Recently, you may have noticed a golden unicorn being toted around in the back of a pickup truck or maybe rolling (literally) around downtown with Kelsey Sweet as a human statue painted from head to toe in gold as its cohort.
Sweet, a Northern Nevada native, local artist, performer, curator, and advocate for suicide prevention and sexual assault awareness, also runs parlorMINT – a collective of various services aiming to “cultivate conscious co-creative communities” and help local artists. Currently striving for a PhD at UNR, Kelsey bases her educational research around the overall awareness of artistic work and how it is portrayed to those around us.
The idea of the Golden Unikorn (with an affiliated Instagram called goldenladysunikorn) came from Sweet’s personal journey and healing process through previous traumas. “So part of my masters in transformative leadership, I had to come up with a capstone project or some sort of like community based project where we take some idea and then try to execute it within a community to see what happens, and that’s the Golden Unikorn.”
Referencing one of her previous art pieces, a book called The Open Jar, Sweet said that the Golden Unikorn was basically that book come to life, or “different vignettes throughout history and examples of what sexual violence has looked like kind of throughout the course of time.” Thus, making the Golden Unikorn unquestionably special was key, not only as a personal art piece for Kelsey, but also as an embodiment of the recognition of sexual violence in our community and the necessity for prevention.
Unbeknownst to far too many of us in Reno is the alarmingly large and increasing number of documented sexual violence cases in our city. Recent numbers put the Biggest Little City at just about twice the national average of reported rapes, growing rapidly in the past few years. Statistically speaking, this leaves the art scene in Reno with just as much responsibility as any other.
Kelsey Sweet giving me a tour of her vast collection of art pieces, explaining along the way what each one meant to her.
Although she says she wishes she could cast a bigger net and help many more, Kelsey focuses most of her efforts on spreading awareness through Reno, using her art and research as a means of doing so. One of the platforms Kelsey has created through her artistic and scholarly exploration is called SITAS, which stands for Sex in the Art Scene. SITAS is a forum that aims to establish a better understanding of sexual assault in the art scene, along with formulating practical solutions within our community for prevention. For the past three years, Kelsey has advocated SITAS during the month of April – nationally recognized as Sexual Assault Awareness Month – and has been doing so this year as well.
Although meant originally for a form of personal expression and therapy, the Golden Unikorn is beginning to become something more than just that. “You know, it's a hit piece, it draws attention, it's big. It's a real-life sized unicorn and you can see it when you’re driving downtown.” And what quite possibly makes it the best agent for promoting awareness and achieving true change is its ability to grab positive attention from the community. “It just makes people smile, makes little kids smile. I mean, I don't have to talk about the sexual assault side of it and why I have it or getting to dress up as a golden lady and playing the statue.”
Sweet as the golden statue with the Golden Unikorn at a recent art sale show in downtown Reno. Photo by Rachel Jackson.