We were lucky to catch up with Veralyn Wen recently and have shared our conversation below.

Alright, Veralyn thanks for taking the time to share your stories and insights with us today. Let’s start with a story that highlights an important way in which your brand diverges from the industry standard.

As a business owner and curator, a lot of my business practice comes from learning from my community and that’s not any different from others but in the sense of art and art theory, implementing ways for art to become viable career paths is super necessary for the future. I lean a lot into my friends and what they’re creating, I pay attention to art theory and philosophies that occur and reoccur. With that, the new chapter of business for me starts with shows and pop-up exhibitions. This is my way of writing myself and others into history.

Veralyn, 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 Veralyn Wen, founder of Blk Absurdity, an art firm where we put artists on! Since we’re in the early stages of development, a lot of our work is on the ground, seeking out artists and work to showcase to others while also allowing artists room to grow! with our shows, stay on the look out by following @veralynwen on instagram! Come support and bring your friends out, this is a movement.

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

One lesson I really had to unlearn was the idea of success being linear and saying yes to everything. I’m still in college for context, but there was a point where every semester for the first two years, I was apart of some sort of program for entrepreneurship and I was beginning to get really good at playing the game of “build a company from the ground up in x amount of time”, but impact has proven to be something not confined by the restraints of timelines. I started realizing that my purpose with Blk Absurdity had been alive in me since I was a kid. Art and business is a marriage that, in some, works very well, but it doesn’t come naturally to every artist, but with B. A. it can and it has.

How about pivoting – can you share the story of a time you’ve had to pivot?

My first company was called Azoula, it was a doula service business and it had a lot of positive feedback and reviews. my issue with it came when I started to receive more and more funding for it. To be given an investment in support of a business that I didn’t feel connected to, I’m not a mother and I had no intention of becoming a birth-worker, that business was really heavy on my heart and I needed to figure out a smart exit for it. So after some time (a lot of time) I dissolved it and gave the concept over to a well-known doula that had the passion and capacity to drive that vision foreword. The saying “if you don’t do it someone else will” is very true and often is taken to mean something sour but every vision that is planted into one person inevitably pours into the next, that is how impact is created and I’m all for impact.

Contact Info:

• Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/veralynwen/

Image Credits
Jalen Turner , Jahni Lane-Foster