Artist Nancy Prager is on a Mission: To Educate the World About the Horrors of Human Trafficking

Nancy Prager has something she’d like to talk about.

Truth be told, she’s been talking about it for a very long time. She is nothing if not passionate, both when making art and when meeting the demands of a most eventful public life. When not painting, Prager has been a central figure on some of the most impactful boards both in the United States and internationally, dedicating her time and expertise to international and human rights issues. But it is her work on anti-human trafficking initiatives that fires up her spirit most of all, and her advocacy has earned her esteem and recognition from numerous organizations and even the French government, which awarded her Le Grand Prix Humanitaire. Naturally, this work has lent itself to her art, in particular her latest exhibit, Expressionist Scenes of Harrow, now on display at the Kate Oh Gallery on New York’s Upper East Side.

Prager, who received a BA from Cooper Union, as well as additional degrees from the Accademia di Belle Arti in Florence, Italy, has been a name in the art world since the 1970s, so exhibits are not exactly new to her. Her work is featured in galleries and museums worldwide and can be found in collections both public and private across North America, Europe, and the Middle East. Such a long career has undoubtedly attracted the attention of art critics, who’ve documented and reviewed her paintings in publications like Bicentennial, Art News, and Nouvelle Littaire, etc.

But you can’t please everyone. Prager recalls how a prospective buyer, when told what Expressionist Scenes of Harrow represents, abruptly changed their mind, perhaps not too thrilled with the likelihood that they’d have to engage in regular discussions about human trafficking with their dinner party guests.

Prager chuckles over the memory. “I want the viewer to bring to [a] painting their own experience,” she says, adding that she does not allow what viewers might want or expect to cloud her artistic process. “I don’t believe in painting bowls of cherries. I want to stimulate a person’s mind through my iconographic forms. I know the story I’m painting when I paint it, but I want the viewer to bring their reality to it.” Spoon-feeding human-trafficking concerns was never on the agenda, Prager says, and it is unlikely that viewers would engage in a conversation about such a weighty topic were that the case. She further acknowledges that she “uses decorative coloration” to report on something that isn’t attractive, isn’t pleasant… to get the dialogue going.”

The result is disarming, imbuing her images, as she explains on her official website, “with a lyrical sense of unease.” We delved into this further; I was her ever attentive listener, taking in her art—and her voice—for myself.

Our readers might be wondering how this conversation might benefit foreign journalists. Prager is the Chairwoman of the Association of Foreign Press Correspondents in the United States (AFPC-USA), of which foreignpress.org, the organization’s official media platform, is an extension. AFPC-USA is committed to supporting the foreign correspondent community in the U.S. by providing educational programs and resources. To that end, foreignpress.org’s mission is to enhance the larger organization’s mission, which is, at least through this piece, to start a dialogue about human trafficking, how it happens, how to prevent it, and how to further educate the general public. A sobering fact: One out of every four girls and one out of every seven boys is trafficked around the globe.

This piece is the first in what will become a larger series about one of the most pressing issues facing the world today, one that is defined by and thrives on what Prager refers to as “the breakdown of the human spirit.” Her expertise will no doubt prove invaluable, offering further insight not just into this issue but into how journalists can report on it accurately and, above all, sensitively. And many serious conversations can—and do—begin over art.

The following conversation has been condensed and edited for clarity.

How did you decide on the name Expressionist Scenes of Harrow?

The word “harrow” has a couple of interpretations but the one that resonated with me was this idea of an “affliction” or “suffering,” is the other term. And, I guess one could say, psychologically, “knocked down,” the Latin phrase means “to torment.” I wanted to talk about the dichotomy between the way you look at the paintings, and how they seem to be decorative, light-colored, and rather cheerful. But when you start to look inside of them, you see they’re indicating a vocabulary of oppression. The symbolism goes further, supporting the idea of torture or being tortured, of being trapped. The disemboweled elements of the figure reflect the perception of a victim of trafficking. In fact it’s known that after six months of being enslaved the victim disassociate from their mind and body!

I want to take my visual dialogue and create a story. I want the observer of the painting to resonate with that story but to bring their own understanding of it. It’s not as though it’s literal. My painting is not literal, it’s suggestive, it’s symbolic, it’s the essence of what I’m trying to say. My purpose is to be a storyteller: to draw people in to the deeper message the way that I’ve envisioned, an introduction through a lyrical and suggestive imaging. My goal is to open their eyes and their empathy) to something that is truly harrowing.

I’m curious about your process. What was the time between conception and then actually beginning to paint, and perfecting these pieces over time?

I’ve been an artist all my life. When I was young, I served on a lot of boards: UNICEF, Vital Voices, UNESCO… All of these were for human rights issues because if I were to define my passion or my purpose, it’s to try and accomplish something to make the world a slightly better place. That sounds a little esoteric and I don’t mean it to. I just wanted to use the talent and outreach that I had to resonate a message that’s going to matter. From the time I was a child, people would ask me, “What do you want to be when you grow up?” and I honestly used to look at them and say to them, “I want to make a difference.” Of course, people thought that was precocious, but it was true.

