Quote

When I wouldn't leave home without my blue contacts or when I was bleaching my hair, I didn't have the language to articulate that I was trying to assimilate to whiteness. If anything, I was trying to look normal.

Vivek Shraya

Change background

T
T
T

Change font

TAGS & TOPICS

Vivek Shraya
Anything
Blue
Look
Normal
Without
Wouldn
Bleaching
Looks
Hair
Assimilate
Trying
Leave
Contacts
Language
Whiteness
Didn
Articulate
Home
Contact

More quotes by Vivek Shraya

Image
I tend to focus less on genre as a starting point and more on idea or intention and let the idea dictate genre.
Vivek Shraya
Image
Despite the fact that I'm not highly skilled in any visual art, aesthetics have always played a strong role in my art, including my first albums.
Vivek Shraya
Image
I am more likely to get paid for my art if it's presented alongside a white artist, so the questions around value and agency arise: What choices should I make, or do I have to make, if I want to be compensated for my work? Why isn't my art valued on its own?
Vivek Shraya
Image
I especially worry about the ways Canadians can be glib about our supposed difference from the US in our acceptance of diversity.
Vivek Shraya
Image
My intention was never to write a trans novel - which is perhaps an effective strategy for writing a trans novel.
Vivek Shraya
Image
Writing about racism requires a directness that writing a love story does not.
Vivek Shraya
Image
I would love to see more dialogue around the responsibilities of art consumers - how can audiences better financially support artists we love, artists who are doing the work, so that artists have a more solid foundation upon which to make art?
Vivek Shraya
Image
I used singing as a safety measure. I would pay attention to what songs the popular girls liked, learn those songs from the radio or library cassettes, and then accidentally sing or hum these songs in class. This would impress the girls, who would then defend me from the boys.
Vivek Shraya
Image
When I was writing, I wanted every word to be not only deliberate, but musical. Precious.
Vivek Shraya
Image
Should I be collaborating with artists of color solely because of their race and my politics? This question is weighted with my own worry that I have been invited to speak or collaborate solely because of my race, and not because of my abilities.
Vivek Shraya
Image
I feel like I have had to catch up to the art I've made, and learn from the protagonists I have written, especially in relation to gender.
Vivek Shraya
Image
Making music has been connected to one of my greatest heartaches, because my own music has never quite connected with audiences. But it was this heartache that pushed me to explore other artistic avenues, like writing and filmmaking, and I ultimately feel most at home in a multidisciplinary environment.
Vivek Shraya
Image
My interest in language is steadfast, but I think each project and its accompanying intentions dictate how language must be used.
Vivek Shraya
Image
I worry about what Trump will inspire in Canada, especially given incidents that have already occurred here since the election.
Vivek Shraya
Image
Children are receptive to talking about gender creativity, confirming the importance of the book as a means to instigate this dialogue at an early age.
Vivek Shraya
Image
I couldn't write about love without writing about hate - specifically, how the experience of hatred embeds itself in the body and prevents love from entering or leaving.
Vivek Shraya
Image
I have been and continue to be committed to art as a tool to ignite, comfort, and discomfort.
Vivek Shraya
Image
It's exciting to consider how art, in its ability to reveal, can be ahead of the artist.
Vivek Shraya
Image
I always work with text orally in the writing process, saying passages aloud to measure flow.
Vivek Shraya
Image
As a person of color, I know race can't be stripped from admiration or preference.
Vivek Shraya