Welcome!

Drea Jay is a visual artist and poet who currently resides in a West Oakland art-house she helped revitalize. A survivor of extreme childhood trauma, art was her escape and freedom for as long as she can remember. Her artwork delves into surrealism mixed with abstraction, while she utilizes radical expressionism to heal trauma. Art is a process-orientated practice for her steeped in meditation, a deep understanding of how color affects the human psyche, and ultimately aspiring to embrace and articulate the unknown.
A considerable portion of her work is mixed-media utilizing acrylic, watercolor, oil, and digital mediums while appropriating textile, found objects and sculptural work. Her use of varied materials reflects her passion as a life-long learner, on a constant search for new philosophies, scientific discoveries, and visual tools to communicate in an accessible manner esoteric concepts.

To Drea, elitism in art is a toxic concept and she believes detrimental to humanity as a whole.
Her inspirations as artists are just as varied: Frida Kahlo, Gustav Klimt, Vincent Van Gogh, Edward Gorey, Salvador Dali, Edo Period Prints, and a variety of Religious or Spiritual Art practices from a myriad of cultures.

The core of her process is to synthesize such distinctive visual languages to find commonalities and harmonies for them to coexist. If wildly different concepts can coexist harmoniously in a work of art, then there is a certainty to her they can coexist peacefully in reality.

View more work at: www.trashempress.com