I hope that when people look at my work, they some how can tap into my emotions and what I was experiencing when I was working on a piece.I want my art to not only catch peoples' eyes, but make them ask questions, whether it be how, who, when or why. I want them to become engaged in some way, shape or form when observing my art. My greatest wish however, would be that when people look at my work they could somehow relate it to their own lives.

For me, growing up as an only child, one would suspect I received plenty of attention from my loved ones; however I was an extremely needy child, with an extremely busy mother. My mother had me when she was nineteen, raised me on her own, continued to work and tried to go to college. I don't hold it against her for being so busy all the time; she did what she had to do for us to get by. Overall, we did just fine, but I was always looking for a way to get more attention.

I have been in several theater productions since fourth grade, yet they have never given me the rush and thrill that art has. True, all eyes would be on me when I would stand up on stage, but it wasn’t good enough. I didn’t feel as if people were really seeing me, only some fake character that was written into a play. I wanted a way to get everything out of me, not pretend to be something I wasn’t. Eventually, after a couple hard bumps in the road of life, I got what I was longing for.

When I was in seventh grade, my mom met someone. We had gone through this before, but I never thought of what it would lead to. Before I even started freshman year they became very serious and changed my life forever. In a blink of an eye, they fell in love, they got married, they got pregnant and they moved me across the country, all within a year. Freshman year was over quicker than I realized, and before I knew it I was a sophomore going to a new high school thousands of miles away from my friends and loved ones. However, if I had stayed in Colorado, I doubt that I would have found my refuge in art, like I did in California.

My art, as well as my art teacher, have both become my saving grace. She has taught me not only to express myself but also to have confidence in my art. Junior year she had me in AP Art with her discussing concentrations, developing new ideas and exploring different techniques to make art. I was finally able to get everything out in the air; either in ink, pastel, acrylic, coffee filters or anything else I could get my hands on. I began to unleash emotions I didn't even know I had inside me.