Local artist spotlight: Monique Jannette

by Chad Jones

Monique Jannette has lived multiple lives. A competitive diver. A geologist with interest in marine life. An environmental and employment discrimination lawyer. A plaintiff in a class action lawsuit against Dallas's West Village.*

Her most recent life is that of an artist, who paints everything from portraits to Japanimation and abstract organic pieces.

A Dallas-area resident from birth, Monique (who's not nearly as French as her name suggests) has taken no official art classes and instead prefers to teach herself at her own pace. As a result, her works are as diverse as her influences and give off a scatterbrained and excited impression. Or as she herself says, laughing, an impression of someone with artistic A.D.D.

Monique's most vivid paintings are the darker ones, the nightmarish ones, the ones that stem from her personal struggle with the chronic nerve pain that lingers from a diving accident at age 17 when she broke her neck. Her work titled "Self Portrait" (see photo at right), beautifully captures what is often an overpowering anguish.

Monique is currently supported by her Supplemental Security Income and paints in the sunlit back room in her one-story house near Greenville Avenue. Sooner or later (more sooner than later), she plans to turn painting into a full-time job and to turn the house into a gallery of her various works.

*see photo gallery