Felicia DeRosa is not just an artist, she is an alchemist of emotion, translating the intimate textures of life into visual poetry. From her earliest days as a child prodigy exhibiting Dali-esque ink studies at the tender age of twelve, Felicia has danced gracefully through many artistic incarnations: draftsman, printmaker, photographer, designer, curator. Each phase added new depth to her voice, shaping a woman whose work now pulses with feeling, insight and unapologetic honesty. After earning her BFA from the Academy of Art University in 1997, Felicia spent years as a beloved fixture of the West Coast’s underground and salon gallery scenes. Her unique vision, blending impressionist tenderness with bold graphic forms, culminated in a striking new genre she called POP Impressionism. Through this lens, she captured more than just images, she offered emblems of human connection, subtle gestures distilled into icons of everyday grace.
Felicia’s artistry has never stopped evolving. From city-sponsored murals in Chicago to soul-searching journeys through Europe, from quiet landscapes to vibrant acts of public art, her work reflects not only the world around her but also the transformations within. Earning her MFA in 2014 marked another turning point, one that invited dimensionality, dialogue and deep community engagement into her creative practice. In 2021, Felicia's journey took center stage in the documentary DeRosa: Life, Love, and Art in Transition, directed by Angelo Thomas. The film chronicles not only her life as an artist, but her blossoming into womanhood, an intimate portrait of courage, creativity, and becoming. Today, Felicia stands as both muse and maker: a woman whose art mirrors a life of fearless reinvention. As we sit down to speak, her story invites us to reflect on our own. What does it mean to transform, and to be seen?
Monika: Hello Felicia! Thank you for accepting my invitation.
Felicia: Hello!! I'm so glad to connect. Thanks for having me. :)
Monika: For readers meeting you for the first time, could you share a bit about who you are and the journey that brought you here?
Felicia: Whew! That's a challenge, haha. Uhm... I shall try to sum up. My name is Felicia. I'm a professional, lifelong artist. I was born on Long Island, New York. My pronouns are she/her. I've been a civil rights activist and youth advocate for my entire adult life.
I am currently living in my 60th residence. I have a bird named Django. I am a public speaker and an amateur musician. For two weeks, I was once a social media sensation in Shanghai. I love muscle cars and road trips. I have an unhealthy attraction to mopey, sad little goth boys. There's a documentary about me, and it kinda blows my mind.
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| Art is less what I “do” and more what I “am.” |
Felicia: I think everyone is different. There are endless ways to be creative and express oneself. In my observations as both a maker and educator, I have found that there are those who get into art as a form of rebellion, while others might get into art because “it seems like fun,” and they've romanticized the artist's lifestyle. Then there are those who create as an exploration of self. All of it is valid, so long as the art comes from a place of honesty and authenticity.
Whatever the motivation and/or application, though, art takes discipline. Drive. An unending passion. Now, whether that means pursuing a formal education like I did or diving headfirst into the self and figuring things out as you go, that's up to the heart of the creative. Really, how one gets there is almost irrelevant.
Monika: Did your artistic talents burst onto the scene as a child, or was it more of a slow and steady climb to where you are today?
Felicia: Art is less what I “do” and more what I “am.” It is like breathing to me. My first language was color. I was once described by an analyst as being right-brained to the point of “disability.” I take that as a compliment.
I have never NOT made art. I've been drawing since I could sit up and hold a pencil. I drew cartoons and wrote short stories that I would illustrate. I would sculpt my own figurines of characters from my favorite books. I've forever been obsessed with narrative, so for a long time, I made my own comics. I would sketch the adults in my life as a way to pass the time when they were busy talking about politics or whatever they were on about in those days. I would draw cars, old buildings, anything that grabbed my imagination at the moment.
Monika: That’s a vivid image. How does this way of experiencing the world affect your daily life as an artist?
Felicia: It honestly borders on compulsion, and it never turns off. Everywhere I look, everything I see, comes with a detailed schematic outlining the everyday. I am constantly aware of vanishing points, geometric patterns, and the color of light. There's a filmstrip in my head that never stops playing. When I meet someone, I do not meet a person called “John,” “Skye,” or “Mary;” I meet planes and angles, calligraphic lines, and subtle variations in hue that represent “John,” “Skye,” or “Mary.” Unfortunately, making eye contact can sometimes be problematic, especially when I am horribly and vividly aware of so many origins and insertions and joints and tendons and movements and processes.
To me, it is the difference between looking and seeing, hearing and listening.
Monika: Would you say your art is a rich collage woven from your memories and life experiences, or do you prefer to dive into total improvisation, letting intuition lead the way?
Felicia: None of that? All of that? It depends on what I am trying to say at the time. My work is observational. It's social commentary. It's the human condition reflected back at itself. It's madness and heartbreak. It's sex and longing. And I know that as an artist, when I paint, I have to let go and give in to the process.
But even more than that, art to me is the highest form of communication, above language, money, or even time. Anyone can experience art and be affected. Good art, the kind that endures, the kind we study, is transcendent, universal. It's a conversation you walk into the middle of and have to infer how it started, or imagine how it might end. That process can change you. At the best of times, it becomes a part of you, as much as you become a part of it.
The biggest truth about art, in my opinion, is that we artists have an obligation to say the things that ought to be said. It's why so many people are wary of us: we say the quiet things out loud.
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| Art is life itself, and I am nothing without it. |
Monika: Are there artists, whether intentionally or unconsciously, who have shaped the way you see and interpret the world through your art?
