Tina Tona

0:08 Hi everyone, my name is Tina Toneruda Singua. I am a collage artist and a graphic designer from Los Angeles and the DMV. Uh, first I'd like to address something that isn't art related only because it's a question I get a lot of the time. Uh, the TA in Tina Tana is actually my middle name. Uh my parents abbreviated the Kenya word Mutona which loosely translates to the favored one. Uh standing on this stage today I'm starting to feel like I'm living up to the name a little bit. Uh thank you so much. It's nice that for inviting me to speak amongst all these incredible artists, designers, and creatives. I'm sincerely honored and a little bit

0:50 baffled to be here and super excited to say what I can about my art. Uh when I reflect on my creative journey, I reflect on all the little moments that intuitively guided me to be the artist I am today. Um that was baby me. Uh so physically my family grew up all over the place. Uh we went from Rwanda to Berkeley, California and then to Ontario and then to Maryland and then to Los Angeles and then whoever I don't know what happens after today. Uh but mentally as a little kid I had a similar spirit of exploration. Um I fantasized about being everything from a geologist to a fashion designer to a doctor to a

1:31 choreographer to a pop star and more. Um it wasn't until 2013 when I was in middle school that I discovered Rookie Magazine. Um this was a online publication started by 12-year-old Tavy Gson. It was ran by teenage girls and it was for teenage girls and it was extremely empowering at the time for me to see the quality of photography and writing and illustration all coming from people who were the same age as me and also doing it with mostly limited resources DIY. I was really obsessed with the aesthetic and the output of Ricky Mag from the age of 13 to 18 that I submitted really terrible photos taken on my mother's digital camera at least

2:15 twice a year with no success at all. Um, but when I'd see the submissions that were accepted and published each month, I was in such awe and adoration of their work that I could never be too upset about the rejection for long. Um, the summer that I discovered Rookie, uh, my sister brought home a book by Dan Elden that I quickly became obsessed with. Uh, it was called The Journey is the Destination, and it was an in-depth biography of the late photojournalist Dan Elden. It included scans from his scrapbooks, which included photos of his friends and family in Kenya. All his photos were decorated with paint and glued materials and things that he found around his house, like food packaging and plane tickets and receipts and, etc.

2:58 Stylistically, I was really enchanted by this work. Uh, but his ethos became a northstar to me. I remember when I was in high school, I watched Steve Lacy do a talk um about his, you know, process and he talked about the bare maximum or rather doing the most you can with the least amount of materials. And I realized in that moment that's what Dan Elden kind of introduced me to.

3:22 And so through him, I was influenced to take my own photos and also use the materials around me to express myself creatively. I didn't have the money as a teenager to get into any of the mediums I was really attracted to like music and film and photography. So I metabolized all my interests into collage art. I started with my father's magazines. Uh so Newsweek, Times, Forbes, and etc. As I started making collages a little bit more consistently, my friends and family would give me their magazines knowing they would going they would be going to a far happier home. And so in my art, I used movie tickets and I used hair product labels, the gold foil that you

4:02 find at the top of like Nutella lids, uh, yarn and flyers. And it felt like the world was slowly becoming my art store. So discovering Rookie and Dan Elden jumpstarted that affinity for DIY aesthetics and kissiness and reflecting my love for my world and my community in my art. Um, in 2018 I started college and that same fall I was finally published in Rookie magazine.

4:30 It was a selection of scans from my sketchbook I kept throughout high school showcasing film photos of my friends with and family with some of my most precious memories. again decorated with acrylics and ephemera. This was my first time ever being published nonetheless by the magazine that basically raised me.

4:49 And while I was studying film and TV production at the time, this was the first of many occasions where I felt like my intuition was trying to guide me somewhere else. Um, almost anyone you ask would pinpoint CO 19 as kind of like a turning point in their life. Uh, in that period of isolation, I learned a lot about myself.

