Feral Heart: ZeyeOne
Written by Nicole Misfitx
Photos by @acid_dropz
Published on April 25th, 2025
“I love the way wolves move. They travel in packs, so the ones who are first in line are the elderly, then it’s the mamas and babies, and then the troop. The alpha is all the way in the back, watching everyone and making sure everybody’s good. If you’re in charge of this pack, you’re out here making sure everybody here is good, and that’s how I am.” – ZeyeOne
There is a paradox to being a woman; powerful bearers of life, protectors, and silenced, stifled. Expectations of women are, don’t take up too much space (with your opinions or physical form), be meek, smile, be pretty, don’t be loose, don’t be uptight, and most of all, be feminine in a way that society deems appropriate. If you speak up, take up space, demand respect, those are deemed “masculine” traits. “Act like a lady” is often the response, meaning know your place, be quiet.
ZEYE, a Chicago native, Chicano female graffiti, tattoo, muralist, and realism artist, works against that standard narrative, emphasizing women should be seen, heard, and represented. Coming up in a male-dominated graffiti scene and art world, she has been through discrimination, sexism, racism, and trauma. All of which has made her even more driven in her journey, growth, and perseverance, coming up as a self-taught artist on Chicago’s south side.
“Spiders represent strong feminine energy. I have it tattooed on my face. It’s supposed to represent my motherhood to my kids. It represents, I’m a strong mother, and I’ll fuck you up if you touch my kids. So imagine, people are fucking freaked out when a spider enters the room. That’s how strong feminine energy is. That’s why they’re trying to dim our light. That’s why abortion is going to be illegal, because we have a strong presence, and we shouldn’t be shut down. I feel like I’m doing that by continuing to paint strong, beautiful women in a male-dominated industry,” Zeye said
Her early inspirations were a duality of feminine and masculine. “I have a lot of strong feminine presence in my family. All of them take no shit as women, but have big hearts,” Zeye said. “All my aunts are Geminis and Libras, air signs, all different types of artists. My mom had me at 17. She’s the oldest of five, so they grew up with me. I’m like their little sister, my aunt’s a few years older than me.” As a kid in the 90s, Frida Kahlo was an instrumental influence on Zeye. “My third-grade teacher was obsessed with her, our whole room was covered in Frida Kahlo art. She gave us a mini-class about her, it wasn’t even part of our curriculum. She taught us because that’s how much she loved her, and I think that’s amazing that she did that for us at such a young age. And ever since then, I was like I’m going to be her! I was in third grade, I was barely discovering my artistic skills,” Zeye said.
Visiting Mexico City sparked her creativity as well: “I was in awe of the amount of talent there! Shit you don’t see here, maybe you’ll see it, but very small. But, in Mexico City, everywhere you look, you’re like ‘What? Holy shit!’”
Graffiti, though, is what called to her artistic spirit as a child. Chicago had a widespread but more cohesive gang culture in the 20th century than the wider fragmentation in current times. Gang graffiti was the prevalent street art. When graffiti started to boom and spread from NYC, it was met with conflict as writers tried to hit spots in gang territories. Some of Zeye’s cousins were Maniacs; her whole neighborhood was affiliated. “They would show me how to do their gang tags on the stoop. Like, ‘no, this is how you draw this. You’re doing it wrong.’ Yeah, fucking crazy. I’m like five, but all right,” Zeye said, laughing fondly. As a kid, she was intrigued by the graffiti pieces gang members would do when someone passed away. “I remember when Omsky passed away. The house next to us, there was a garage in the front of the house, a big ass garage; people with money. They jumped over that fence and put in big Old English rest in peace, Omsky, and I was like, damn, this is beautiful. So I just was always super intrigued and naturally drawn to it,” Zeye said. Down the line, she ended up joining EDSK crew, with whom she was friends for a long time. But her art came to a screeching halt. “I had my first kid at 19 years old, right after high school, I had to go right into being a mom,” Zeye said.
