BIOGRAPHY

I'm a multi-disciplinary artist with a specialty as a Singer/Songwriting, Fashion, Creative Director and most recently Playwright.  It is important for me to express myself, particularly through a creative outlet because that is a core part of what makes me feel whole, balanced, healthy and making art is how I document history and culture for myself and as a contributor to my people, community and culture.

artist statement

In terms of musical style, writing and influences, I sing in the styles of alternative, trip hop, soul and soft rock but would like to experiment more with electronic music. I love listening to artists like Lauren Hill, Erykah Badu, Sia, Adele, Banks, Jessie Ware.  The high and rush from creating meaningful is what motivates me as an artist; telling my story, being able to create with good people, produce music with a deep artistic voice/vision where I feel reflected is a strong sense of style that listeners can easily connect to while pushing and challenging my capabilities.

 Goals

I struggle with finding momentum and prioritizing time to do work that is my very own. As a young person I have learned that the world was not created to shine light on stories like mine, that my art was always an outlier to the mainstream. I embrace and am challenged in that notion. I am an organizer so first and foremost, I am constantly in a mode of organizing and carving out a platform so that my art and art from my community has a platform to share it in the first place. By the time I get thinking about what my art could be on that platform, I am too exhausted to create.  What will help my professional development is to have access to a group of like-talented peers to encourage and hold me accountable will be helpful, yet scary and challenging while setting goals.

CONTACT

• email: oskarly@gmail.com