Meet Artemis Moon-Walker | Founder & Artist of Artemis and the Moon

We had the good fortune of connecting with Artemis Moon-Walker and we’ve shared our conversation below.

Hi Artemis, can you walk us through the thought-process of starting your business?
I started my business in early 2020, right as the world shut down and I found myself in a brand new and scary world. Artemis and the Moon in its infancy was an attempt at control and understanding, however tangible I was able to hold onto it. Using my own personal collection of insects and foraged flora, I began to attempt to preserve my specimens for years to come, in an attempt to beautify my own home. I had no idea that one day my adornments would be lovingly embraced by other folks in their homes; what a joy that has been to come to see. I originally started my art as a resin medium, which as an environmentalist is something I look back and shudder at! Eventually I thankfully naturally shifted to instead upcycled and thrifted frames, also shifting to flora I hand-forage and process myself such as flowers, mushrooms, bones, moss, and the like. One day I hope to achieve complete sustainability and be able to raise my own bugs as well. My business has since blossomed into something outside of me and I am eternally grateful for that shift in perspective. What a uniquely beautiful experience it is to create an extension of yourself and to release it to the world, only to watch those that welcome it into their cupped hands to mold and shape it into something you could have never imagined.

Let’s talk shop? Tell us more about your career, what can you share with our community?
My medium, working with insects specifically, is a bit unconventional and has certainly been met as such. It has been massively difficult to find my audience and still is probably my #1 struggle with outreach. Sitting at markets, watching people interact with the “creepy crawlies” is always entertaining, especially if I’m able to change one or two minds and hearts. Insects, especially dead, can be deemed macabre and gross, but I push to show the humanity in mortality, and love to stage the presentations betwixt flowers and mushrooms and moss, things we all love in nature, to show that bugs are just a part of our world and culture of beauty and appreciation, as we are, even in death.

Shoutout is all about shouting out others who you feel deserve additional recognition and exposure. Who would you like to shoutout?
My amazing community has been the driving force behind my art’s success, as they are always the ones purchasing my art, sharing, commenting, exposing my outreach and uplifting me in ways I am so incredibly humbled by. In the beginning of my attempt, I had a friend push me to sell the piece I had made for them, my first ever actually, even against my greatest wishes, and that push is what molded Artemis and the Moon into what it is today. Without that friend I would have never thought myself or my work good enough to sell as an “art”. At the center of it all though, my partner Hunter has been so indescribably and incredibly supportive of my work as well, as well as a huge inspiration, motivator and investor in my work. Hunter has pushed my to expand to where I am now almost completely, as I am not a naturally confident person that originally even thought i would ever be able to call myself an artist. I would be no where, and no one, close to where or who I am in this moment without my community, friends and partner; my chosen family. I am surrounded by the most incredibly supportive, encouraging and good people I truly owe it all to them.

Image Credits
photos taken by me 🙂