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

Jency, appreciate you joining us today. What’s been the most meaningful project you’ve worked on?

The last few and the next series are all about me getting vulnerable with myself and the audience. Working through body dysmorphia and breaking cultural expectation of being a “good” South Asian woman in society. My She is series, depicts multiple women in different sizes and tones to remind myself and. others that our bodies are right where they need to be, fighting for us to survive in this patriarchal society. That regardless of size and skin tone, we are beautiful.

Jency, before we move on to more of these sorts of questions, can you take some time to bring our readers up to speed on you and what you do?

I am a multimedia artist and epidemiologist based in NYC and I have been creating since childhood, but I began honing my skills in art in college. Art for me started as a way for studying, being a visual learner, illustrating helped me digest my classes better. After some time, art really began to be a tool for me to find my identity as a first generation Indian American. Being raised as a child of immigrants (and eldest daughter) I had to wear many hats and standards to uphold, I found art to be a way to become my true self. As my identity evolves, my art practice evolved from only printmaking to combining many different mediums together. My newest pieces incorporate relief carving on wood, embroidery, beads, and old indian fabrics. All of my work focuses on my Indian American background as well as my art and science career. With a woman in each image to fight societal norms and embrace the multiplicity of identities. The women always posed in with confidence in their body either in nude or in Indowestern clothing. The background of my pieces typically have beakers, amino acids, and other organic compounds representing thoughts and feelings that I am preparing to release as well as embracing the both/ands. The ability to accept that there are muliple truths in our journey possible at the same time.  Every piece I create calls to action important conversation such as colorism, racism, sexism, body positivity, and autonomy. My goal as an artist is to motivate change and conversations for change within the community.

2023 has been a wonderful year to me and I look forward to what 2024 has in store. I had completed my first art residency, my first solo show in NYC, thriving with The Culture Candy collective, and joining Atlantic Gallery as an artist. None of this wouldn’t have been possible without an uplifting and supportive community and having my art coach push me (shout out to Terri Frohman). This has motivated me to keep evolving in my work push myself to be active in my art practice pushing boundaries to uplift voice for people of color.

Is there a particular goal or mission driving your creative journey?

I don’t know if this is a particular goal or mission for the creative journey, but I always want my work to start or be part of the tough conversations about resilience, colorism, racism and other societal norms that have impacted children of immigrants or anyone that has experienced these issues. My work tackles societal and cultural issues within the South Asian culture, and I hope with the work that I create, I can also become my truest self and become comfortable within my own identity and skin and motivate others to do the same.

What can society do to ensure an environment that’s helpful to artists and creatives?

Support living artists! Even if you can’t buy their piece, follow them on social media, go to their show opening, share their work with others. Art in any medium should be more incorporated in education, work, and daily life. With many people that digest information through art, there should be more funding in art. See art as a career path, not just a hobby. Without art, there would be so much missed in life, art is revolutionary.

Contact Info:

• Website: www.artbyjency.com
• Instagram: instagram.com/art_by_jency_15il
• Other: tiktok: Artbyjency15il

Image Credits
Sahiti Yarakala