Jason Perry Interview

[Background music fades out with interview start.]
Jason Perry: My name is Jason Perry and I was introduced to painting, drawing and poetry, just through trying to stay focused on life. My art found me in the ghetto. It found me in Compton, California, and throughout the sirens and the gunshots, you know, I stayed on my easel. I stayed drawing, you know. At this particular time it wasn't anything productive, but it was something that I needed to get out of my system, so it's like a coping mechanism. 
My style of art comes from a place, you know, of pain, suffering, love, motivation, anything that's inspiring, you know? It bellows inside of me and starts to come up and I come up with these creative ideas and I have to get them out so either I write about them, I draw, or I paint.
I would say my style is kind of like a cultural style. I don't want to put myself in a box and say it's ÒBlack Art,Ó you know, but, it's the kind of style that's edgy. It makes the viewer want to find out more about what I went through or what does this piece actually mean? So, you know, I try to use my talent to spark conversations about whatÕs going on today.
I've captured liberation through my art by being able to free myself. Sometimes, you know, in art, you can say so much without saying a word. You know? The image itself is enough. I paint liberation the way I see it. You know, my liberation may be different from someone else's and my liberation, it seems like it's always at odds with this nation, you know? 
So, I take my talent and I use that blank space that's on that canvas or that piece of paper and I liberate myself with that, because that's all I've had for so long. Is just that. So whenever I start a project, before I even put the brush to the canvas, I already see the finished product. ItÕs done, because I already see the pain or the thing that inspired me. I already see that emotion complete so the only thing I have to do is transfer it. 
I want to show people, through my art, that because I'm different doesn't mean that I'm a threat to you or doesn't mean that I don't like you or anything like that, you know what I'm saying? Art is such a good conversation starter that you try to put the things in the piece necessary to propel us forward, but people are easily distracted and sometimes, you know, with most things, it, sometimes, it gets lost in translation. That's why I made the statement earlier of ÒBlack ArtÓ you know? Because I'm an African American and I do art, that doesn't mean all my art is Black. 
I also try to stay away from the things that make people afraid of us, man. And it's sad that I have to do that in order to get people to understand me, because before people can understand my art, they have to understand me and most people won't give me the time of day, just because of the way I look. So they're missing something there.
What I try to do is I try to infuse my pain with these pieces that won't cause people who don't look like me to shy away from what they're seeing. To understand my liberation, you have to understand me because everything in my pieces, they come from a place of pain, suffering, of motivation, love, something like that. 
[Music fades in and then plays to the end of video.]
Jason Perry: If people see my art, I believe that they'll see my fight.