Miki Dare


Miki Dare
Region: Vancouver BC
Generation:
Born Yes, BC

Bio

Where the Stars Rise: Asian Science Fiction & FantasyMiki Dare (Dare is pronounced DAH-RAY in Japanese) lives on the West Coast where she likes to express herself with whatever falls into her hands – from a pen to a paintbrush. She enjoys working with mixed media (from food packaging to fire) and acrylics on canvas to explore issues of identity, personal history, and social realities. Her latest art series is titled Geisha Girl Stereotype Survivor. Her science fiction and fantasy writing can be found in Analog Science Fiction and Fact, Inscription Magazine, Grievous Angel, Tesseracts Twenty: Compostela, and Where the Stars Rise: Asian Science Fiction and Fantasy. To learn more about her work and see what Miki is up to, visit her website at mikidare.com.

Artist Statement

We live in a fast-paced, instant-gratification consumer culture. Like processed food, stereotypical images are consumed and thrown away daily worldwide without a thought. The result is a swirling mass of garbage floating in our media and mental landscape. My work is about picking through this psychic garbage while maintaining a sense of creativity, humour, pride and strength.   Countless images bombard us with messages telling us we are less than – constantly eroding our humanity on so many levels and letting me know my “place” as a woman of Japanese heritage. Stereotypes and institutional “isms” tear away at our human essence and can make folks feel burnt out, broken and something to be thrown away. Sometimes people truly have been and the ghosts of this remain. Graffiti, flames, spilled wax, splattered paint, torn pages and garbage hit the canvas. Find inner peace in the pieces. Be a geisha girl stereotype survivor. We live in a fast-paced, instant-gratification consumer culture. Like processed food, stereotypical images are consumed and thrown away daily worldwide without a thought. The result is a swirling mass of garbage floating in our media and mental landscape. My work is about picking through this psychic garbage while maintaining a sense of creativity, humour, pride and strength. Countless images bombard us with messages telling us we are less than – constantly eroding our humanity on so many levels and letting me know my “place” as a woman of Japanese heritage. Stereotypes and institutional “isms” tear away at our human essence and can make folks feel burnt out, broken and something to be thrown away. Sometimes people truly have been and the ghosts of this remain. Graffiti, flames, spilled wax, splattered paint, torn pages and garbage hit the canvas. Find inner peace in the pieces. Be a geisha girl stereotype survivor.
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