That is my aim: to use whatever limited ability or access I have, and time, to try and address some things that I find truly disturbing. So the purpose is to raise awareness and hopefully get support.

I have a friend who ran the United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime. There’s an understanding that there are three major criminal actions, and they’ve always been front and center but shifting in intensity. The three were and still are arms—bullets, weapons—drugs, and the third is human trafficking. Human trafficking is not just trafficking for sexual exploitation, it also includes labor slavery. What I gleaned from [my friend] is that you can use a bullet once. You can use drugs once. But you can use a victim again and again and again. That’s what makes trafficking horrendous. It’s the breakdown of the human spirit. It’s the concept that this person is just an object to be sold, exploited, and destroyed.

The sad part that is technically acknowledged is that after six months of exploitation, especially if it’s slavery or sexual slavery, they [human traffickers] will break all cords to reality. Because if you’ve been there for six months, the only way you’re still alive is that your mind has created another reality and that’s the only reality you know. So, talking about destroying a human spirit, there’s nothing more powerful than that.

My purpose in these paintings is to use every opportunity I have to raise awareness and get support from the public, from the educational system, and from governments, to address this.

How is your work informed by or how will it inform social justice?

Much earlier in my career, I was asked to be a member of the Black Emergency Cultural Coalition, one of many groups I was a part of. We went into prisons and dealt with men who were incarcerated for serious crimes. We would go in maybe twice a month. I taught these men painting, I taught them how to express themselves through art. But I realized they were going to get out and if they didn’t get a job that paid them enough money, they were going to go back into some criminal element. It was an interesting time and very eye-opening.

Two of the most beautiful letters I received were from prisoners incarcerated for murder. It’s so extraordinary that from people who could be violent and destructive—there exists a core in everybody that has a tenderness to it, you know, maybe their life was harsh and of course, they suffered. This sensitivity, this nugget of gentleness seems to exist in us all. We have many journalists [in AFPC-USA] who understand and want to be useful, they want voices to matter. And here’s a perfect subject: You change one child’s life, you’ve saved the world for them. For us as individuals, we have a purpose to make a difference. And to be able to say that to someone is the greatest gift that you can bestow.

But how do we get this into the schools? Because that’s the only way you’re going to stop it, through information. If you’re a parent for your children, if you’re a young person for yourself, we need to do this. We can make a difference.

According to one critic, your work was presented “in the essence of ‘erotic charge.’ What is erotic charge and how does it imbue the images you present with a “‘lyrical sense of unease?’”

I believe that they meant the convolution of sensuality to sexuality. That’s the way I would have interpreted it. And I think that’s what you and I were talking about, given the dichotomy where maybe it’s soft colors to draw in the viewer. Once you’re in, there’s a maze of symbolism. You’ll see if you look at them [the paintings] for a while, one thing can be something a little more odious. Animals. Violence happening. As I said, it’s all kind of illusionary and presented with a softness so that I could get that interest and get that kind of an audience. It alters the vision from a decorative one to a journalistic one. I’m reporting, basically, I’m not decorating, I’m not doing forms in shape. I’m making the statements and I fuse the images that the writer called “a lyrical sense of unease.” It can expand to discomfort, like the example of the woman who didn’t want to buy it once she knew [what it was about]. She’s a perfect example. She said, “Tell me about it,” and so I did. But it was an interesting and sad reaction. Placing hands over our eyes can only perpetuate this evil!

My purpose is to make the statements, not sell the paintings to the same degree. It’s always flattering and always appealing when other people want to take artwork home with them or if a museum wants it, but it’s that personalized element, of what you bring of yourself that resonates with you on a personal level. So it isn’t any more the artist, symbolism, or ideology. It’s that it takes on a much more expansive role and message.

Your work appears to challenge preconceived notions about sensuality and the feminine form. How do you respond to and feel about that?

That’s a very good comment because I disembowel [my images]. You know, you’ll see a breast here, or an outreached hand grasping at something with a twisted torso. The forms are not decorative forms but the piece has, and I think it’s an illusion brought on by the colors that I choose, which are very light—you could use the word “attractive”—colors that are opposed to the darkness of the subject.that really lurks under the facade of the painting.

How have you over the course of your career nurtured the relationship between viewer and artist? How does this influence your artistic process?

It doesn’t at all. I think I created an opportunity for dialogue and interpretation and I want the viewer to bring to that painting their own experience. I don’t believe in singularly stating my vision. I want to stimulate a person’s mind through my iconographic forms, I guess you could call them symbolic forms. I know the story I’m thinking of when I paint it, but I want the viewer to bring their reality to it.

It’s why I choose maybe a decorative color to report on something that isn’t attractive, isn’t a pleasant subject, is too hard of a subject, but if you get the dialogue going, you’ve created something that has potential consequence.

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Expressionist Scenes of Harrow will be exhibited until Friday, September 23.

Kate Oh Gallery

31 East 72nd Street

New York, NY 10021

Tuesday – Sunday 12 p.m. – 7 p.m.