We’re looking forward to introducing you to Stephanie Dillon. Check out our conversation below.
Hi Stephanie, thank you so much for joining us today. We’re thrilled to learn more about your journey, values and what you are currently working on. Let’s start with an ice breaker: What do you think is misunderstood about your business?
People often think being an artist is just about making pretty things. My work isn’t decorative; it’s a form of cultural commentary. I’m not painting to match someone’s sofa. I’m telling stories about waste, beauty, resilience, and the way we discard what still has value for example: objects, people, ideas. I work with materials that have already lived another life because I believe art should confront disposability, not contribute to it.
What’s misunderstood is that my work is as much about thought as it is about texture.
Every piece is a conversation…about what we value, what we throw away, and what we choose to keep. You’ll see my studio filled with pieces that
Can you briefly introduce yourself and share what makes you or your brand unique?
Hi, I’m Stephanie Dillon
An artist, writer, poet, and cultural thinker, or as I like to say, a professional ideator. My work digs into the unspoken and confronts the ache of being human. I create from the thresholds of survival, loss, and reinvention, offering sharp reflections on vulnerability, resilience, and the weight of what goes unsaid.
In 2016, I was diagnosed with breast cancer, and my creative journey began. Not as a career move, but as an act of defiance. It was an urgent need to make something beautiful out of the mess. Since then, I’ve been documenting what it means to live through what almost broke you.
My work blurs boundaries, weaving together lived experience, emotional clarity, and cultural critique. Over the past few years, I’ve contributed to publications like Rolling Stone Culture Council and Forbes, exploring thought leadership and modern survival through a deeply personal lens.
This year is especially exciting! We’ve recently wrapped two restaurant collaborations, Canterbury Boardwalk Kitchen + Bar and Vagabondo in Excelsior. I also have two books on the horizon: Untitled, a poetry and art coffee table book designed by my talented assistant Marki, and a collaborative work with Fashion 4 Development, a subsidiary of the UNGA.
The truth is, I don’t believe in tidy endings or easy answers — only in the courage to speak what’s been buried. And now, more than ever, that feels urgent.
Thanks for sharing that. Would love to go back in time and hear about how your past might have impacted who you are today. Who were you before the world told you who you had to be?
I actually have a poem about this exact topic, which you will find in my upcoming book Untitled
Its called “You can be anything”
I wrote this for my daughter and my younger self! Here it is!
You can be anything.
Not everything.
Not obedient.
Not digestible.
Not the girl they dream of
the one who says yes,
and means maybe.
You don’t owe them gentle.
You can be impossible.
You can be the fire that ruins
their neat little narratives.
You can be the one
who walks away first.
You can be the voice that cuts through
a room full of cowards.
The silence
that makes men sweat.
You can be art
or logic
or rage
or grace
or all of it
at once.
You don’t have to explain your ambition.
Or your stillness.
Or your refusal to bleed
on command.
You don’t have to get smaller
just because someone else
is afraid of your size.
You can wear your mind
like lipstick.
Loud.
Undeniable.
A shade no one forgets.
You can leave marriages.
Jobs.
God.
Homes.
You can start over
without asking permission.
You can tell the truth.
Even when it makes people
nervous.
Even when it costs you comfort.
Especially then.
But promise me this:
Don’t become the kind of woman
who turns herself into a mirror
just so someone else can like their reflection.
Be anything.
But never be
less than who you were
before they told you
who you should be.
Was there ever a time you almost gave up?
I give up all the time, sometimes daily. It’s like falling in and out of love.
One day the work feels like everything, the next it feels impossible.
Courage isn’t about never wanting to quit; it’s about returning anyway. It’s the quiet decision to keep showing up for the work even when you’re sure you can’t. That cycle of doubt, surrender and return is part of the rhythm of making art.
I think our readers would appreciate hearing more about your values and what you think matters in life and career, etc. So our next question is along those lines. Is the public version of you the real you?
Yes and no. The public version of me is real but it’s curated. It’s the part of me that can be translated into something people can consume. But there’s always more beneath it. The mess, the contradictions, the days I’m not sure what I’m doing. The real me isn’t a brand, it’s a human. The public me is the version that can stand under the lights without flinching.
Okay, so before we go, let’s tackle one more area. What is the story you hope people tell about you when you’re gone?
I hope they say I noticed things; beauty, waste, injustice…and turned them into something worth keeping. That I made people feel seen. That I used what I had, shared what I knew, and didn’t pretend to be perfect. That I left behind work and words that outlived me, and maybe gave someone else permission to begin.
Contact Info:
- Website: https://stephaniedillonart.com
- Instagram: @stephaniedillon_art
- Linkedin: Stephanie Dillon
- Other: Substack: https://substack.com/@stephaniedillonart?utm_campaign=profile&utm_medium=profile-page
Image Credits
My Photographer is also my assistant Marki aka Moments By Marki – she has taken pictures of me, my art and all my gallery displays. In these photos youll see my book cover for Untitled vol.1 (published with SnapCollective) My gallery in Miami and NYC (gallery AP space) as well as our new install at canterbury boardwalk Kitchen and Bar!
