Erika Marie York
Bowie, MD
“I use the same paint brush no matter what I’m doing. It’s a flat brush and that’s all I know. It’s broken, and the brush part falls off but I use it anyway. It’s perfect for everything.”
Thick black lines delineate each figurative element in Erika Marie York’s acrylic paintings. Her brightly colored figures with angular limbs and little or no facial features are crammed together tightly, often cropped off the picture plane, assuming lives too large to be contained on the canvas.
When Erika began losing her vision in elementary school from Stargardt disease, a form of macular degeneration that leads to vision loss, she drew from her parents abundant creative influence and began to paint, an experience she has always found joyful. “I love the idea of creating something that wasn’t there before. It’s really freeing to think about something and take it out of your head and put it in the real world. It’s also empowering to have that kind of control. I think everyone can relate to the feeling of powerlessness. But, I can literally do whatever I want with a canvas and paint. I can paint what I want to see,” she shares.
Born in Washington, DC., Erika took many art and drawing classes in high school and college in order to hone her craft before pursuing her B.A in Sociology from Smith College. She has since been diligently creating artistic pieces in mediums such as acrylic on canvas, original designs screen printed on T-shirts and handcrafted necklaces with natural stones and beading. Erika’s first gallery show was at the prestigious Pepco Gallery with Columbia Lighthouse for the Blind. This was the first time she felt like a working artist, and she relished this moment.
Erika’s figures draw the viewer in with their bold contours, powerful color combinations, and interesting poses. This process is reflective of her vision impairment, as she often cannot see others’ features until she is up close. She explains, “I use high contrast colors and I normally outline the figure I’m painting in black and white. I want them to really jump out at the viewer. I do this because it’s easy for me to see what I’m doing when I use bright colors and outline everything.”
Erika’s inspirations are plentiful, from her mothers handmade quilts and clothing, to her father’s drawings and woodworking, she has lived a life in a home surrounded by art with the encouragement to be creative. Outside influences such as artists Frida Kahlo, Basquiat, and Keith Haring were early artistic illuminations, as well as characters in tv shows and movies. Cartoons are a particular source of inspiration, a comparison that is reflected in Erika’s vibrant colors and expressive body language.
The exuberance Erika brings to her practice defines her process as she typically works on two or three pieces at once, spreading canvases out on floors, propping more up on furniture, and rotating the one she’s working on to her easel. She expresses “Art helped me cope with losing my vision. When I’m painting I don’t think about what I’ve lost, I just think about the colors and the shapes that I can create..I can let go of expectations and just see what happens.”
Erika is excited to work with ArtLifting to uplift others and spread advocacy. “It’s very easy to feel defeated by a disability or circumstance,” she says. “ArtLifting is helping to break down barriers for people like me who have a disability and have a unique perspective to share with the world. Being a part of ArtLifting would not only be empowering for me, but it would be empowering and encouraging for others like me who have struggled with vision impairment.” Erika dreams of getting her art into the world, painting large scale works, and collaborating with brands like Dr. Martens.
