We were lucky to catch up with Waladi Ali recently and have shared our conversation below.

Waladi, thanks for taking the time to share your stories with us today We’d love to have you retell us the story behind how you came up with the idea for your business, I think our audience would really enjoy hearing the backstory.

Yes, I’ve always loved creating artwork ever since I could remember. At one point in my youth, copying artwork on TV, from cartoons to anime, I loved storytelling and beautiful colors. When I came home from college in 2022 to officially starting my business I had to reflect. It took me until about 2024 to really put into words what we were really doing, besides just selling art. The answer that came back to me was storytelling. Not in a traditional, enclosed way though, more so giving those we serve the opportunity to tell the story they have within them. Whether it was “taboo” or “forbidden” for them to tell it, we aimed to create a space through resonating images that empower them to say what they have to say with confidence and share their voice with the world. That’s how we felt we were solving a problem no one else was solving. Some businesses create very beautiful works of art, and at one point so did we. But that’s where it typically stopped, and it felt a bit selfish to not have a reason for other people to care and or benefit from what we were doing.

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

My name is Waladi Ali. I am the CEO of “WBA Art LLC”, a business dedicated to giving our audience of creatives the opportunity to tell their story through artwork. Whether it be original artwork we create for them, create with them, or show them how to create, we want to give creatives the tools to tell their story with confidence. 2025 has been quite the year for us, completing over 10-20+ events, selling lots of artworks, books, custom art services, and even leading storytelling classes. We’ve been blessed to meet a wide variety of individuals that remind us that the work we do is relevant and important. If anyone viewing our business’ goods and or services for the first time learn anything or have a one sentence takeaway, it’s that, “Your story matters more than you think, and more than others know”.

We’d love to hear the story of how you built up your social media audience?

Our current social media audience on Instagram @ida_law is currently at 2.8k followers, and our Tiktok @ida_law is around 2.3k followers. Very modest for pages that started out as my personal pages and still have personal remnants of a time long evolved. Tiktok was very interesting as our initial goal in late 2022 was to surpass 1000 followers to have the capability to place the link to our website in the bio. So, we began to use viral sounds to make videos relating to business owners and artists. It was fun, and at the time we still uploaded original artwork and timelapses so people could see more of our work. We eventually did surpass 1000 followers, and we can confidently say, unlike Instagram, we don’t know everyone that has followed our Tiktok. Our content and algorithm as more global reach on that side I’ll say. Instagram, however, is more intimate, as it gained more traction during our time in college, since everyone there was an entrepreneur and needed art, or just enjoyed our work. The same formula has been used since then in present day, though has spiked this year with the advent of events we’ve participated at and creatives wanting to keep up with us, to learn more ways to tell their story. We’re blessed and look forward to all of the people we haven’t had the pleasure to meet yet.

Any stories or insights that might help us understand how you’ve built such a strong reputation?

Currently, we feel it is the background stories behind our work, the ability for the messages to be digested, the interactive portions of our work, and command strips in our art prints. It truly is astonishing the amount of people that have thanked us for putting command strips in our packaging, as if it was a revolutionary concept. Back to our comics and art overall though, the topics we delve into are relatable to our audience of mostly adults even older than I, and those around my age group. Real life things that affect everyone, even with majority African American representation within our work. People still see themselves in the story, and are always asked without fail, “What do you have to say about this?” or “What do you think?” and “How do you relate?”. Hopefully these answers are close enough to how our audience and community views us within the current market we inhabit.

Contact Info:

• Website: https://wbaart.com
• Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/ida_law/
• Linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/in/waladi-ali-15289419a/

Image Credits

Courthney Russell