Life, Values & Legacy: Our Chat with Jasmine Azor of New York

We recently had the chance to connect with Jasmine Azor and have shared our conversation below.

Hi Jasmine, thank you for taking the time to reflect back on your journey with us. I think our readers are in for a real treat. There is so much we can all learn from each other and so thank you again for opening up with us. Let’s get into it: What are you being called to do now, that you may have been afraid of before?
Currently I am enrolling back into school to get my degree. I’m a college drop out. I tried to go back in 2014 and ended up dropping out again. This time at my big age I feel like I’m ready to take it seriously. I’m not so distracted. My frontal lobe cortex is developed haha

Can you briefly introduce yourself and share what makes you or your brand unique?
My artist name is Jasmine Nichole Art. Jasmine represents my Cancerian emotional sensitive energy. Nichole is the duality of my middle name and Scorpio rising and homage to my mother whose name is nichole and is a Scorpio Sun. Lastly there is Art. My last name does start with an A but I go by art publicly because it’s my lineage. It’s my essence. My thought pattern and breath. It’s what I associate myself with every being to. And I can gladly say it’s my Aquarius moon that contributes to what you all see within my expressions.

Now that that’s all said. I’m Jasmine Nichole art, a self taught multidisciplinary Creatrix. I work mostly in digital/fine art, poetry, fashion design, modeling/content creation, creative direction and a slew of other creative areas.

I started creating art from before I can remember… my worlds were very split so to be honest I wouldn’t say I was able to thrive creatively where I was as I wanted. I grew up in my mothers household and family… and unfortunately I was the only artist and creative on that side… and in my fathers household, while my father was a music producer himself and had creative ties in the family, my older sister Bebe were pretty much the only creatives.
I didn’t really take any art classes outside of what is required in school. And I wasn’t some kind of artistic prodigy. I wanted to be a fashion designer and so styling and creating my own wardrobe was my expression. My personality and social skills was what pushed me forward artistically. Everyone knew what I wanted to be because it exuded me and I pretty much told anyone who wanted to listen lol
But anywho by the time I graduated HS and enrolled into my first year of college where I actually learned how to use a sewing machine and had to really garment construct I disliked it. And I realized what I truly love was the drawing, the imagining and creation of my own worlds and expression. And so fashion was out the window and fine art came crashing into my world. I’d already dropped out of college and now had to teach myself how to be a fine artist. Drawing, portraiture, acrylics, oils, mixed media, etc… over the next 10 years I would find a way to cultivate all of that into the woman I am and artist I am now.
Nowadays I’ve found a door way to incorporate all that I do. Fashion, modeling, fine art, content creation etc all into one place. And those are the get ready with me/outfit reveal videos you see all over my socials.

Amazing, so let’s take a moment to go back in time. What part of you has served its purpose and must now be released?
The part of me that’s served its purpose was the part that constantly felt she needed to mother and develop everyone. The one who needed to save and sacrifice herself for the betterment of everyone else around her. I’ve had… or better yet I was forced to relinquish her. Forced to kill her off. Forced to die and be reborn into someone who now has better discernment and knows when and where to place her energy. Do I stumble sometimes. Yes. But I’m mentally more clear now about my role in this present journey and how I need to navigate it.

When did you stop hiding your pain and start using it as power?
Hmm 🤔 I can’t say I’ve ever hid my pain. To be honest that’s exactly what I’ve built my entire existence on: exposing my paints thoughts hurts and vulnerabilities. My art my poems my captions and statuses. It’s all my pains. I build my identity on you can’t hurt me with the information I choose to release, you can only hurt me with what I covet or hide in secret. I am the soul that wants to show the world that pain is as much a part of life as laughter excitement and joy. It’s like light and darkness. The two exist and two sides of the same coin. You can’t have one without the other. And I believe that why I grew so fast on social media all those years ago was because I internally knew that those pains and hurts and vulnerabilities once alchemized into art was fuel for me and transformed into my power.

So a lot of these questions go deep, but if you are open to it, we’ve got a few more questions that we’d love to get your take on. Is the public version of you the real you?
Yes and no. The public me is more optimistic and sweet and genuinely compassionate. I thrive in the energy of people. I come alive.
But what people don’t see is that I need and seek validation that I am a good person constantly. Maybe it’s a past life thing and maybe I wasn’t a good person. But in this life I’m constantly seeking approval that I am who I say I am. I’m always trying to prove to myself that I am valuable. And tbh I don’t show that as much as I should. Not because I’m embarrassed but because I truly don’t know how to. This is actually the first time I’m even putting it into words. And as I type this my brain is trying to process how to explain it or transform it into art.
I’m also a lot more sarcastic in real life the people around me would say I’m rude. I’m a New Yorker first let’s just say that lol my environment raised me ¯\_(ツ)_/¯

Before we go, we’d love to hear your thoughts on some longer-run, legacy type questions. What pain do you resist facing directly?
For a long time my late grandfathers voicemails… I just listened to them 2 days ago for the first time. I avoid looking at his photos or hearing his voice. Losing him was a very traumatic experience and there was and still is a lot of guilt surrounding that time for me. I wish I had more time. I wish I did this or said that etc etc… and because of that I’ve just avoided him spiritually. We all grieve differently and I had a lot of loss during that time. Mourning family members, friends, relationships and even myself. All at once. I haven’t gone public with it all and it’s because I’m still ashamed of all the pain, the person I was, everything that happened. I’m still trying to understand my role in everything over the past 5 years and I avoid it because I don’t like that woman. I don’t know that woman. I don’t understand that woman. And so it is easier to kind of just shut that door sometimes…

Contact Info:

Image Credits
The only piece not taken by me would be the green and yellow lit portrait that was taken by @popphotography in Miami, FL

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