Brandan “BMike” Odums is a visual artist based in New Orleans. With BMike’s work, he plans to be the change that the community needs, and he does that by creating art that helps people see that change. As he often works with spray paint, BMike creates murals that depict historical Black figures and others making a difference in the world.
BMike spoke with rolling out at the New Orleans Jazz Festival about his work and what inspired him to get into creating art.
What led you to start making art?
This particular area of the Jazz Fest is called the Bruce Brice Art Village. Bruce Brice was a pioneering artist which relates to the Jazz Fest as they created this section last year to honor his legacy. They invited Richard Thomas, myself, and Terrance Osborn to be a part of that experience. I’m from New Orleans, and I grew up surrounded by all the beautiful things that make this festival what it is. I was fortunate enough to grow up with that as my backdrop and my reality, so it’s very hard to be surrounded by this and not be an artist in some way. I was always excited to paint and draw, and it just blossomed and grew from there.
What was the inspiration to go in the specific route with your art?
My journey has been pretty wild. I went to a high school that was for arts and then went to college for filmmaking. I did that for a bunch of years. That led me to basically fall in love with graffiti and street art, and then that sort of snowballed into me doing a bunch of murals in New Orleans, which took my path down this lane and thinking about the power of just communicating large scale and public spaces. What I wanted to communicate was the things that I love, which are my community, people who look like me, and stories that made me feel celebrated. That’s the type of art I continue to do.
Why are the arts important?
I think the role of an artist is to imagine alternatives to the present. I feel like if you can’t understand why that’s important, then you either live under a rock or something because we understand that there are so many things about the present that we want to change and that we need to change, and I think it’s the artist’s duty to imagine those alternatives because we have to have a radical imagination seeking beyond what’s in front of us. I feel like the role of an artist — and the role of all of us as creative people — is using our imagination and imagining alternatives to the present. What I hope happens when people see my work and see what I create is that they can understand that what I do is almost like synthesizing what we all should be doing: imagining alternatives to the present using our creativity, our vision and our desire for a better future to manifest the work that we do.
Where can people find your work?
You can find me at www.bmike.co, www.enternalseeds.com and www.studiobenola.com.
