Mochi aGoGo – Artist
Art is one of the single most important things in this life to me. Not long ago, I was at the lowest point of the my life. Drug addicted, homeless, in and out of hospitals, seemingly on the brink of death on a daily basis. I got pregnant and had my first and only child, who without a doubt saved my life. But going from one extreme to the other left me with no sense of self. I began creating the art I am most known for now 3 years ago when I first moved to Oregon, alone with my 9 month old baby. I created an anonymous Instagram and made it my goal to create a video or take pictures every hour long lunch break, which was my only time alone. This became my only outlet for me to be my true creative self. I was a preschool teacher and parent of an infant and everything else in my life was very pinterest-esque. My Instagram gave me a chance to freely express my silly, freaky, weirdo self. I could be playful and colorful and messy without judgement. That being said, I have made art almost exclusively to be used on the Instagram platform from the start. So I have always been well aware and mindful of their guidelines. My content has never included “nudity, sexual intercourse; genitals, or closeups of fully-nude buttocks.” Still, within a year, I had two accounts deactivated for inappropriate content. Since then, I’ve created new accounts, each time being more and more meticulous and mindful of creating and censoring my content in a way that will keep it safe from deactivation. However, In the past 3 years I’ve been deactivated a total of 5 times due to “inappropriate content”. I am an artist. I am a single parent. Over the years my art has become not only a creative outlet, but a source of income for myself and my single income little family. Every deactivation is a devastating hit. Having to rebuild followers, track down customers, reorganize orders. It’s gotten to the point that no matter what I post, regardless of the content, I have an underlying fear that it will get reported, deleted and maybe throw up a red flag for my account to be deactivated again. The interesting thing is I see accounts every day posting content much more revealing and/or overtly sexual than mine. But they are usually conventionally beautiful people doing conventionally beautiful things. My art is strange, my art is meant to combine beauty with the gross and weird, to be silly and kinky and fun. And I truly believe that the reason it is deemed inappropriate is because it doesn’t fit into those conventional boxes.
