I have so much music that I do. Just like how a visual artist is always sketching something but they might not share it, I'm always writing songs or coming up with melodic lines on piano or guitar. It's therapy. It's always happening.
My style is a little masculine, and what I loved about Pyer Moss was how well he can make a blazer, the looseness of those pants, or color palette that he chooses from season to season.
It's just that little box in the middle of Fort Greene, Brooklyn. Most of the time I go I don't even leave that apartment. I have just enough: a little bed, a little kitchen with two pots. I make some tea and I look out the window or just lay down.
I don't want to think too much about how I'm carving and what I'm carving - you are just carving away the excess clay and there's a piece underneath there. And it's kind of like getting out of the way. Maybe that's what the commonality is: It's getting out of the way so that the art can speak.
I remember when I signed with Kedar Entertainment through Universal Records. It was my first record deal and it's the one I still have now. At that time, there had been a couple of opportunities I was almost given, but at the last minute the giver came back and told me it couldn't happen.
It's almost like a lot of black people in America, a lot of young black men, are born with this cloud over their heads. It's their penitentiary cloud, this philosophy we all have, that it's harder for us.
What I like about houses like Givenchy. It's easy to pull from. With Givenchy you can accessorize to build anything, any look.
I don't have any particular thing I do ritualistically. I do the same thing every day. I get up. Drink a lot of water. Have a wheatgrass shot. Drink some green juice. Eat as healthy as I can.
Now my record deal helps me to do things for free or give more time to my community than I could otherwise.
I've had two children. I've had three boyfriends. I've had a lot of things happen that can change your opinions and values and philosophies.
I relate to that - he inspires me across the board. His music inspires me and reminds me to maintain honesty in the things that I do, to have an absence of fear. Listening to Earl Sweatshirt's music is like therapy to me.
The girls just like to be in the shoes. They like to scuff up the floors and walk around in high-heeled shoes that are too big for them, all over the house.
My third mother is my paternal grandmother. Her name is Viola. She gave me my sense of knowing why, or knowing why it was important to ask why. She made me understand that I don't have to believe everything I hear.
My favorite jewelry, it's just what I'm feeling at the time.
But now I realize that this record business really needs me. No one else is trying to take a chance or do something different.
I love putting the music together. It's like art
I'm a performance artist first; I'm a recording artist second.
I have an organization called BLIND [Beautiful Love Incorporated Nonprofit Development], so named because even though my interest is in the black community, because that's where I grew up and that's where I'm most skilled in fixing things, it doesn't end there.
I thought it was cool how [ Riccardo Tisci] wanted to blend Africa and Asia because they relate to each other in so many different ways.
I think we [with Riccardo Tisci] share a sensibility about art - we pull from the ancient future.
I think giving is a blind act that should come from a part of me that sees no discrimination (that's why I called it "blind").
I feel like I haven't done anything. What have I done? I've just made a few records.
I don't know if I'll ever accomplish most of my dreams - I have so many.
I just love expressing my joy and my mind through what I wear, or how I cook, or how I dance, or how I write or perform a song - how I move.
I think that when Riccardo Tisci wanted to bring more attention to the lack of African American presence on the runway, he also wanted to bring attention to the lack of a sensibility of African and Asian art.
