Suleika Jaouad

felt like a sacred kind of transformation.

The second I write something down, especially something that feels heavy, it lightens.

I can see it differently.

I can examine it.

I externalize it from my body onto the page.

I had no artistic training.

My mom is a visual artist.

And growing up, she taught art classes in the attic of our house, which was her studio.

And so I would go there after school and mess around with whatever tools were available to me.

But beyond that, I had no visual art training.

But one thing I always really appreciated about my mom and that she reminded me of when I was in the hospital is, you know, especially with watercolor, you can't control the movements.

You're in collaboration with the pigment and the water and you have to let it flow and bloom and bleed and you don't have control, much like in life.

Yeah.

And sometimes I'd paint something and I'd say, this is a mess.

I'm going to throw it out.

And my mom would always say to me, no, the mess is actually where the energy is.

Keep moving into that.

There's no such thing as a mess.

That's usually where something interesting is happening.

And so she was a great art teacher, not just to me.