A visual artist with a gypsy heart and revolutionary mind, DOPE SWAN visual arts curator Lichiban Szatmari talks with Sallomé Hralima about what she sees blooming around the world and how a soundtrack for her art would sound.

What are your most frequent “daydreams and nightvisions”?
I dream through the earlier part of the day, literally, and stay up drawing all night until my eyes hurt and I start to see colors vibrating in space. (She laughs.) But seriously, my most creative period of the day is between 10pm–5am, so I normally work until very late. Most of the city is asleep. While I’m working on some image, I often wonder who else is up doing something creative. I love the solitariness of the night. It is great for self-reflection and soul-searching. Painting is a form of meditation for me, a kind of spiritual exercise. So I would say my nightvisions are my drawings and paintings that I give birth to at night. They are visions that keep me sane. I daydream of a lifestyle where I can do art 24/7 and not have to work at a job that is not directly related to this.

What would be the best post an art critic could write in a major newspaper or magazine about your work?
“If you’ve become tired of pretentious art with its forced conceptual content or had enough of the rule of hi-brow postmodern art works whose value is determined by the interior decorators of hotels and banks, then you might take a closer look at Lichiban’s work. This lady is on a mission to penetrate your heart directly and massage your soul with her emotionally charged imagery. Her portraits tap into the deeper layers of the soul to unveil the beautiful, sensual, melancholy or transcendent realm of the senses.”

If you had to work with one musician, dead or alive, to put together a soundtrack for your art, who would it be?
That is so tough! If I really have to pick only one, well then it’d be Nina Simone. And I would have beats made to go with it by someone who comes from the school of J-Dilla, Hi-Tek, DJ Premier or Pete Rock.

Artists now take on the role of entrepreneur, community organizer, advocate and much more. What would you say is the most beneficial professional development artist take on?
Even though there are more art events that are affiliated with a humanitarian or political cause these days, I think that artists could use more of their influence and mobilizing power to raise awareness about today’s critical issues and to give back to the community. I dream of a day when my art will take me to a place where I can organize major art events that will benefit some kind of socially conscious project, which can range from free art classes for children who come from disadvantaged background to protesting human rights abuses, racism, war and other monsters.

What do you feel is the major link between a community and its artists?
The shared experience. The artists’ work has to be relevant to a community for it to be received and appreciated. It has to resonate. Take spoken word artists, for example. They are the mouthpiece of their people and their power of touching people’s soul come from that fact they draw from the experience they share with their communities. The experience of the beautiful struggle, you know? I also think that artists and the cultural products made by them are essential for a community’s existence. A community’s artistic heritage — the music, visual art and poetry — contributes to its sense of identity, pride and solidarity.

If you may, share with us some or all of your “bucket list”.
This is a VERY partial list: to keep on drawing until my heart stops. To produce some of the baddest art shows that will reconvert people who lost faith in art. Get to know my favorite artists and musicians personally. To continue exploring the world; I really want to check out Mali, go back to Kashmir and to the Himalayas once more, and visit Japan, and a thousand other places. And a road trip across the US is long overdue! I want to become a mother and see my kid(s) thrive. I want to get involved in developing a reform for secondary education on a major level. To learn Spanish and keep up my Arabic & Persian. And to get a driver’s license.

She’ll need one for that cross-country trip! See more of Lichiban’s work here or follow her daily dealings on her blog.