This week I had the opportunity to meet with Taidora, an aspiring artist and photographer at Rowan University . In 2019 she decided to turn her doodles into paintings and came to realize that painting is her passion. Taidora always saw herself as owning her own business and being her own boss and with her new found talent she plans to do just that. She now has her own small painting business Vtatelaya where she paints custom acrylic paintings for her buyers. We sat down and talked about what inspires her paintings, why she paints, and how she had the opportunity to paint a portrait of a well known celebrity.
Tell me a little about yourself.
“My name is Taidora. I’m from Irvington New Jersey, my major major is Business Management. My talent is Art I do acrylic painting and I’ve been doing it fully and consistently for about a year. “
What inspired you to begin your painting journey? When did you began taking your talent seriously?
“This is interesting question just because I would always doodle when I was little and I was always a visionary learner, so everything and how I would be taught would be through pictures. It just was always something that I just did but never took serious until recently. A little over a year I actually took it seriously because people wanted to buy some of the things I made for fun, so I was like okay and then I started getting orders and I was like hmm i’m starting to get money so let me start doing this and investing into it. That’s how it all started.”
What are themes/style you enjoy painting ?
What are some of your favorite things about art?
“My favorite things about art is just simply the ability to create something that someone has never seen before also, I just love the conversation and the people that you know comes around that realm. Usually when you’re an artist you talk to other people who possibly do music your fully emergence into the creative world and you really really that that’s everything and that everyone cares about entertainment and visuals. So that’s my absolute favorite thing is just that it is everything.”
What are somethings you dislike about art?
“I’ve never been asked this question, things I dislike would be the consistency factor you wanna remain consistent to still be relevant however, one of my biggest struggles is putting out the same energy and intention to each of my pieces and still being consistent. Right now i’m going through a break because nothing is coming to mind, like essentially what you would call writers block. That’s the thing I dislike because if your not on top of your toes you will be forgotten but, you kind of need sometime to yourself to put out the same quality pieces.
Can you tell me the story about how you got to paint a portrait for FatBoy?
Click hear to listen to the story about how she painted a portrait for Fatboy
How would you say you art has changed overtime?
“My art definitely has changed DRASTICALLY ,it definitely changed mainly because of my mental how I viewed it definitely changed because I took it more serious. When I took it a lot more serious I was a lot more patient with it and I hyper focused on details. Now I care more about crispness, cleanness, and precision more so than before I cared more about idea and creative aspect. Now being that i’m more comfortable with the creative aspects and stuff like that now it’s just all about keeping my work consistent and clean. You can see that difference now if you were to compare what I did last month to last year.”
Tell me about a piece you’ve painted that related to your real life?
“One of my first large pieces it was a 30 by 40, and a little small little background abut me I was raised by a single dad and I have my brother. So i’m just use to having black men in my life so I wanted to do a piece dedicated to black men. “
Listen to Taidora talk about what prompted her to paint this piece.
What is your next big project that you want to do?
“My next big thing , taking like huge leap I want to do piece for a very nice hotel. I would love to… it doesn’t even have to be particularly a hotel I just want a larger company to see something in my art that they would want implement in their business. So it could be a car dealership it could be anything in that realm, but I think that what I need to have as my next step because you know doing art and commissioning and things like is fun but I think working with other companies and stuff like that would really signify to me that I made it. Because anybody can say I want this but to have it be something that is originally mine and companies are interested in that , that’s what I really want. “
Rowan's Got Talent 