Tatyana Fazlalizadeh

Tatyana Fazlalizadeh (born 1985) is an American artist, activist, and freelance illustrator. She is best known as the creator of the campaign and art exhibition Stop Telling Women to Smile.

Biography

Fazlalizadeh was born in Oklahoma City, Oklahoma. Her mother was an artist and art teacher, but Tatyana did not begin creating her own art until she was in high school. She moved to Philadelphia to attend the University of the Arts, graduating in 2007 with a Bachelor of Fine Arts. She is of black and Iranian descent. Her work featuring Barack Obama was included in the book Art For Obama: Designing Manifest Hope and the Campaign for Change, which was edited by artist Shepard Fairey. She is most well known for her Stop Telling Women to Smile campaign.

Stop Telling Women to Smile In 2012 Fazlalizadeh gained notoriety when she began to use street art to speak out against the street harassment of women. Her poster campaign, Stop Telling Women to Smile (STWTS), was based upon interviews conducted with women about their experiences of public sexual harassment. Each poster features a portrait of a woman, along with a caption responding to her experience. Captions include statements such as "My outfit is not an invitation" and "No, you can't talk to me for a minute." The campaign offers women an opportunity to fight back against their harassers.

In 2015, Fazlalizadeh took the project to Mexico. In April 2015 Fazlalizadeh created "International Wheat Pasting Day" as another continuation of the Stop Telling Women to Smile campaign. As a part of this event, participants, in groups of three, went out on April 17, 2015 with images received from Fazlalizadeh to paste works all over the world in various languages. Participants were also able to upload their plans and accomplishments to the STWTS website. Through this project Fazlalizadeh aims to have her work and message reach a larger audience and to engage her supporters in her practice.

Published in 2020, Stop Telling Women to Smile: Stories of Street Harassment and How We're Taking Back Our Power, documents Fazlalizadeh's street art project. The book includes excerpts from the original interviews and images from STWTS, revealing Fazlalizadeh's process and providing a "contribution to the important conversation about endemic sexism."

Recent work In 2016, Fazlalizadeh created a mural titled Sakia, Sakia, Sakia, Sakia, along a portion of McCarter Highway in Newark, New Jersey. The mural is in tribute to Sakia Gunn, a 15-year-old lesbian who was murdered in a hate crime in 2003. The mural was part of a broader mural named Portraits, part of the Newark Downtown District's Gateways to Newark Initiative.

In response to the 2016 United States presidential election, Fazlalizadeh wanted to make a work in her home and historically Republican Party state of Oklahoma. The text on the piece includes, "America is black. It is Native. It wears hijab. It is Spanish speaking tongue. It is migrant. It is a woman. Has been here. And it's not going anywhere." In this piece the location of the piece in Oklahoma is just as important as the overall concept to Fazlalizadeh, according to her, because of its political history.

In 2018 Fazlalizadeh was a participating artist in Round 48: "Beyond Social Practice" at Project Row Houses in Houston. Her installation "The Personal as Political" incorporated the stories of people who identify as Black, queer, and/or women to create political art.

In 2020, Fazlalizadeh created a mural series in New York City featuring portraits of Breonna Taylor, Atatiana Jefferson, Tony McDade, and Nina Pop as part of her work addressing racial and transphobic violence.