Today we’d like to introduce you to Ashley Miah.
Hi Ashley, it’s an honor to have you on the platform. Thanks for taking the time to share your story with us – to start maybe you can share some of your backstories with our readers.
I’ve always known that my passion was in the art field, and as a career path often referred to as “limited” it’s safe to believe that art chose me.
As a female artist of color, there are limited opportunities and knowledge of how to pursue a career path in the arts. Holding a BFA in Fine Arts, my experience throughout my art education provided a scope of knowledge in art history and personal development as an artist in skill and purpose, but limited career opportunities to the oversaturated fields of art education itself and graphic design. As an aspiring artist, you don’t learn how to pursue being an artist as a career path in current-day society. As a product of an urban environment, I wanted to develop a resource for minority and other underrepresented artists and creatives to gain exposure as I sought those opportunities for myself. During the last year of my degree, I began explaining the concept of creating something “for the culture” to a close friend who is also an artist and identified with the concept. This one conversation sparked the concept and development of The Culture Candy, an urban arts organization that creates opportunities for underrepresented artists.
Everyone starts somewhere, and our somewhere was hosting outdoor art galas and markets during the pandemic. Utilizing the need for outdoor events during this time, we created opportunities for artists and communities to connect throughout New York City and gained an audience of artists that we refer to as our “collective”. In creating opportunities for myself, I was able to network and build a community of artists who were ready to put themselves and their work out there. Pursuing my individual art career as I developed my company was (and is) no walk in the park, but I found that as (I) Lee Lee La Cubana developed as an artist, more opportunities opened up for The Culture Candy and the collective.
Now, our collective is not just limited to New York City and includes artists in other major cities like Atlanta, Miami, and Los Angeles. As things shifted to allow indoor activities during the pandemic, we grew from showing outdoors to hosting large pop-up events, to curating for businesses and facilities in major areas all showcasing underrepresented artists. As an artist, I worked my way through the circuit as well, showcasing at pop-ups, galleries, and in major restaurants and facilities like hotels and health clubs throughout New York City. As we grew, so did our team at The Culture Candy. We are now an all-minority-woman-owned business and want our artists, and visual artists in general, to be celebrated and receive the same recognition as those in other creative fields such as actors and musicians. A step in this process was creating NYC Art Week in June 2022, which will be accompanied by an art fair and convention called heART Con in coming years. As a small minority-owned business, despite the challenges that arose and we will continue to be faced with from some museums and foundations on conceptual development and ownership of the concept, we continue to push back and fight for underrepresented artists to be showcased and receive an equal amount of opportunities in the art world. The creation of this concept, my individual work as an artist, and my community work with The Culture Candy positioned me to receive the honor of being one of Crain’s 20 in their 20s along with the attention of other publications, affirming that my journey is headed in the right direction.
We all face challenges, but looking back would you describe it as a relatively smooth road?
Since the pandemic, we’ve seen a lot of entrepreneurs and public figures discuss the importance of prioritizing rest and allowing opportunities to come to you, but there is a stage before that in which you have to work to create a space for your business or talent to attract those opportunities. As an entrepreneur, burnout is no stranger, yet pushing yourself to work and expand your business to create and seize opportunities for yourself is a must in the beginning stages. Work-life balance is something I’ve struggled (and continue to struggle) with, but I accept that it comes with the territory in the early stages of entrepreneurship. I have found ways to overlap my artistic and social lives, by utilizing art outings for social media content, visiting galleries and partnered locations during social outings, and making genuine connections in the art scene that make work obligations and making appearances fun.
Thanks – so what else should our readers know about your work and what you’re currently focused on?
As an artist, I create acrylic paintings and mixed media work that captures parts of my personal journey through the lens of pop art. While some may identify with or pursue pop art for accessible iconic imagery, I like to think of my work as Purposeful Pop Art.
Born and raised in (The L.E.S.) an urban New York City neighborhood prior to gentrification, many of my subjects play on 90’s pop and urban New York City culture, along with combining pop culture references and spirituality. This collaboration of ideas explores my upbringing in the ’90s to early millennium in urban New York City, and my family’s Afro-Cuban roots of Santeria in Spirituality. There are themes of using nostalgia to provoke the feeling of valuable experiences and connection throughout my work. Using pop-culture references and memories from my experience, I create contemporary pop-art pieces that represent a memory to me but also provoke a memory or feeling for the viewer. It is like having a conversation with the viewer, connecting our individual experiences through nostalgic response to imagery. There is a sense of freedom in compositional choices in my work because as a pop artist I am able to place images together in a collage-like sense that are reflective of me personally. Although I am known as Lee Lee La Cubana, I am of mixed race in which my Mother is Black, Cuban and Chinese and my Father is Puerto Rican and Bangladeshi. Not belonging to or identifying with one solid group, I am able to collage references that make up my personal experience to relate to the viewers of my work. There has always been a notion of having to “prove” my belonging to each of my genetic groups in which I do not speak Spanish and I look Spanish but identify with the Black heritage passed along through my mother’s values and traditions. I create works that reflect my geographic upbringing of an urban environment, hip-hop culture, or communal references because anyone from either of my cultural backgrounds can connect with the work and therefore myself, through experience and identifying with what those references provoke in themselves. Being from an urban socio-economic background, I have found richness in experiences and cultural references that are now often appropriated and locations with rich urban history that have been gentrified. These are themes I continue to explore in this phase of my work, making my art representative of my personal journey and relatable to those with similar experiences. Serving as a reminder of internal riches, my art signature is the diamond and aims to spread reminders of internal wealth in my current collection.
What does success mean to you?
The definition of success varies based on each person, and whether they conform to the pressures of society’s definition of what success is supposed to look like. For me, success is pursuing or achieving in the direction of something you’re passionate about or doing what makes you happy. You can have a successful family life, be successful in your field whether that’s at a company or in having your own business, successful in “making it out”, or healing yourself and achieving peace, it really is personal to you as an individual.
Contact Info:
- Website: leeleelacubana.com
- Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/leeleelacubana/
- Other: theculturecandy.com
