How do you view concrete aesthetic construction and pursuit? You've said you wish your work to be understood in terms of it being beyond physical existence. 

More and more, I come to the conclusion that it’s beyond a personal aspect - that there’s a unified frequency, and we all go through similar experiences. I feel like if you get it, you get it, and if you don’t, you’ve still got it. Once you realize that, you’re merely a vessel to inspire yourself.

Whatever work I’m making is probably a reference point to a visual I’m trying to convey. Even if it’s an auditory piece, I’m really making a film in music. You know, I just didn’t necessarily have the budget to make that film, so instead I’m making music, whatever it may be: patterns, sections. 

How do you approach the reality of an audience when developing your work? How do you view making it public?  

My approach is that there is no approach. 

My life wasn’t broadly accessible. My upbringing wasn’t accessible. My reference points are different. 

It’s for the people that understand the inaccessible. Then, what’s accessible and what isn’t, is merely a projection. If a reference point is understood, people are able to grasp the inaccessible. It’s a choice. Understanding is a choice. 

I believe everyone has an internal power to come to some type of understanding. I feel like it’s a choice not to understand. 

Ultimately, I’m making it for my health, and hopefully it resonates with people who understand that. The important thing is knowing your high point. You can’t come from a lower place - thinking that you’re gonna do anything for anyone. 

If you got to dictate the terms on which your art was discussed, — the vocabulary, the premise of questions — do you think the conversation would be dramatically different? 

Yes, but no. I feel like everything’s up to interpretation. Who am I to tell somebody what they feel viewing my work? 

I feel like so many fellow artists, especially those coming from Detroit - I’ve seen it with some of my favorite people from Detroit -, would succumb to the environment and feel like they have to portray this role or to tone it down, to become colder to themselves. 

There’s so much rawness, and people don’t want their wounds to get infected. 

I feel like the problem with work is that so many people are looking to others for this inspiration and for this safety and comfort when they need to realize that what they’re seeing in these people is a reflection. And without that, there’s nothing. Look at your reflection first, and then maybe it'll make more sense when you look at other people's work.

How do you approach coming to as true of a meaning as you can in your work? 

I feel it occurs once I stop trying to give answers to myself, because that's where it stems from - your internal self first. People are so focused on what everyone else is doing that they get lost in the mist. 

There’s never one specific thing. My upbringing was very unorthodox. What I represent or what I look like - what I remind people of - might not necessarily be what is expected of someone from where I come from. My reference points were very different to the people I grew up around even though we were all in the same box. 

I realized, like, hey, look in that corner; look at that shadow in the corner; there’s something interesting about that shadow. And everybody’s looking at you crazy, and you realize no one else sees it. So, then, maybe I need to attend to it. I’m seeing my own shadow, I’m seeing myself..