JAIHAN DEAN

(she/her)

Jaihan Dean is a skilled portrait artist in her community in Markham. From a very young age, she has always enjoyed drawing. At the age of four she won an art award from the city of Toronto! Expressing her creativity has helped her navigate and overcome emotional hardships throughout her life.
Jaihan is now in her fourth year of a double major in Psychology and Studio Arts at the University of Toronto, with an immediate goal of developing her art business. Her goal is to merge her background in psychology, and love for art in order to create a creative therapeutic space for black youth. She wants to utilize art therapy to help those with mental health disorders transfer their ideas through art and other creative modes of expression. This form of psychotherapy provides a unique and creative opportunity for individuals - particularly black youth - to resolve stress, cultivate awareness, and inspire resilience and improved self-esteem. Jaihan hopes to normalize art therapy as an outlet for black youth and hopefully deliver these services through her own black-owned business. For now, she creates commissioned portraits for those in her community.

Visit Jaihan's Instagram

Jaihan Dean: Artists

The Reveal

Materials: Graphite
Dimensions: 18x24”

The present version of me is displaying a facial expression that shows fatigue and fear. This is to show that the process has not been easy and can sometimes be tiring and scary. Imagine being face to face with the childhood version of yourself after all that you've endured. I have to look at the childhood version of me and let her know that it will eventually be okay but being my own therapist can be scary.

The childhood version of myself is displaying an expression of joy and happiness. She's nonchalant to the intensity of the events that are taking place around her. She has no idea how certain aspects of her life will have an impact on her future. She is happy and her innocence have not been destroyed, nor has her world fallen apart yet. I was around eight years old in this picture and had already witnessed so much at home.

I find that in life things may seem good when looking at another individual's life, but there are some things that need to be exposed and dealt with in order to have a better understanding of the self. As I was about to start tearing up the present version of myself I became hesitant. It became a scary process, a nervous wracking process. I had just spent a lot of time drawing myself and I have to tear it apart. I then realized that that was the message that I am trying to express. This process of getting to your inner child and healing in general can be very scary. I have worked hard to get to where I am and then realized I had to tear down some of the layers that I thought were okay. The rips were at random because I don't necessarily know the exact times in my childhood that I have to confront. I'm usually faced with a situation that propels me to then reflect on how my childhood could have played a role.

There's always 2 sides of the story

Materials : Digital Media (Procreate)

Dimensions: 8"X 11"

The idea I had for this assignment was to create a double sided narrative that would provide two perspectives on three systems that have played an important role in my life: government, the police system, and religion. These systems are viewed differently depending on the person that you ask but so I wanted to show the two sides of the story. These narratives were put together using my perspectives as well as perspectives through research and conversation. Each of the pieces are digitally drawn. The images look jumbled at first but with a pair of 3D glasses, the viewer can experience the images. I chose to use this approach because I wanted to use something that is usually made for entertainment as an instrument that provides others with a lens into serious matters. This is an instrument that is often used in one's childhood and it brings the viewers to take a look into these systems that have affected me from childhood.