Nancy Nivillac
You go through phases where parents can be insufferable, you take risks in exchange for memories and adrenaline, you swear you and your parents have nothing in common, you’re figuring out your body and yourself. You’re coming of age. It’s an inescapable paradigm that everyone will go through. Most of the time when I get overstimulated by change, I like to ponder beginnings. I was raised by a single mother, who on top of raising a kid, was also still figuring herself out at eighteen.
But witnessing my mom's expression in the single room where we lived together was admirable and magical. She would get new piercings, then her piercings would be colorful within weeks, multiple canvases of surreal art laid on the floor, her magnet refrigerator memes of body positivity and motherhood, her cultural appreciation for the African community and dressing up in colors that pop, continually passing out flyers in the street to expand her business, which is now very successful, her holding her passion and love for art.
It's no wonder she is my inspiration.
I want my photography to portray nostalgia and glimpses of the past but also rebrand it into my own eyes with the correlation of good times slipping away fast. I’m excited for people of diverse backgrounds to see my work. I remember growing up making internet friends. It's quite easy to be fascinated by cultural differences such as local parks, local citizens, etc. and by capturing my neighborhood, I feel like it’ll do just that. I took photographs from my mom’s past growing up as well as mine to raise the question that I’m not the only one pondering about my beginnings.
Nancy Nivillac, b. 2006
David, 2024
Digital inkjet print
Sheet: 16 × 20 in. Nancy Nivillac, b. 2006
Vanished, 2024
Digital inkjet print
Sheet: 16 × 20 in.
Howdy-do! Nancy Nivillac is a twelfth grader attending the High School of Environmental Studies in the chaos of Midtown Manhattan. They are from the Bronx and love sitting with neighbors when it's warm outside, playing in the water by the fire hydrants, and dancing to music. They’ve been dancing all their life on the step team, dance team, in a ballet class, and more.