We recently connected with Nancy X. Valentine and have shared our conversation below.

Nancy X. , thanks for joining us, excited to have you contributing your stories and insights. One of our favorite things to hear about is stories around the nicest thing someone has done for someone else – what’s the nicest thing someone has ever done for you?

The kindest thing anyone has ever done for me was allow me to sign a lease with an artist loft before I identified as an Artist.

In December of 2015, I was living in my hometown of rural Fergus Falls (pop. 14,119) and working in retail as a supervisor for the local Herberger’s department store. Less than two years prior I had graduated from the University of Minnesota Duluth with a Bachelor’s degree in Communication with a minor in Writing Studies unsure of ‘what I wanted to do when I grew up.” I spent a year and a half trying out different jobs through various companies in hopes that something might stick.

At the time, I was renting this adorable one bedroom apartment above one of the downtown businesses. To say it was tiny would be an understatement, but it felt like home and I loved it.

One Saturday night I was folding laundry when I heard a knock on the door. I answered it and a stranger greeted me asking if “so and so” was home.” I explained that no one by that name resided there and the stranger left. The next morning I locked up and headed out to attend a church service with my mother. When I returned to get ready for a shift at Herberger’s, I unlocked the door and headed to the kitchen. To my surprise and extreme fright, that same stranger from the night before was standing in my kitchen next to the sink.

Flight, fight or freeze…I went into fight. I started yelling at the stranger screaming at him to get out while also aggressively asking how he got it. Thankfully, his response was to take flight and I watched him run out of the building, down the metal outdoor staircase and turn around the corner. In that moment, any feelings of safety in that space were stolen and I knew I would need to seek housing elsewhere.

At the time, I was only 23 years old, fresh out of college with little-to-no credit and even less financial literacy having been raised in a first generation immigrant household. Every single apartment I applied to turned me away because I had “no credit or co-signer,” which I found to be infuriating because it felt like I was being punished for working so hard to be financially independent while pay my bills on time using money I earned rather than borrowed from a credit card.

Almost a month into my housing hunt, I saw a posting for an open apartment in the Kaddatz Artist Lofts in downtown Fergus Falls. I applied, and to my surprise, the building manager called to invite me to tour the space and interview me as a candidate for tenancy. After we went through the usual questions, she finally asked “what is your artistic practice?” When I explained that I had always been creatively inclined, but was not a vocational artist she explained that I was ineligible to live in the lofts if I was not an “Artist.” She then followed up by asking “if you’re not an Artist, why did you apply to live here?” I shared my reasons for being unable to feel safe in my previous apartment and her response surprised me. She listened deeply and responded with a very similar story of her own. She knew what it was like to feel unsafe in one’s own home and extended her compassion to me by granting me this conditional offer: “I will let you live in the open artist loft so long as you pick a medium and dedicate yourself to – no co-signer needed.”

I signed the lease that day and drove immediately to a local big box store to purchase the medium I could afford at the time: Crayola watercolor and Canson watercolor paper. I started to self-teach watercolor painting the week I moved in and have never stopped.

By allowing me to move into the Kaddatz Artist Lofts, this building manager not only granted me a safe and secure living space, but also the environment and conditions I needed to step into my artistic practice and launch my creative career as a visual artist. This was the kindest thing anyone has ever done for me.

Awesome – so before we get into the rest of our questions, can you briefly introduce yourself to our readers.

I am a Chinese American artist living and making a life in rural Otter Tail County, Minnesota.

Conceived as the second child of a family residing in Lanzhou, Gansu during the era of China’s ‘One Child Policy,’ my mother immigrated to Minnesota, USA in 1992 to gift me, her daughter, the opportunity of life.

Though often referred to as “the creative kid” throughout my lifetime, it wasn’t until 2016 that I officially launched my creative career.

With natural artistic inclination, self-determination and children’s craft-quality watercolor supplies as the only tools in my bag, I signed a lease with the Kaddatz Artist Lofts where I self-taught and began to pursue painting. In the spring of 2017, I was awarded a Career Development Grant from the Lakes Region Arts Council which allowed me the means to acquire professional grade materials and the freedom to create with conviction.

I views her artistry as a channel to deepen my cultural connections to and between my Chinese heritage and Midwestern roots. My creative process begins and ends with intention, resulting in conceptually complex visual stories woven with nuance and symbolism. My expressive stylized brushwork is inspired by Chinese calligraphy and meant to evoke empathy.

I believe that artistry and advocacy work in tandem and I live out this value by creating contemporary Chinese scroll paintings and sharing that work throughout rural regions. In May 2021, I created “The Audacity to be Asian in Rural America: we owe you no apologies,” a series of 12 watercolor and Chinese ink scroll paintings on rice paper depicting the animals of the Chinese Zodiac that visually tells the story of the Hao family’s ( -my mom’s side- ) Chinese American immigrant experience in rural West Central Minnesota, as a part of Artists Respond: Equitable Rural Futures, a project of Springboard for the Arts supported by the Blandin Foundation.

For you, what’s the most rewarding aspect of being a creative?

For me, the most rewarding aspect of being an artist is that I get to connect with folks who resonate with my values or perspective through my creations.

Though I have learned how to move through social spaces with some ease, I am, at my root, an introvert. “Networking” is not an activity I enjoy, and finding folks who I align with aren’t easily found in my immediate geographical community.

Art-making allows me to work-out and express my ideas, values, philosophies, and experiences in a way that “attracts my people.” I love the act of creating – the flow state – and the freedom I feel after finishing something that allowed me to process nuanced complexities I’ve been pondering.

By putting these artworks out into the world, I am both sharing my expressions and inviting folks to engage with me. My art does the “networking” for me – sifting out those who do not resonate with it – affording me more energy to exchange with those who do.

What’s a lesson you had to unlearn and what’s the backstory?

As a first generation Chinese American, there are many lessons I’ve had to unlearn in order to evolve as an Artist. One of these lessons is that I should be meek and never voice my true opinion.

Growing up in a rural midwestern city in the 90’s meant that much of the community I was raised in did not reflect the color of my skin, nor the culture of my household. I learned very quickly that the best way to feel acceptance in school was to mute my opinions and assimilate to American culture.

Though this meekness allowed me to survive mostly unnoticed throughout my school years, it has not served me in adulthood, nor my artistry.

I am a neurodiverse individual who thinks about things deeply and the art I make reflects that. The first few years of my creative career, I created work from that posture of meekness and it was limiting. Fear of whether or not the folks around me would like what I was making limited my courage to create complex or meaningful paintings.

It wasn’t until I witnessed an increase in anti-Asian discrimination and hate during the COVID-19 pandemic that I was activated in a way that forced me to shed my fear and move through this world more boldly. With the broader AAPI community vibrating with fear, I was moved to make “The Audacity to be Asian in Rural America: we owe you no apologies” a series that could only be created once I shed the meek and let my heart be heard.

Since that series, I see any polarization over my artwork as proof of its power and impact. It encourage me to keep creating work that’s true to me.

Contact Info:

• Website: www.nancyxvalentine.com
• Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/nancyxvalentine/
• Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/nancyxvalentine
• Linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/in/nancyxvalentine/
• Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/@nancyxvalentine/

Image Credits
All photographs captured by Nancy X. Valentine