5:08 I took a year off of school and in that time I was an art director for Crybaby Zen and I was just making like a lot a lot of art in my free time and sharing it to social media a bunch. I had a very post like nobody's watching mentality and soon enough I found out that people were watching. Uh during this time I got my first edi ed editorial commission with the New York Times and um this was the second time I felt the calling that my intuition was trying to guide me somewhere else and this time I answered and I changed my major and it was a really big leap of faith at the time but it felt like my year off was organically dedicated to art. So why not dedicate

5:49 the rest of my life to it? And so the projects and commissions I've had an opportunity to work with since such as Partle and Vogue uh The Atlantic, Teen Vogue, Wired, Columbia Records have kind of fed into that hope as well. Uh when I started making my collages, the prospect of a process would have baffled me. Uh because it was and it still is a little bit of a like spiritual experience. Every piece has warranted its own process. Almost a year ago, I talked to it's nice that and when I was asked about process, I literally drew a blank. Since I've tried to be a little bit more present as I create so I

6:30 can articulate it better for myself, honestly, and also for y'all. I've broken my process into three phases. And so, the first one is obsession and curiosity. Basically, knowing yourself. This is my favorite phase and one that is literally in constant action and even when I'm not working on any particular project, it's still going. I've been obsessed with pop culture since I was a kid. Um, with music videos kind of being my introduction to visual culture. The more I learned, the more I realized music videos were really the first place that black artists could freely explore diverse themes and aesthetics through fashion and music and cinematography and design. I also just really love art and

7:13 design. I'm sure you all do, too. Um, I'm constantly collecting books and magazines and zenes and albums and ephemera. I've made a point to practice personal curation and tracking my own taste and affinities through various channels. When I entered at Dreamhouse LA, the concept of a north star was something that came up a lot. And so that inspired an arena channel with the title Northstar where I drop all my past and current fixations that have driven my creative work. Things like Outcast Bob music video um that introduced me to the very sugary and saturated world of afroofuturism.

7:50 Uh the artist Melain Thomas who showed me the power of materials and dignity uh in African sign painting and how that shaped my perspective of who can decide what good or real design is. uh very jinzy of me, but I also have a fina with an astounding audience of 25 followers where I'm constantly posting things I've researched for fun and that interest me and that I'm organically drawn to. Uh whenever I scroll down, I feel like I'm witnessing a very slow progressive construction of visual identity.

8:23 And so phase one is a constant subconscious force. Phase two is a little bit more intentional. I'd say this phase is curation and intuition um or otherwise blacking out. This is the hardest phase to define and I call it blacking out because it's also a little bit it's it's the most immersive. It's also the most tactile. It includes tangentially doing intentional intensive um image research and allowing myself to choose what feels right based off of the intuitive muscle that I've built. In my personal practice, at times I'll sift through magazines and I, depending on how I'm feeling or what song I'm listening to, I'll cut out a bunch of

9:05 images, and by the end of it, I'll see that there's a very clear narrative in front of me. Um, the phase also includes collecting drafts, making numerous iterations of something, sending sketches, and applying feedback, and engaging in a lot of play and learning how to trust myself. Um, so right after this phase is phase three, the leg work. By this time, by the time I get to this phase, I'm done with all the cerebral and esoteric parts of creation, and it's time to get my hands dirty or sticky. Um, it's the refining process, uh, the construction of the thing that existed only in my head and mood boards for so long. I consider this one the most relaxing

9:48 and cathartic phase because I get to use my hands and the stress of creating something out of thin air no longer exists. It's a it's the synthesis of all the phases in one concrete thing. Um, a lot of my process is deeply rooted in my origins as a collage artist, but I found it useful to while I'm exploring other mediums.

10:10 Inner child playdate was a product of an internship I did with Dreamhouse. If you remember 9 minutes ago, I was telling you guys about how I came into art through resourcefulness using materials around me because I didn't have the means for anything else. Um, it's a little bit cliche, but I believe that art has changed my life and I wanted to make something that empowered others to create since I know what it's done for me. Inner child playdate was a rizograph printed scene and it included collage kits and coloring pages and activities all rooted in connecting you to the child inside that used art to learn that used art to play and that used art to express.

10:51 Um, another thing I've been working on a result of as a as a result of these different phases is applying my history to collage to animation. Uh, this was born out of curiosity and also reflecting how much I love music videos, if I haven't mentioned that already, and had this need to metabolize that obsession, I started to feel like there were certain things that static art couldn't express that I personally love.

11:15 And so, out of that was born these little collage animations. Um, since sharing these, I've had the opportunity to make a few for Vogue during Valentine's Day. They sent me a brief for their astrology themed love story series. um in February and gave me creative control to create a few motion graphics to accompany each story. I was also commissioned to create these animations to be used as stage visuals for the musician Samaras Sin to be used in a Rolling Stone concert as well as a few festival shows in Europe.

11:49 Um, my creative journey is con my creative journey is constantly shapeshifting and as you can all see, I'm not sure what happens after this, but if there's one thing I've learned, it's that the journey is a little bit more important than the destination. Thank you.