Sonja Meltonramesar Visual Arts

"... under de pressure..." (but resiliency is mine!💪🏽⚡)

Happy Friday!

"A flower does not think of competing with the flower next to it, it just blooms." (~Zen Shin)

"When a flower doesn't bloom, you fix the environment in which it grows, not the flower." (~Alexander den Heijer)

"Perhaps the earth can teach us, as when everything seems dead and later proves to be alive." (~Pablo Neruda)

"Loving yourself is not vanity, it's sanity." ~Katrina Mayer

Got that magnolia art tho.
Happy Valentine's week & enjoy the pinkness💗🌸🌺

It's a magnolia shower fallin' down on yo' a$& 😉😄 Happy Valentine's week, people. Love up!

I miss the cherry blossoms in the DMV, but Berkeley will do for the time being🌸

"...look at the state we're in, look at the state we're in..."

(from, "Cherries" by Hope Tala ft. Aminé)

It's a Valentine's blitz! More stolen moments to gather my thoughts...

Happy Valentine's Week!💗 Permission to indulge. Romanticize your life💋

Happy Valentine's Day (late) & week💗! Sometimes, you just gotta steal the moments.

"Estuary, No.27", by Sonja Meltonramesar ©️2023

... just evening things out.
When the petals fall, a divine smelling carpet ensues. And thank you, God🙏🏽💗🌸

This is my work. This is my meditation. This is my prayer. This helps me figure things out. This helps me calculate monumental equations. This helps me solve...

I forgot, spring springs a little earlier in the Bay. The smell of these magnolias are divine

While on my way somewhere with a heavy mind on the immediate back burner, I was shown a divine gift

On my way somewhere with a heavy mind on the immediate back burner, I'm shown a divine gift...

Savoring moments...

"Light Study & Citrons, No.'s 1, 2, 3", by Sonja Meltonramesar ©️2023

"Oshun Emerges, No.1", by Sonja Meltonramesar ©️2019

This is my work that was selected to be part of the 2 installations of "Bandung to the Bay" at Oakland Asian Cultural Center.
The installations highlight the intersections of solidarity of Asian & Black communities.

My photograph features a Sinhalese Sri Lankan American woman (i.e., highlighting the world's Afro-Asiatic diaspora), embodying the west African, Yoruba Orisha, Oshun.

Model: Sheoli Gunaratne
Photographer & stylist: Sonja Meltonramesar
Makeup: Sheryl Littles

This is the actual ongoing installation (from now until Feb 28, 2023) at the Oakland Asian Cultural Center.
Come check out, "Bandung to the Bay" -- celebrating the Lunar New Year, Black History Month and Black & Asian solidarity!



(Image courtesy Oakland Asian Cultural Center)

Hey ya'll. This event is almost over, but just wanted to let you know that Oakland Asian Cultural Center is really doing the thing! ✊🏽
Gung Hay Fat Choy! And Happy Black History Month folks! ❤️🖤💚...🐇
My work has been included in this event. Will post information about actual installation.
Unfortunately, my family duty calls & I cannot even come out to make the event. Life. Priorities...

Join the panel talk celebrating the Lunar New Year, Black History Month and Black & Asian solidarity at the Oakland Museum of Oakland in association with the Oakland Asian Cultural Center.
Gung Hay Fat Choy!

"Join us for a special edition of Oakland Asian Cultural Center's Open E.A.R.S. for Change, a series that highlights the intersection between Black and Asian histories in Oakland. Stephanie Hoang from OACC will moderate a lively conversation about cross-racial solidarity with oral historian Roy Chan and Carolyn Johnson of the Black Cultural Zone."

Where: Oakland Museum of California, History Gallery/mid-level
When: Sunday, January 29, 2023
Time: 1-1:30pm

My work will be included in this larger celebration at the Oakland Asian Cultural Center -- coming up on Feb. 4 -- in celebration of the Lunar New Year + Black History Month. But in the meantime, check out what's going on at the Oakland Museum of California this weekend.
Gung Hay Fat Choy!

Gung Hay Fat Choy!

Happy Lunar New Year 2023!
(Chinese New Year - Year of the rabbit)

of the rabbit

"Did you know that Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. penned his 'I Have A Dream' speech at Penn Center?"

This place is hallowed ground. I visited here, by bus while I was attending Howard University (1988?) and again in 2014.

Check it out! Some very sacred work of mine was selected to be included an upcoming art exhibition:

UPBRINGING -- "DMV artists illuminate the intimacy, intensity and complexities of the parent/child relationship"

Where: RHIZOME
6950 Maple St., NW
Washington, DC

When: Feb 1-28, 2023

Opening reception: Fri., Feb 10, 2023, 6-8pm

"A Yemaya Prayer", by Sonja Meltonramesar
©️ 2023

I'll be featuring the Yoruba Orisha, Yemaya, this month until Feb. 2 (the day she is honored in Bahía, Brazil) -- in-between anymore everyday stuff.

Cowrie shells. Mother. Cleansing. Healing. Water. Ocean. Feminine mysteries. Fishermen. Sea. Moon. Comfort.

"Saltwater Prayers, No.1" by Sonja Meltonramesar, ©️ 2023

New Year meditation & prayers while honoring God, the Universe, and the Orisha, Yemaya (goddess of the 🌊 ocean, sea, the life force of 💦 water).
The Orishas are the deities from the Yoruba tradition -- of Nigeria & its Diaspora. Yemaya seems to have always been a part of my life, since childhood.
It makes sense for many reasons, but even more so since I've discovered with DNA testing sites that of all the ethnicities I am comprised of, Nigerian is the greatest estimate:
Ancestry: 25%; Nigeria East Central, 1%
23andme: 14.3%

Happy New Year, all! These pics were taken on New Year's Day (1/1/23) -- the same day people celebrate Yemaya in Rio de Janeiro. I thought I'd do the same.
Yemaya (or Yemoja, Iemanja, Janaina -- depending on which part of the African Diaspora you are in) is the Yoruba Orisha of the 🌊 ocean...the seas...all waters of the earth...healing... motherhood... fertility...love...
She plays a major role in my life; and has done so particularly in my pregnancy with my only son & during childbirth...as well as during other critical times in my life. Anyone who knows me personally, knows that my family is going through some very rough seas right now. So, along with God and the Universe, I thought it was high time to honor her. I embody her. I celebrate her. I pray to/through her. Mafarefun Yemaya!!! 🌊💙

"Homegirl" by Sonja Meltonramesar ©2003

On assignment at the Mountain Jazz Festival (Oakland, CA). R&B and jazz recording artist, Ledisi. This was the first time I ever heard her sing. What a powerful force she is!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EMSW1Z2UFZQ

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ledisi

"Facing" by Sonja Meltonramesar ©2003

On assignment at the Moutain Jazz Festival. I can't recall the name of these artists, but I like the dynamic.

This is amazing! Mayan pyramids are discovered to have held together by the nectar of the prickly pear! 😲
But at the mention of the prickly pear cactus, I can't help but think of the song from Disney's The Jungle Book, sung by Baloo the bear (i.e., The Bare Necessities)

"Now when you pick a paw paw, or a prickly pear, and you prick a raw paw, next time beware..." (See my comment for the link to the video)

Mexico's 1,500-year-old unknown pyramids