A Quote by Mickalene Thomas

I've always been interested in masking, layering, dressing up and beautifying yourself and what that meant to black women. I've always wanted to make things that I haven't seen before.
My first experiences with fashion were dressing up. It was always about fantasy for me. Dressing up as characters . . . I always thought that's what clothes were - that they would make you into the person you wanted to be. I'm an actress, so I love to act, and I think that's one of the most important things - the thing that makes you feel like another person.
I've never been interested in dressing one woman. What's interested me was to have a philosophy. It hasn't been important to put a woman in a blue dress. I wanted to dress women who wanted to look at themselves. To stand out. To be women who were not part of the crowd. A woman who fights and advances.
I always loved reading. I always was the spelling bee champion. I always loved words. I always wanted to know what they meant, why you used them, who first said them. I was always interested in that.
I was always quite good at fixing and working with cars. My dad's always dealt cars, and I've always been brought up around them. They're one of the things I've always been interested in.
I've always been interested in the news, but I've always been interested in what's popular. I've always had a little bit of a populist take on things. Which I know is interesting when you talk about Donald Trump.
I wanted a real profession. And I'd always been interested in architecture and in design and in, really, what makes things work. And understanding what's kind of behind the walls and why things stand up and some things don't.
I embrace my darker skin - always have, always will. In addition, I believe black women have always been trailblazers and trendsetters. Acknowledgement or not, we are and always have been beautiful.
I always wanted to do creative things, but I was really interested in entrepreneurship. My family comes from a very entrepreneurial culture, so business was always something I was interested in.
Quite frankly, black folks have always been at the core of what it's meant to make this nation human.
We wanted to make movies back in college before Rooster Teeth. Our roots have always been in feature filmmaking, and we've always wanted to go back to it.
I've always been a bit of a drama queen. I was into make-believe and dressing up.
Beauty has always been an ?element of discussion for black women, whether or not we were the ones having the conversation?. Out of necessity, black women have always had to consider others' perceptions of a certain beauty ideal, just starting with the skin color.
There are many things that black women can continue to do to help black folk. First, black women have historically been among the most vocal advocates for equality in our community. We must take full advantage of such courage by continuing to combat the sexism in our communities. Black women, whether in church, or hip-hop, don't receive their just due. Second, when black women are in charge of child-rearing, they must make ever so sure to raise black children who respect both men and women, and who root out the malevolent beliefs about women that shatter our culture.
Even when I was Miss World, I did all the dressing up I could, so the pretty face thing was done. But it was never about just looking pretty with the crown, I always wanted to make it more than that - I wanted to make it about beauty with a purpose. So I carried that into my films as well.
Most executives are male, so it's always sort of their vision of stuff. I'm constantly fighting against that even when I play the wife or the girlfriend or the best friend. I always try my hardest to bring as much layering in and not make things stereotypical, but it's hard.
I absolutely love what I do. And I want to dance for as long as I can and feel good about what I'm putting out there on the stage. But my goal has always been to be a principal dancer with ABT. Before I knew that there had never been a black woman, that was always my goal. I wanted to dance Odette-Odile and Kitri and "Don Quixote" and Aurora in "Sleeping Beauty." So that's still my goal. But knowing that it's never been done before, I think makes me fight even harder.
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