We recently connected with Mee Jey and have shared our conversation below.

Mee, looking forward to hearing all of your stories today. We’d love to hear about when you first realized that you wanted to pursue a creative path professionally.

It took me a while to realize I wanted to be a professional artist. It never occurred to me despite having a strong hobby of painting and drawing, and in fact not even after my first solo exhibition of large scale drawings. I made a gradual transition from a hard core research to the profession of a visual artist over 4 years.

I had a rupture in my academic pursuit in 2010. It was the year I completed my Masters Degree in History and Archaeology. This rupture meant I was not in any university, meaning I had nothing to do. I cried my eyes out out of shame, hatred towards myself and my fate. It was this time when my husband brought out my papers and inks and instigated me to draw again. It was my only ‘work’. I painted 18 32×25 inches large drawings by 2012 for my first solo exhibition. I even co-founded a traveling relational art project with my partner in 2013 that became popular among non-artist communities across multiple states of India. I got enrolled again for higher research degree in art history. During my field trips I realized my works were by far better than many many artists I studied and interviewed. Luckily I also sold some of my works at a high price that motivated me to pick up art as my career that brought me more joy and satisfaction than the research part of it. In 2014 I declared to myself and others that I am just an artist: nothing more, nothing less.

Mee, 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?

As an ‘outsider’ in the Indian art world, meaning I had no degree in art or familial lineage either, I was not welcomed into the art community despite multiple media coverages on National and regional channels. I began to understand the deliberate distancing and strict hierarchy between the art as elite & exclusive and the common people as not capable of grasping the intent or expanse of its value. This realization led me to co-found ARTOLOGUE: Art for All. This project inspired from concept of travel and dialogue, began as a barter system between our host family and us. The idea was that we would travel to different parts of India and stay with people and paint a little corner of their house, in return of their hospitality. We documented this creative process on social media where even the host were encouraged to paint their dream-scape with us. This became so popular among the non-art community that we were inundated by invitations from all parts of India to stay with them and paint murals with them.

Prisons, police stations, schools, colleges, school with special need students, rehabilitation centers, orphanage and village communities were some of them. While travel remained an essential aspect of this project, experiencing creative process first hand became the attraction of this project for the host community.
Over past 9 years this project got me two solo exhibitions, an Indian State award and eventually USA’s State Department funded Legislative Fellowship and McDonnell International scholarships in 2017.

Let’s talk about resilience next – do you have a story you can share with us?

In 2016 I was invited to work with a public school in deep rural area. We covered over 30 miles in-roads to a small farm-labor community with barely 20 thatched roof mud houses. The school had 5 brick-cement rooms. That is all. The school premise had a running boundary wall was white washed with lime stone for us to paint on. In this kind of scenario commercial paint and brushes seemed useless given that these kids may never have access to these tools, but they need opportunity to express their creative self. I asked the kids to bring me a pinky-finger thick twigs. They went around and brought sticks. I broke the sticked in about 10 inches long and asked them to chew on one end making it like a bristle/ brush. Meanwhile someone was asked to bring indigo powder which is a local resource. I made a thin paste of indigo and kids painted their whole school premise using twigs and indigo.

This improvisation was important to tell these kids that creativity means looking for means to make things work not relying on same set of knowledge, idea or tools. Creativity requires you to draw inspiration from your limitations and turn your challenges into your tools.

What do you find most rewarding about being a creative?

There are multiple aspects of being an artist or a creative personnel that I find rewarding. The personal aspect is that you are not artist only in your studio but also in your quotidian life. Creativity becomes an approach to life even before we realize it. There is nothing that upsets me more than my failing to experiment. Not even a project that has turned far from my expectation. Each experience is a learning experience. The fear of failure prevents normal people from taking risks. While as artists, we tend to lean in unfamiliar and uncomfortable subject matters, materials, techniques and scale of works.

In the public space when people resonate with my works, I feel deeply satisfied and proud of myself. This feeling multiplies when I work with a community whether in India or in the USA, they request me to prolong the project timing. This simply means that they relate to my process and synergy between us has been achieved. This also assures me that the community will either continue to practice this creative endeavour in future or at least this will remain etched in their mind and soul for years to come and remind them of their individual and collective creative potential.

Contact Info:

• Website: https://www.meejey.com/
• Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/mee_jey/
• Facebook: Mee Jey
• Twitter: @artologue
• Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCQi6pw0HL7iE7m3jAbxSNHA

Image Credits
artist photo: @rjhartbeck All other photos: @artologue