Mary Ellen Pleasant Painting

I'm an Oakland, CA based painter and hair stylist, the latter of which provided the supports and independence to cultivate my art over the last 25 years. Music, politics and people are integral aspects to my work. Music elicits powerful visuals, politics and social issues offer opportunities to challenge and illuminate, and people's faces are multi-colored landscapes etched in a tangle of emotion and experience. My goal is to offer substance and context that bring people closer to real issues that affect us all. I regularly feature people of color, and my hope is to empower those who feel marginalized or somehow short-changed. I grew up amid the tumultuous 1970s in south central Los Angeles. Luckily, with excellent grades and scholarships, I attended UC Berkeley in 1981 for Fine Art, studying under the renowned ceramic innovator Peter Voulkos. However, due to a period of disillusionment, both politically and artistically, I dropped art completely for eight years. Upon my return in 1989, I dove in with a renewed appetite to explore past my limits. I even built an art studio and gallery inside my hair salon. At 40, I matriculated in a commercial art school, thinking to become a 3D illustrator. But it didn't take long to discover where I felt most at home, in 2D illustration and portraiture.