep contributing to the expansion of the underground art scene.

Do you think there is something that non-creatives might struggle to understand about your journey as a creative? Maybe you can shed some light?

The journey to become a successful creative is generally a very non-linear process, with plenty of pivots and more trials and errors than usual, to discover what works, what’s honest and truthful, and then finding the balance between skill, passion and profit. Dealing with art is often the selling of ideas – it appeals to a human’s innermost feelings and intrinsic sense of beauty or belonging – it’s not an easy career path to choose and survive in.

Many renown artists are still struggling to be seen, heard and supported, and this journey is one to be respected. Fulfillment comes not just from financial and material success (although it really helps!) but the given chance to help people connect with themselves and one other is reason enough to keep creating in a cycle that keeps on giving.

Contact Info:

• Website: destroyartinc.com
• Instagram: destroyartinc

Image Credits
Photo Credits – Michael Hrushka, Fotomusiq, Melanie Goodman-Dante, Destroy Art