You're listening to Ted Talks Daily Amelie's, who now perhaps more than ever, we're understanding the deep relationship between our spaces and our sense of identity and purpose. Artist Shantelle Martin found a new way of seeing through her art and by leaving her comfort zone in her Ted 20-20 talk, she shows us how we can do the same thing in this uncomfortable moment.

She shows us how to let go of our fears, be more of ourselves and see, she says seeing is a lot more than just having the sense of sight.

So here we are. I'm at home, as I'm sure many of you are, too, and we've all begun to understand how our relationship with ourselves, with each other and the spaces we exist in can deeply impact our sense of identity and purpose. So much has dramatically changed. There's a sense of distance now, unlike ever before. But what if I told you that you could find a way from your heart to your hand to reconnect again and not through this practice and embrace in this pause, I could help you to recalibrate your mind so that you could explore this new reality with joy, fuzzy imagination and hope.

And all it would take is a simple pen to get you there. Let's go back to the beginning. As a kid growing up in a council state in southeast London. I was an outsider. I'm the oldest of six kids and all of my siblings are very English. Blond hair, blue eyes, very cute. And then there was me, half Nigerian brown with an afro. So what happens when you look different and you feel different? And in many ways you start to think differently from everyone and everything around you.

How do you find your way out of a dark, racist, homophobic and very lonely place? This is where the pain comes in. I started to draw and the first thing I did is I followed this line and I drew myself out of a culture that was only telling me what I couldn't do. I trusted my pen and it led me to Central St. Martin's, a very fancy art school in London where I graduated top of my year. However, I soon realized there wasn't a place for me in London because wherever you wish to believe it or not, England is still a country that is rooted and functions within the class system.

And as a young black gay female artist from a working class family, I didn't stand a chance. So I left London and I moved to Japan, where I didn't experience people asking me where I was really from. I was just another gaijin, which ironically means outsider. I was immersed in a culture that honors both Maiken and Krofft, where people perfected craft over generations. It's a culture that moss' both time and space so that all this can truly create freedom.

And what I discovered was a place I wasn't angry with Tokyo had and wronged me in any way I could no longer create with anger or out of pain. I had to bravely allow myself to create from a different place. And what I found is this incredible tool transcended a line on paper. I found this thing that connected my head to my heart and my hand to everything. I could see the world in new ways. I found connections and corners and the solutions to problems I never knew existed.

It's like the world with always positive and negative spaces could now be seen. And just by seeing it, there was no longer any fear. It's like my pen was a flashlight and the unknown was still there. But it wasn't scary. After five years of living in Japan and focusing on my craft, I felt like I needed a new challenge.

So I moved to New York because that's what you do as an artist, right? You move to the greatest city in the world, has the ability to make you feel completely and utterly invisible. This is when I began to truly ask myself, who are you? I would wake up in the morning and before I began my day, I would meditate on this. And with this question in mind, I kept drawing. I followed the line. I let it lead the way, the process of picking up a pen, something everyone has access to, the act of giving myself permission to let go of all force or fears, insecurities, anything that would get in the way of allowing myself to be completely made.

That became my way of experiencing freedom. When I got to New York, I didn't want to play by the rules of the art world. I continued my practice as an outsider. I kept drawing curiosity, became the ink from my pen, and I continued to dive deeper. Over time, I began to create a bold, confident space for myself, a space that was all my own. Initially it was just my bedroom. But that bedroom ended up in the New York Times and suddenly I was being seen and known for this world I had created.

Since then, I've created and collaborated with some of the most unique artists, institutions and spaces from the screens of Times Square to the New York City Ballet for their incredible artist series, where I interviewed a number of dancers, their stories and words became the foundation of over 30 drawings and artworks which took over the promenade walls, windows and floors. For a long time. I wanted to create a space for contemplation and poetry, and in twenty nineteen I was given the opportunity to do just that.

By the trust of Governor's Island. They provided me with the perfect canvas in the form of a former military chapel. Meet the main room with drawings on the exterior inspired by the history of the island.

You walk inside, you take your shoes off, and there's a drawing on the floor in the form of a maze that brings you back to you. It's an invitation to become calm and this allows you to see phrases on the wall. May you be WINZ, may you sleep soundly at night. May we save trees? May you, may you. May we add these phrases seem like they're rising from you or falling into you.

I've let my lines become much like a language, a language that has unfolded much like life. And when there has been silence, I saw connection through conversation, asking questions to push through the discomfort. Drawing has taught me how to create my own rules. It has taught me to open my eyes and see not only what is, but what can be. And where there are broken systems. We can create new ones that actually function and benefit all instead of just a select few.

Drawing has taught me how to fully engage with the world and what I've come to realize through this language of lines is not the importance of being seen, but rather the gift of seeing that we give to others and how true freedom is the ability to see. And I don't mean that literally, because site is only one way in which one can see.

But what I mean is to experience the world in its entirety, maybe even more so during the most challenging moments like the one we face today.

I'm Shanteau Martin. I draw and I invite you to pick up a pen and see where it takes you.

PR ex.