Felicia: When I was little, my big influence was my uncle. He was a naturally gifted artist. You could ask him to draw literally anything, and he'd pull it out of thin air and cast it onto the paper without even trying. He was like a magician, and I wanted to be just like that, unlimited! But he didn't care for art. It was “too easy,” so he never did anything with it. Instead, he gave me paper and pens and told me to “do it myself.” So, I did.
I was 12 when I first participated in a professional exhibition. I was the child prodigy showing with the adults. As a kid, I was enthralled by the Renaissance. When I was a teenager, I was obsessed with Dali. By 15, I had my first solo exhibit. I eventually went to art school and learned everything anyone would teach me.
Monika: What were some of the pivotal moments or experiences that helped define your artistic identity?
Felicia: I gazed upon The Allegory of Spring and found religion. I lay on my back in the Sistine Chapel, stared at its ceiling, and listened to the master speak. I was in the fields outside of where Van Gogh lived and understood color as a living being. I stood before a Rothko and wept. A bragging right of mine is that I am a fourth-generation, direct-line student of Auguste Rodin. Because of that, I am deeply in love with Impressionism and consider myself a Neo-Impressionist, the theory, the bold detachment from antiquity, the glorification of the mundane.
Monika: Beyond inspiration, how has your practice evolved in terms of technique or philosophy?
Felicia: I am also a technician. A color theorist. I make my own paint, from scratch. I build my own boards. I took a year of medical school just so I could study cadavers. I did that so I could have more of a tactile, mechanical understanding of the human form. I figured, if Michelangelo could do it, so could I! There are others who have imprinted upon me: Mucha, Kahlo, Walker… honestly, an endless list.
Any good artist is always reaching further, growing, evolving, learning from whomever resonates with you. Pushing boundaries. But it's more than just technique. Maybe even more than concept. It's how the work affects you, the maker; how it does or does not speak to your viewers. It's where a work transports you, and what that does to you on a fundamental level, as you begin your next piece. I am always challenging myself, always asking “why.”
Art is life itself, and I am nothing without it.
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| One Night in Paris. |
Monika: Do you think AI will spell the end of traditional art, or are we headed toward a future where two parallel worlds, one human, one machine, coexist so seamlessly that it becomes impossible to tell where genuine human creativity ends and artificial intelligence begins?
Felicia: AI is theft. It is appropriation. It takes zero creativity or vision. You type in a few prompts, and the computer mines the internet for whatever it can find, chews it up, and shits it back out.
The actual artists who created the work that AI steals from in the first place never get credit, much less financial compensation. It is a capitalistic tool to try and devalue and formalize, trivialize, the creative process. It's something they have been trying to do for decades, so that the money pigs can continue to line their pockets without actually paying for labor. But at the end of the day, you can't fake lived experiences or emotional responses. The pain of loss. The fragility of living. Love. Now, we are seeing AI being weaponized to populate social media with fascist ideology and misinformation.
Honestly? Fuck AI.
Monika: How has your transition shaped you, not just as a person, but as an artist? Did it open new doors in your creative world or shift the way you see and express your art?
Felicia: Transition is hard. For so many reasons. It's because of it that I found a real community. I found purpose outside the arts. Gathered a chosen family that I would die to protect. It made me realize that all the hell I lived through was so I could be the person I always needed in my own life.
In the beginning, I had to completely deconstruct myself. Who is this “Felicia” person anyway?? I had boxed her up when I was maybe 11. What parts of me were real, and what parts were the masks I was forced to wear? How would I know? My home was not safe. Being queer could literally get you killed. I had never heard of a “trans person”, not in the way we understand it now, until I was in my 20s.
Coming out to myself, then, was the scariest thing I've ever done.
Monika: Were you afraid that this transformation would impact your creativity or artistic voice?
Felicia: As far as my art is concerned, I was terrified that my work would lose its edge. I took a year off and journaled, but mostly I just gave myself the time and space I needed to “become.”
Like any puberty, I was maybe seven years into my transition before I finally started to figure out who I am, who I've always been, and who I wish to be.
When I finally got back into the studio, my work had evolved into something more introspective. I was connecting to things, people, like I never had before. I started sculpting again. I was uninhibited in a new way. I felt freer. It was new and wonderful and awful and amazing all at once.
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| I was terrified that my work would lose its edge. |
Monika: Do you remember the first time you saw a trans woman on TV or met one in real life that helped you realize, “That’s me!”?
Felicia: I wish I could say yes, but I suffered alone in a bubble, believing I was a freak for knowing myself the way I did. There was never a time when I questioned my gender. I always knew myself as a female human, but lacked the resources, support, or even the language to identify it, let alone do something about it. So in the closet I stayed. I played my role and focused on surviving my childhood. Remember: I grew up during the AIDS crisis, when anyone not cisgender or heteronormative got hunted.
I was 25 when I met my first trans person (that I knew of). It was also around then that a therapist defined for me what I was actually going through, Gender Dysphoria. Those were very difficult times. After all those years, could I really just allow myself to be myself, for myself?
Monika: Choosing a name is such a deeply personal decision, one that can hold layers of significance and meaning. How did you come to choose the name? Felicia? Does it carry a special resonance for you, perhaps representing a part of your journey or embodying a particular feeling or aspiration?
Felicia: You're the first person outside of my family to ask me that! I had my mom's baby naming book, so I started there. Unfortunately, she had terrible ideas for “if it's a girl.” Leaf?! Sunshine?! Hell no. I ended up doing what I always do, I did research. I focused on my heritage and familial history, and found culturally significant names from around the time I was born. I made a list and pared it down from 10, to 5, to 3. Felicia was always at the top of the list, so really, it was an easy pick. The name resonated with me.
END OF PART 1
All photos: courtesy of Felicia DeRosa.
© 2025 - Monika Kowalska
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