My Own Muse— A portfolio & conversation with Bayan Yunis

For this portfolio, Bayan Yunis was named a Young Arts winner with distinction by the National Foundation for the Advancement of the Arts in 2023.

Additionally, she was honored as a Presidential Scholar in the Arts and lauded with the National Gold Portfolio by the Alliance for Young Writers & Artists.

The below includes an interview with her and the personal statement of her portfolio.

Genuine love and admiration for art skips generations in my family; I was blessed to have inherited it from my great-grandfather. Throughout my journey of discovering my photographic niche, my parents, grandparents, aunts, and uncles all told me the same thing when they saw my work. Art is supposed to be pretty. Striving to seek the familial validation I craved, I did just that. Piece after piece, my production of inoffensive motel art made me more and more unfulfilled. When the pandemic struck, I tired of the wad of growing anxiety that I had become and diverged from creating to please others. Though I did not know it at the time, I started using photography as a way of processing the pressures that crippled me. It started with the surface-level struggle of the predictability of living in a lockdown. As time progressed, my work began uncovering my deeper social and identity stresses. The more I created, the more I learned about myself and, in sequence, the more content I became. My self-discovery forced me to see how nuanced art could be beyond its prettiness. Art isn’t “supposed” to be pretty. It can be, but my art is supposed to be expressive. My art broke down the locked door that hindered me. I create to further tear apart the emotional and mental barriers that prohibit my growth. Through these visualizations of the constancy of feelings of grief, familial and community surveillance, masking authenticity, among other things, my portfolio selections each represent struggles I was experiencing during the time of their creation. In like personal-fashion, I became my own muse; indeed, the only constant tying each of the pieces together.

The Journal: How did you first get into photography, and what made you want to build a portfolio?

Bayan: Honestly, it started with my older sister. She took a few photography classes, and a lot of my family members were either hobbyists or professional photographers, so it was always around me. It just felt natural. Photography became the way I could express things I didn’t really have words for. Taking classes helped me explore that more seriously.

The Journal: Your high school had a pretty big photography program, right?

Bayan: Yeah, surprisingly. We had eight different photography classes you could take over four years. Photography I was black‑and‑white film, II was digital color, then there were alternative processes and more conceptual classes. It all built up to AP Photography. The art program overall was really well developed—just under utilized.

The Journal: A lot of your work has silhouettes, digital collage, or images inside images. How did that start for you?

Bayan: I never go into a piece with a super clear idea. I usually just take a bunch of photos when I have the time, and then later I pick things and let myself fall into a flow state. The silhouettes and layers started because I liked how they looked. I’d make something and only afterward realize what it meant to me.

The Journal: In your statement, you talked about a shift from making work to please others to making work for yourself. When did you feel that change?

Bayan: Around junior year—2021, during COVID. Before that, I made things I thought looked nice or that I thought other people would like. Afterward, my work became more about exploring ideas for myself.

The Journal: How did your family respond as your work evolved?

Bayan: At first they weren’t very supportive. When I started getting national recognition, they warmed up to it. I think they were still hoping I’d go into something STEM‑related, like becoming a doctor or engineer, but they understand now. My work has shifted more into printmaking these days, but the themes connect back to what I did in high school.

The Journal: Do you think photography helped you process your diasporic experience?

Bayan: I wouldn’t say it helped me process it directly. Photography mainly helped me find community—other artists who understood similar experiences. The family‑related pressures are theirs more than mine. Making art just connected me with people who think like me.

The Journal: Can you talk about your American flag piece—what it symbolized and how you made it?

Bayan: That was a junior‑year assignment: make something that represents the United States. With my immigrant family and hearing why people come here; the American Dream kept coming up. The idea that you can immigrate, support yourself, and help your family back home. But in reality, a lot of people end up working just to survive. It feels like a hamster wheel; you keep moving but stay in the same place. That’s what the piece was commenting on.

The Journal: You also mentioned masking authenticity in your work. What did you mean by that?

Bayan: That was more about my day‑to‑day life than the work. The piece that fits that idea best is Our Authentic Selves, where I’m physically wearing a mask and layering different portraits and silhouettes. I liked the visual distortion more than planning any symbolic meaning from the start.

The Journal: Which pieces relate most to themes like grief or surveillance?