This changed when she had her second son at 23 years old. “I was painting with him in my arms. Not with spray paint, though, I was painting murals on walls with paint brushes. He’s 14 years old now. So basically, since he was born, I started painting seriously. I started to take myself more seriously with it,” Zeye said. Something about Zeye is that she puts her all into whatever she focuses on learning and creating with a fervent passion.
Zeye faced constant criticism, doubts, and being discredited by men both in graffiti and outside, which only fueled her more. “I was always around men who would say, ‘No, no, you can’t do that! You’re gonna be pregnant and barefoot.’. I never thought I’d do this. I never thought I’d be in galleries,” Zeye said. As she got serious with graffiti, she wanted a way to stand out, especially to represent women in the scene. “I feel like drawing cool, badass, feminine women is the way, that’s just my personality. I just paint my personality, but they’re not me! Everybody thinks I draw myself. I try to make them all look different,” Zeye said.
This is when her Zeye characters were born, around 2014. She took them from sketchbook to walls, where her skills really started to shine. “I was just learning a bunch of technical shit, not just flat one-color graffiti shit, progressing each time. I just started doing it, and then people started noticing it, and they were like ‘yo want to be in this gallery?’ I’m like, for real? Sure. That’s just how all that came about. I genuinely just did it because I fucking love making things.”
One of the best aspects of Zeye’s creativity is her inability to be stagnant with one thing. After having her first son, she felt major brain rot working in retail and then a barber shop. She became a master barber with sponsorships. “I grew to hate it. Why? Because dudes get the same shit every fucking week. It was just very routine. I love change. I get bored easily, and that doesn’t mean I’m afraid of commitment, I just like to stay busy,” Zeye said. “I’m self-taught. I try it and I figure it out myself. I don’t go on YouTube. I’m an impatient girl. I love learning. I love to be challenged.”
An example is one of my favorite pieces by her for the Chicago Truborn Weed show in 2020. The piece was a sculpted hand holding a joint, at the center of the palm was a realistic eyeball with long lashes. A string of fairy lights sparkled around it, all inside a glass bell jar. “I love that one because I thought about what marijuana does for me? It makes me zen out,” Zeye said.
However, there’s another calling for Zeye that the universe kept sending back to her. A friend saw Zeye’s artwork and encouraged her to become a tattoo artist. “She’s like, ‘I’ll even let you practice on me. That’s how much faith I have in you.’ She bought me a tattoo machine and I started tattooing out of my kitchen on friends. And this is a big no-no in the tattoo industry, but we all start somewhere. I’m so grateful for those friends,” Zeye said. But, being a single mom didn’t leave her with the availability to work at a tattoo shop late hours of the night. “Slowly but surely, it always found me. The universe is like no bitch you’re going to tattoo,” Zeye said. While working at the barbershop, she would still draw, and a regular client was impressed with her work and invited her to be an apprentice at his shop, agreeing to her schedule. She has been a tattoo artist for 14 years.
“I feel like tattooing helps my art, because I tattoo a lot of realism. It helps me learn how to draw my characters. They both feed each other, tattooing and painting,” Zeye said. “That’s how when I sculpted a hand, I was able to get all those details in, because I’m paying attention to little shit that you have to pay attention to when you’re tattooing it on somebody. So now that I have this tattoo mentality, I’m just a perfectionist about everything. It’s like, no, not good enough, next. I even look at shit I painted last year, and I’m like crap, trash, I got to do way better. I’m my only competition, man. I’m not trying to shit on nobody, I’m just trying to shit on myself; keep shitting on myself and men.”
“Art heals me for real, I don’t care how corny it sounds, it heals me,” Zeye said.
