Arpana Rayamajhi’s Immortal Inspiration

Living in a system where art is very much part of our culture, we never saw it as a viable means of living. It was never considered something respectable. My mother was one of the first women who started acting in theatre, television, and movies, and her generation—especially as women—had a whole different world to deal with. When she was really young people would believe she was the character she was playing. She would walk home and men on the street would hurl things at her saying, “You’re that mistress!” What still hadn’t changed for my generation was this concept of how you can’t live a life being a creative. My father worked at a casino as a general manager, but I think if he didn’t have to get a job he would have been an artist. He was one of the many people who are very blessed creatively but maybe not karmically. Growing up it was really frustrating because I felt like nobody around me understood me. In retrospect now, I can see that it comes from a society that isn’t very affluent.

I was always the daughter of my mother first. I was very good academically, I felt like I had to prove myself so I would work extra hard. If I did really well they would say, “Of course she did really well, she’s Sushila Rayamajhi’s daughter and they have all the means to do whatever,” and if I fucked up at anything, especially math, it was like, “You’re this person’s daughter and you’re bad at math?” My mother was one of the most popular actresses in Nepali cinema. We would step out of the house and everybody would recognize us, but financially, it was literally a story of a struggling artist. Nepali audiences were very critical and ashamed of their cinema, so popularity and finances were not necessarily the same.

I love it. I never really did anything back home because I wanted to make rock n’ roll music, be a painter, and do all these things that never fit into the status quo of what it meant to be popular. What I really wanted to get away from was this feeling of being watched all the time—your closest relatives, friends, and acquaintances trying to see how well you’re going to do or how badly you’re going to fall. In New York it’s really nice because I can just be a person and say, “I did work for this.” I had to go to a free school because that was my only chance to pursue art. I didn’t understand my own reality until I got older. My mom wouldn’t tell me the different struggles we had. I think my life since moving to New York has been an everyday revelation of everything.

I moved to go to Cooper Union and ever since I took that cab from the airport and saw the city from a distance I was like, “Holy shit, this is where I’ve always wanted to be.” It was that feeling of knowing that I belonged somewhere immediately. Granted, with social media and the political climate in the U.S., becoming an artist right now is very tricky—especially if you’re in fashion. Everything is being criticized by non-critics. It’s a really tense time. It’s funny for me to think I came here to be free, but freedom is just a concept no matter where you go.

The energy when you’re a teenager and you feel like you have to belong; that’s where the love for it started. I think I watched MTV or VH1 and saw Nirvana—these guys on stage doing whatever the hell they wanted and people going crazy over them making this amazing music. Growing up in a culture that told me as a woman you have to be a certain way, rock n’ roll was basically saying fuck you to everybody’s face. I’m talking Soundgarden versus Britney Spears. For me it was about the mediocrity versus something different. I wanted to be a musician and not a face. Björk is one of my biggest inspirations ever and she doesn’t fall in the rock n’ roll realm at all. She does her own thing and I think that was really important to me; to be your own voice and not like anybody else.

I would say I’m a full-time jeweler doing part-time modeling, but I’m not a model—it was never my aspiration. When I first moved I was getting stopped on the street to be scouted. I was 20-years-old and I did not understand how difficult New York was at all. In my head I was like, “I’m going to go to this amazing art school and be in a rock band,” and two years of part-time jobs later I’m like, “Get me my agents.” [Laughs] I’m very thankful for it. I had a whole other situation happen to me in the middle. My mom was diagnosed with cancer and I went back to Nepal, so I kind of disappeared from the scene for three or four years. Finally, I decided it was time for me to move on and share my life and my work, and that’s when it all kind of happened. I’m working on a few different projects now. I’m also making music on the side.

I’ve never doubted myself creatively, but I really questioned who I am as a person after I discovered my mom was going to die. That completely shattered all perceptions of what I thought I was—the fact that my mom was not going to live forever made me realize that I’m not going to live forever. It was the first time in my life where I felt like I didn’t want to see anyone because I thought people would see me for who I really am. Maybe this is what Buddhists talk about when they talk about ego: I had nothing to hide and I felt naked. What not everyone realizes is that people are always acting and putting up a front no matter what. Everybody always talks about culture as my inspiration—America loves talking about ethnicity so they’ll always say anything is “ethnic,” but one of my biggest inspirations is death. I think that’s one of the reasons I make work, so that I can immortalize myself and maybe deal with myself better.

All the time—ethically, very much. Living in this world, trying to make money and connections, and doing what you want is not easy. I thought five years ago I knew the kind of person I wanted to be—it’s not true. I’m always going to question myself. When I’m in my studio working I’m like, “What makes you think what you do matters? What kind of impact do you even think you can leave?” Those are the kinds of questions that if I’m hopefully able to answer to myself, I don’t need to answer to anyone.