Bayan: We the Mourners is about grief. People Watch deals with community and familial surveillance.

The Journal: What were you using technically: camera, software, lenses, that sort of thing?

Bayan: I started during COVID, so I just used my iPhone 11. Later I switched to a Canon, but at the time, that’s all I had. Photoshop did a lot of the heavy work.

The Journal: How did you use Photoshop for all the layering and silhouettes?

Bayan: For silhouettes, I’d trace images in Illustrator, clean them up, turn them into SVGs, then bring them into Photoshop. Then I’d layer portraits or other photos, arrange grids, and experiment with how layers interacted. It was a lot of playing around.

The Journal: You repeat a lot of small images in grids. What draws you to that style?

Bayan: Chuck Close was a big influence. I loved the idea of something being greater than the sum of its parts. I also just like how grids look. Over time, they started feeling like calendars—like the more portraits in a piece, the more that issue showed up in my life at the time.

The Journal: Any other artists who influenced this portfolio?

Bayan: Karen Navarro. Her series The Constructed Self especially. My piece Predictable came from an assignment inspired by her collage work, and that piece basically launched the whole portfolio.

The Journal: You originally started on a pre‑med track. What made you fully choose art?

Bayan: I started at Purdue as a Brain and Behavioral Science major on the pre‑med track. I was interested, but something felt wrong. When I switched to art, it felt like a weight lifted. I didn’t expect to pursue art beyond high school—it felt like it would just be a hobby—but switching felt right.

The Journal: What do you hope to do career‑wise?

Bayan: I’m learning how to run a studio. I work as a studio tech in the printmaking shop, the photo lab, and soon a letterpress studio. Long term, I’d love to be a professor and spend summers doing art residencies.

The Journal: Are you concerned about artistic freedom in the current political climate?

Bayan: In the big picture, not really. In the short term, yes. But society works like a pendulum. We’ve swung this way before—like during WWII—and eventually swung back. I think the same will happen now.

The Journal: Can you describe how you actually gathered and created the images in these collage pieces?

Bayan: I’d stay up late, set up lighting—usually sunset lamps—and take a bunch of portraits with different angles and expressions. I’d save everything and later pick images that fit together. The whole process was very flow‑state. I’d copy, paste, flatten, experiment—just letting something appear.

The Journal: Which piece opens the portfolio, and why?

Bayan: Predictable. It was the first piece I made, and the rest of the portfolio grew from it. After that, I organized everything by color and what looked good next to each other.

The Journal: What concepts are you exploring now in your printmaking and photography?

Bayan: I made a series called My Own Muse using my mom’s archival photos. Right now I’m preparing for a solo exhibition next November called Arabic to Maqsura—“My Arabic Is Broken.” It looks at being a third‑culture kid, the contrast between home culture and everyday American life, and the feeling of being an outsider everywhere. I’m using archival images and new photos to build large works where each image acts like a pixel in a sculptural print.

The Journal: What gear are you using now?

Bayan: A Canon EOS Rebel SL2, a zoom lens, and an 80mm.

The Journal: Have you tried film photography?

Bayan: I want to get into medium and large format. Processing film is what scares me—something always goes wrong—but I love the aesthetic. It’s just hard to juggle that with the large‑scale printmaking I’m doing right now.

The Journal: Did you create most of your portfolio during COVID?

Bayan: Mostly. I made four pieces earlier, and three the day before the YoungArts deadline.

The Journal: How has being an artist affected how you live or think?

Bayan: I’m more observant, and I’m more excited to live. Everything—good, bad, boring—feels like potential inspiration. It keeps me from hitting creative blocks.

The Journal: Are you part of any art communities in college?

Bayan: There used to be a photography club, but it ended after everyone graduated. The art program at Purdue is tiny—maybe 15 to 20 people in my year—so it functions as its own community.

The Journal: Outside this portfolio, what themes do you keep returning to?

Bayan: Childhood and family. I love old family photos—garage sales, antique shops, anything like that. You can see family dynamics just through how people are posed. I always come back to that.

The Journal: Any advice you’d give your high‑school self?

Bayan: If you want to try something, just try it—no matter your skill level or what equipment you have. I started with an iPhone. Skills and gear come later. Passion’s the important part.

The Journal: Thanks so much for your time.