00:00The past about 13 or 14 years, I've been traveling to New Orleans with some of my closest friends, family, and loved ones.
00:15For Essence Festival, we laugh and call it the homecoming of the black girl magic.
00:19Being a woman of color, we're taught to turn down our magic to fit into certain rooms.
00:25But at Essence Fest, there is no ceiling here, right? We're all having a good time.
00:29And it's important to know that you're fly, you're beautiful, you're exactly who you need to be.
00:34And me telling another sister that might just give her the extra push to go back home and make her live loud and proud.
00:53I've been to New Orleans countless times. I've never been during Essence.
00:57The best part is, like, literally walking down the street and pass all these black women and it's all love.
01:04Like, yes! Like, yes!
01:06If black girl magic were a place, it would be Essence Festival.
01:09Oh, absolutely. This is headquarters.
01:10Like, this is it. This is it. This is headquarters for it.
01:12I always say, without representation, you're left seeking validation.
01:16We need representation, whether it's in a muralist, whether it's—
01:21Yep, absolutely.
01:22You do a lot, girlfriend, first of all.
01:23She's got a lot of slashes.
01:24A pilot.
01:25A lot of slashes.
01:26An artist.
01:27Right, I'm everyone.
01:28Some of the slashes.
01:29Some of the slashes.
01:30I'm interested in traveling the world and flying and scuba diving.
01:33Yeah, I did.
01:34I grew up loving the outdoors.
01:36And I said, you know what?
01:37I'm going to learn how to fly airplanes so I can take myself to places around the world.
01:41We're examples in our community.
01:43And so the fact that people can see us and they want to follow our path, that makes me feel amazing.
01:48And it makes me proud to be in a room like this.
01:50And essentially I draw.
01:51You know, I do the most basic thing that we all do and did do as children.
01:55But at some point I didn't stop doing it.
01:58I continue to do it.
01:59And hopefully that's something that I can use to inspire other people.
02:02I just want to say that was so beautiful because we think that we have to stop doing things that we love or that we're passionate about.
02:09Yeah.
02:10Because the world gets to us.
02:11I think what's so amazing is that when I walk into spaces like this, I feel like I belong.
02:15My biggest accomplishment has been to look into the audience and see somebody say, I think I can do what she can do.
02:19That's my goal.
02:20Like no matter who I paint, I want a black woman or any person, any woman to like identify as that person.
02:28Yes.
02:29Like, oh, that's me up there.
02:30Exactly.
02:31The fact that I get to paint women like yourselves all over the world from here to Ghana in the most beautiful way possible.
02:39Like I paint us how I want the world to see us and how I want the world to treat us.
02:44As an entrepreneur and as an artist, I get to be loud and proud every single day.
02:49But, you know, being loud and proud gives other people the baton to be themselves.
02:53Yeah, it's kind of similar, you know, what you just said.
02:55It's like if I'm on stage or if I'm doing my show, then that's when I'm loud.
02:59I'm doing something that is so, so, so simple, but it can have a profound impact on everyone.
03:05I didn't know that we were so vast and different.
03:09And when you come to a place like Essence Festival, you see all of our colors.
03:13You see all of our personalities and I love it.
03:16I think walking away each Essence Festival, I take a little bit of encouragement, but I feel like I've gotten the ability to do more.
03:24I've been inspired to do some of the other things and have the guts to really, really run full speed ahead towards what I want.
03:30That's what I want.
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