“In the newer work, they just have legs. They don’t really have the gift of arms. Removing arms, I can figure out what can be done without arms, what kinds of commands can be given through other kinds of gestures. There’s still a lot of power left in the body, and I’m trying to see how much I can take out and still retain a powerful or influential core, or one that can tell a story.”
— Laylah Ali

The Artist

Laylah Ali is an incredibly inspiring artist. She has all of the qualities: obsessive compulsive, detail oriented, habitual collector, and a perfectionist. I was in awe of her work when I saw her on PBS’s Art 21. At first glance I was not sure if the two-dimensionality of her work appealed to me, but after viewing each piece and listening to her talk about her approach and methodology I gained a huge amount of respect. The subject matter is mostly dark, but so perfectly elegant in its execution. I love how the characters are so still and stable in their poses. She speaks about how her work has shifted from capturing the moment that the action has taken place, to the moments directly before or directly after the action: “I think when people say the word ‘violence’, oftentimes we think of the violent ‘act.’ In my earlier work it was more about the moment that somebody was getting strangled or hanged, whereas now there’s very little concentration on the moment when violence occurs. I’m more interested in what happens before and after. And the figure is the perpetrator of the violence, the victim, the negotiator. We understand or read violent acts through the characters and the figures.”

Storytelling

The more I ponder the art of storytelling, I begin to record the different kinds of storytelling that exist and what makes them different. In Laylah’s case, she uses one pivotal moment in the story to give you a glimpse into the world and though the characters are sometimes mid-action, the pauses feel natural and not forced. They are silent in a way; and this is something that I think is so important about her work. Violence is so impactful - so intense that sound is usually non-existent. The eyes take control and we absorb what we are seeing more than we are recording what we hear, and even if we are listening there is still a silence present. I find that I lose appreciation for images that highlight the noisy chaotic part of intensity and instead fixate on the images that show the still parts. These are the ones that are truly memorable.

Another aspect of storytelling that the artist uses is repetition. It is interesting to think about what repetition can actually accomplish and in what ways it can be done. Laylah repeats the images of the characters with slight changes in their facial expression and gestures creating a rhythm that looks as if it could continue off the paper and repeat into infinity. BCMPRU (BeeSeeEmmPeeAreYou) is how my 3-D professor explained design principles: Balance, Composition, Emphasis, Pattern, Repetition, Unity. I hear his words echoing in my mind when I look at Laylah’s work because to me, she uses each one of these elements so perfectly to create her story. Her use of repetition would have been a great example to me as a design student to fully grasp how those principles can be tools for artists to change a delivery method to their story, or enhance a series of pieces that tell a story.

Inspiration

One thing that I would love to do would be to collect examples of repetition in art and really see how it is used and how many ways it can influence a theme. I have a few items and images that I have collected over the years that have caught my eye, but maybe I’ll devote some time and make a little folder in my inspiration folder within my design folder (ha hierarchies) called repetition. Hmm, maybe I’ll make one for all the principles!…or maybe I’ll just write in on a post it and bookmark it on my computer and dream about having collections of everything. yep.

Example collection item: