Black Bird Community Spotlight
An ongoing series spotlighting the creative community of Black Bird, including the artists who showcase their art on the walls in the shop’s rotating art show. All words and photography is my own.
Sai Li: Tattoo Artist
Sai Li was born and raised in mainland China. With growing tensions between the United States and China, she said, she often finds herself struggling with her identity, oscillating between feeling “ashamed” of her country of origin and feeling proud of China’s rich history and culture.
Recently, she has started to face this feeling of disconnection and uncertainty. “Perhaps this in-between space is where I truly belong. Perhaps I don’t need to choose a side. Perhaps art-making can help illuminate what feels too difficult to face.”
Fogged Mirror explores the gap between the past and the present and the loss of identity post-immigration. It asks: “What do you see when the mirror is fogged? Is that you? Or are you still trying to figure that out yourself? Is it still your hometown; your home country, when you became a tourist to it? Is the land in which you speak your second language your home now? Do you belong to one of them, to both of them, or to the gap in between them?”
“For me, art making has always been about brutal honesty, vulnerability, and confronting my deepest fears, sorrows, struggles, and moments of joy.”
Mel Waters: Acrylic Painter
Mel Waters is a Black and Filipino Artist whose current works explore and celebrate street life and culture around San Francisco, focusing primarily on Black, Brown and Asian communities.
Mel was born in San Francisco, and has stayed long enough to witness the effects of the wealth gap and the decline of certain populations. His paintings are filled with nostalgia for the past, as well as storytelling for the communities of the present.
“This body of work represents the connection I feel to this city and the Bay Area culturally, through the lens of what I remember seeing as a kid in the 80s and 90s”