Zeye has lived through immense grief, loss, trauma, and pain. Within six months, seven people in her life passed away. Her first solo show last year, La Big Bad Loba at Chicago Truborn, was about trying to survive grief that felt like drowning, especially with the heaviest tragedy of losing her brother. She reflected on the unbreakable, loving bond they share. “My brother was my best friend in the whole world, and continues to be my best friend. We were that for each other, and we both loved each other very much. I was looking at pictures of us the other day. Since birth, every picture is of us squeezing each other, and I’m just like fuck, man. He was an air sign, and I’m an air sign too. He was a really good artist, also self-taught. We’re both left-handed. We’re natural-born artists,” Zeye said, smiling as she reminisced.
“My brother was younger than me, so I was his protector. I was always beating people up for him. He was little, there was like an eighth grader picking on a third grader. I was in 6th grade, I was like, ‘what’s up? Nah, it ain’t gonna happen, you ain’t gonna touch my brother.’ I actually had a bat, so I started beating his ass with a bat, but the bat was a wiffle bat. So, you know that shit bent, but he knew I wasn’t playing, though he was like, oh shit, she really is going to fuck me up. Like, yeah, fuck out of here, bro.”
The ocean of grief crashed against her hard when he passed. “I couldn’t make art for about six months. I didn’t do anything for six months. It was hard, but I know he would have wanted me to keep going. I know he would have been like, ‘if you don’t fucking get your shit together, sis.’” Zeye said. A piece in her show showed this sentiment.
“I did a lot of crying in my car. It sucks because you’re alone with your thoughts. I would cry my ass off in there. So, for one particular piece, I made a rearview mirror, and I hung dice that I sculpted on it. The dice, it’s snake eyes two 1’s, that’s supposed to represent the bad luck and all the bad shit that’s going on and what I’m crying about in the car. I added resin tears, glitter tears, and lashes. I etched the glass with, ‘You got this baby.’ I had to give myself pep talks in the car. I’d be like ‘stop crying bro, there’s nothing you can do about it.’ With my brother… I had a hard time accepting the fact. Of how I could have helped him or how I could have prevented it, all the what ifs,” Zeye said tearfully.
“I’ve talked to mediums, of course, I’m a witchy person, so I believe in the occult and that there are spirits around us watching us and protecting us. Our ancestors are watching us and protecting us. I have gotten the messages through that. You know, like ‘yo sis, like, do your thing, man.’” Zeye’s biggest supporter is always with her, rooting for her to win. The beautiful love and deep sister/brother bond they shared came through clearly as she spoke, a warmth like he was right there with her.
Being a protector is the core of Zeye. Like the title of her solo show, she calls herself the big, bad wolf. “I love the way wolves move. When they travel, they travel in packs, so the ones who are first in line are the elderly, then it’s the mamas and the babies, and then the troop. The alpha is all the way in the back, watching everyone and making sure everybody’s good, and that’s how I am. I always make sure my pack’s good.” Zeye said.
As a wolf, she isn’t afraid to howl and bite back to protect and fight for what’s right. “I’m just a wolfy ass, feral woman, no man or president gonna tell me what I can and can’t do. I feel like that’s the mentality that most women should have: be aggressive. You should always stand up for yourself,” Zeye said.
Check out her next show, Bruja’s Brew 4: Feral Hearts, along with Lady Luuz, Zorzorzor, and Kozmo, opening April 25th, 5-10pm at Grace Jane Gallery [3203 S. Halsted St, Chicago, IL]
Zeye’s online shop, where you can find her merch: stickers, prints, shirts, and more.
Her Main IG: @ZeyeOne
Tattoo IG: @LaBigBadWolf
Thank you to @acid_dropz and Zeye for providing photos!
Nicole Misfitx is a writer and photographer passionate about documenting art, graffiti, and street art in Chicago. Her love of writing led her to receive a degree in Creative Writing and Journalism from schooling at Columbia College Chicago and SNHU. She then combined her love of documenting art, photography, and writing to showcase various art, artists, and important social topics. Her drive for writing is to give exposure to lesser-known artists and the overall street art and graffiti scene in Chicago. In addition, she enjoys nature, travel, movies, all things spooky, and fashion.