Art has always been an important part of the soundtrack of the Meridian community’s life and that tradition carries on through the creativity of its artisans.

Angi Ware is among the talented artists who call Meridian home and uses her work to spread a deeper message.

Ware is a wife and a mother; an infection prevention nurse at East Mississippi State Hospital and a master of science student of psychology. She is also an artist from a family of artists.

Ware calls her art “assemblage art.” Per the Encyclopedia Britannica, assemblage art was first seen in the cubist collages of Pablo Picasso around 1911. The term for the art was coined in the 1950s by artist John Dubuffet. Assemblage art incorporates everyday items into the final piece as the artist creates something entirely new.

In Ware’s case, she takes old and forgotten items and “makes them fabulous again.”

Ware uses many mediums in her art including vintage dolls and vintage bottles; most of the things she uses are vintage if possible. Her art includes everything from jewelry and headbands to chairs and tchotchkes. All of them are unique and each one of them is Ware expressing herself for everyone to see, and she is OK with that.

Ware said an artist friend of hers once told her that if someone doesn’t like something (you make) it just means it is not meant for them anyway.

The artwork is appealing in itself, but Ware said the message that she is trying to convey is more insightful than her art. Ware said people, and women especially, need to understand that they need to identify who they are and find a way to be comfortable with themselves.

“Make every day count and just do you,” Ware said.

In her art, she is trying to tell women, especially, to find themselves.

“Deep down in your core there is someone that you always were,” Ware said. “Find that, grow that, because that is where your true happiness is going to lie.”

Ware said she hopes, along with her degree in psychology, she will be able to help young women with self-image, self-confidence and finding the person in their core. Right now, her art speaks for her, and hopefully it speaks to the people she is trying to reach.

Standing in her garage workspace, amid an eclectic mix of things that either are her art or will become her art, as a record player finishes a final track, Ware related one of her favorite quotes, from actress Amy Poehler, “Great people do things before they’re ready. They do things before they know they can do it.”

Ware paused and added, “If you sit around waiting for the right time to follow your passion your life will pass you by and you will wish that you had done something, anything. Quit making excuses and make that first step, even if it’s a little step.”

Ware has taken her first step and shows no sign of stopping.

You can buy Ware’s art at the Vintage Market Days of Mobile this weekend and in Decatur, Ala. in April, at her Curious Revival booth at the Family Flea Market on B Street in Meridian or you can check her out at www.facebook.com/absintheangi.

This is the first of a new series that features unique artisans and businesses that call East Mississippi/West Alabama region home. To recommend an individual or business for the feature, email editor@themeridianstar.com.