There's something about us using the word fascism and thinking about, "What is it? What does it mean, and what are the tenets of it?".

It's hard for black women to ask for help. We think we don't need it. We're used to being in pain and living with it.

I also think that [political turmoil] gives artists something, a way of kind of processing.

The book [There are More Beautiful Things Than Beyoncé?] is quite complex, and I was worried that it would be marketed as one-sided or flat, and I knew that Mickalene's [Tomas] work would be able to encompass all the many states of being that are in the book.

In my experience when I do try to avoid something, it makes its way into the work anyway. To be in front of it and just make friends with it is easier for me.

I don't claim to say, "All black women are like me," because they're not.

There was something about Beyoncé that felt like a vessel, I guess, that I could kind of impose all of these feelings and thoughts onto. I was drawn to a little bit of a dichotomy between the glamour and celebrity and the very deep and complex legacy of black women, and what that means in terms of performance.