We’re excited to introduce you to the always interesting and insightful Tyra Johnson. We hope you’ll enjoy our conversation with Tyra below.

Tyra, looking forward to hearing all of your stories today. What was the most important lesson/experience you had in a job that has helped you in your creative career?

Assume positive intent. If my old boss happens to be reading this (hi Shana!), she’s either smiling with pride or laughing at how stubborn 21-year-old me was! It’s such a simple point but goes so far. The short story is, I was fresh out of college and I interpreted an e-mail from a coworker to be much more than it was and reacted in a pretty passive aggressive way. Essentially, I raised a non-issue to my manager at the time who had been working with this person for years. She pointed out that our communication styles were just different and I needed to not read that far into it.

A part of our company culture was to always assume positive intent in all interactions. (I hadn’t been through this training yet and was quickly added to the next session). It’s so easy to turn an interaction into something it isn’t. Going into every situation with the base assumption that no one is intentionally trying to offend, argue, or slight you, is the first step in avoiding conflict and miscommunication. From there, seek to understand instead of seeking to be correct (my parents taught me that one) and you can navigate most tricky conversations in business and in life.

As I progressed to managing others in corporate spaces and within my business, it’s become a phrase I use all the time. It’s just a perspective shift that creates space to think without emotion crowding judgement. It also allows for people to have a bad day. We’re all going to say things with a tone at one point or another, and I just take the stance that someone’s bad day or less than ideal attitude has nothing to do with me and move forward!

Tyra, love having you share your insights with us. Before we ask you more questions, maybe you can take a moment to introduce yourself to our readers who might have missed our earlier conversations?

I’m an interdisciplinary artist, meaning I combine mediums. For example, I’m working on an exhibition now that combines sculpture with audio, and my “Construct” series combined sculpture and poetry. My goal is to create art that truly moves people by taking them out of their day-to-day. One of the ways to do this effectively is to engage more than one sensory system. The more I create a temporary “bubble” to view my work in, the more effectively I can get my point across.

My work is influenced heavily by adobe architecture and the topography of places I’ve been. Different angles actually look like you’re moving through a landscape while the overall meaning is driven by human experiences. I’ve always been fascinated by how we’re tied to earth and wanted to communicate my experiences in a way that shows my connection to nature.

The other half of my business revolves around functional art and design that mirrors my sculpture style – lamps, chairs, incense holders, I’ll be releasing a small collection later this year!

Learning and unlearning are both critical parts of growth – can you share a story of a time when you had to unlearn a lesson?

The most important lesson I had to unlearn is a little contradictory. I had to stop asking for advice so often. What I mean by that is, I had to start trusting my gut. As creatives, we naturally second guess ourselves. So when it came to deciding what direction I wanted to take my business in and settling into my style as an artist, I had to learn to turn inwards. So much advice for artists revolves around “see what sells” or “see if people engage with it”. Which in reality, isn’t great advice for someone starting out who may not have an audience or have found their voice. We should be guided by the message we want to send with our work, at least at the beginning. Once I started to anchor around what I know is best for me, there was a night and day difference in the quality of my work and people received it well. I just had to learn to listen to myself.

Have you ever had to pivot?

On a related note, the big pivot was my style of work. When I started professionally showing and selling work, my primary medium was mixed media painting. I had gotten so much advice to “pick a lane”, “stay consistent”, etc. Which led to me making art that was technically sound but unfulfilling. So I started working on sculpture in the background. I spent 3 years on trial and error, making art for arts sake, and one day it clicked.

It became so wildly clear to me what direction I wanted to go in. That combined with a busy season for painting commissions pushed me to pivot. I spent another 8 months working on sculptures and not painting a single thing and I didn’t even miss it. I luckily had a full time job, so I didn’t worry about selling anything for almost an entire year. I knew it would come across as “out of nowhere” but I was so frustrated that I just said “might as well try”.

It was amazing. I never thought the work would be received so well. It felt like opportunities started presenting themselves to me as a sign to keep going. The irony is, painting bought me the time to experiment with sculpture without needing to think twice about who liked it. I didn’t even share with my friends and family. I wouldn’t do it any differently. As much as I wish I would’ve gained some clarity early on, I don’t think I was mentally in a space where I would’ve conceived the ideas driving my creative practice today.

Contact Info:

• Website: https://www.tyrajstudio.com/
• Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/just.tyraj/
• Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCLKEmajI1HxhtUAb7GcFSlw