BY SUZY STUMP for WEEKLY VOLCANO 8/15/25 |
When Tacoma artist Amber Cox posted on Facebook earlier this month, she didn’t sugarcoat her situation. “I’m 37 and I found out 5 days ago I’m unexpectedly pregnant. I’ve lost 3 loved ones in the past 8 weeks. I have 2 children, 2 dogs, and my art is my only income. Please come down and take a look at the hundred+ pieces I have available today. I’d greatly appreciate your support. You won’t be disappointed!”
It was part plea, part announcement, part survival strategy. Within 24 hours, she was back online celebrating: “I sold 2 pieces for $600 so far today. That double heart texture one sold for $500!!! Biggest sale to date!”
This is how Cox sells her work—on Facebook Marketplace, on the corner of 30th Street and Portland Avenue, face-to-face with whoever stops by. It’s the kind of hand-to-hand hustle that leaves no room for ego. She has bills to pay, kids to feed, and paint to buy. And she’s still dreaming bigger. “I’m very much a free-flow artist,” she says. “I never start with a plan. My process is about feeling into the moment—what colors call to me that day, whether it’s a stencil, spray paint, a brush, or something unexpected. I just start creating and trust what comes.”
The Corner on Portland Avenue
Cox has lived on the Puyallup Tribe Nation for six years, in a neighborhood where the freeway walls are alive with graffiti and people know you by sight before they know your name. “Selling my work on the street corner has connected me with so many incredible people,” she says. “Graffiti artists, fellow creatives, neighbors, and passersby who stop to talk.” It’s not an easy setup. Some days are slow. Some days are chaotic. Some days, like the one she sold the $500 double heart piece, feel like a breakthrough. But it’s where she feels connected. “The love, encouragement, and high-vibration energy I’ve received from the local community, the neighborhood, and Native friends has been powerful,” she says. Even the graffiti inspires her. “It’s part of the conversation,” she says. “At times it’s fed into the spirit of what I create.”
Color as Survival
Cox’s work is loud—blacklight pieces that blaze with neon pinks, purples, blues, and greens. She also plays with pastels, stencils, and mixed media, moving between mediums like she’s chasing the next high. “My art often feels like a psychonaut’s acid trip,” she says. “It’s about celebrating the beauty of life.” She doesn’t claim to be some sort of prodigy. “I wasn’t a good artist when I started,” she says. “I plastered my walls with photos—my stepmom, Cindy, will tell you—my walls were like a scrapbook.” It’s that trial-and-error approach that’s kept her moving forward. “Each exploration of a medium has expanded me as an artist,” she says. “The emotions in my work come from whatever I’m living that day—sometimes shaped by the music I’m listening to, sometimes by the way I’ve moved through my day.”
Setbacks and Swerves
August has been a rollercoaster. She booked her band, Professional Poor Girl, for its first gig—then it was canceled. She’s in talks with Tobin Art Gallery for what would be her first gallery show in Tacoma. She’s unexpectedly pregnant—maybe with twins, she hints. She’s lost three people close to her in just two months. Still, her posts carry a mix of candor and optimism. “Life is a beautiful trip,” she wrote after finding out about this Weekly Volcano feature. “Dig it while you can ‘cause the ride is short and one day the waves stop coming!”
That resilience is what makes her work more than decoration. It’s survival. It’s problem-solving. It’s hope you can hang on your wall.
A Big Break That Changed Everything
Her first real taste of wider recognition came at the Evolution of Souls Festival. “It felt like my big entrance into the wider world as an artist,” she says. She displayed and sold hundreds of pieces and earned more than she ever imagined. “It happened so naturally and beautifully,” she says. “That was when I realized my work doesn’t just exist in my own little sphere—it resonates, it matters, and it can make a difference in the world.”
What People Take Away
One of the most meaningful connections she’s made through her art came when she met a couple who’d recently lost someone close. “They told me I reminded them of that person,” she says. “It wasn’t just my art—it was my vibrancy, optimism, and putting myself out there.” That’s the kind of impact she’s aiming for. “I hope people feel invigorated, inspired, and alive,” she says. “If my art can spark even a moment of excitement, wonder, or fresh energy, then I’ve done my job.”
What’s Next
Cox is realistic about what it takes to keep creating—more space, more opportunities, more sales. She dreams of painting bigger. “The bigger, the better,” she says. She’s chasing gallery shows, band gigs, and whatever else will keep her moving forward. She’s also realistic about the mess of it all—parenting two kids while unexpectedly pregnant, juggling art and music as her only income, taking hits from life and still posting her location online so people can come buy her work. “Even if you’re not good at it, you can just do it,” she says. “That’s what I did. That’s what I’m still doing.”
On the corner of 30th and Portland, you might see her surrounded by canvases that pop with color. Some are priced to move, some she’ll never sell. But every one of them is a piece of that survival instinct—an artist’s way of keeping the waves coming for one more day. This is the Tacoma way, gritty, resilient, and full of uncertain destiny. Follow her here: Facebook.com/amber.cox.796708
