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7 reasons we heart artist Inocente Izucar--and you will, too

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Inocente Izucar, 18, grew up homeless. She’s undocumented. She’s a flamboyant, bold-as-brass, entirely honest artist. And she’s telling her story Friday night on MTV in the short documentary Inocente, which was written and directed by Oscar nominees Sean Fine and Andrea Nix Fine.

Why do we love Inocente? Let us count the ways…

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She’s not afraid to be herself

Every morning, Inocente paints on her face—but she’s not hiding who she is, she’s embracing it. Her look is just as original as her artwork. And boy, do we love her for it.

But that doesn’t mean everything is A-OK. Her artsy appearance seemed odd to many of the kids at her school. And before she made the documentary, they had no idea she was homeless. She knew she would be made fun of if they found out.

Photo by Sean Fine
Grand experiment

Inocente loves trying new things, from challenging herself with unusual painting surfaces to taking on different activities.

Facebook Q: “Besides your devotion to your art, what other interests do you have?”

Answer: “i love art and i always will, but i would also love to learn sign language and join the circus!!! i love the circus. i would really like to do trapeze in the circus for a year :) also i like the word you used "devotion" it had the word DEVO in it, and thats my favorite band”

Via Facebook

Photo by Sean Fine
Pass it on

Inocente is super humble. She is constantly amazed by all the attention she’s garnered since the release of the documentary, including folks who want to buy her work. While she knows it’s great that she can live off her passion—a mark of her commercial success as a professional artist—she confesses that she’d rather give her work away to people she know will enjoy it.
She’s a dreamer, but that doesn’t mean her head’s in the clouds

“No one’s going to make my dreams come true I have to do it myself, everyone has to fend for their lives in this world. So I just always tried to better my life, knowing no one else would do it for me.” - Inocente
Oh so sweet

Sometimes, she orders dessert before dinner. Add that to our end-of-summer bucket list, please.

“You can never go wrong with a root beer float.” – Inocente

She wears flowers in her hair and paint-splattered red Converse on her feet. She’ll rock a tutu when she’s in the mood. Her personal style is nothing if not eclectic and unique.

Via The New York Times
Can you say adorable?

Inocente paints what she loves. And right now, she’s finding tons of inspiration from her adorable, newly adopted albino bunny, Luna.

Facebook Q: “How come you love bunnies so much? Where did that begin?”

Answer: “I think as a child i always was fascinated by there cuteness and ability to over power the world with cuteness.”

You can check out her art as she paints it on Facebook—she is constantly posting pictures. And it’s not all fluffy bunnies (or frogs or giraffes or pigs or penguins). When the mood strikes, Inocente crafts imaginative, graphic, sometimes surreal visions of women and other things.

Via Facebook
Outta the box

Inocente told The New York Times that she has no desire to take art classes, because she doesn’t feel the need to know about the history of art to be able to do what she loves. The real lesson? When it comes to art, there’s no such thing as right ‘n’ wrong.

Photo by Sean Fine
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When you look at Inocente’s paintings, they are just as whimsical and joyous as their creator’s name suggests. But just because her work is filled with bright colors and cuddly creatures doesn’t mean that’s been Inocente’s experience.

In the documentary, she talks about what it was like to convince her mother not to jump off a bridge and commit suicide. She talks about how she’s never lived in one place for more than three months, about the bullies that plagued her at school, about her fear that she won’t make it as an artist. Her story is emotional and showcases the vulnerability lurking just under the surface. But it also illustrates how she has persevered, despite the odds. And that’s what puts it at the top of our must list.

Watch the documentary’s trailer below…