Connect What is your favorite type of art to create?

My favorite work is abstract mixed media, where texture, layering, and discovery become a language of their own. Drawn to tactile surfaces and unexpected combinations, I build each piece intuitively - following a color, an image, or a feeling through cycles of adding, obscuring, revealing, and refining. I like to work on multiple pieces at once, bouncing between them as others dry and they all evolve. The work is finished when it suddenly, unmistakably, declares itself whole.

Where do you find inspiration?

The simple, overlooked bits of beauty—mundane, fleeting, human—are what move me. I work in bold color as a buoyant answer to hardship, darkness, and unrest. I rarely begin with a fixed meaning or subject; my art reveals itself as I make it, helping me process what words cannot. Each bright stroke becomes an act of defiance: joy refusing to be extinguished.

What would you do with $25,000?

A $25,000 award would give me something rare: breathing room. As a single mother with one child in college, one at home, and two jobs, I make art in the margins. This prize would help support my family, ease daily pressure, and allow me to invest in materials, framing, entries, and studio time. Most importantly, it would affirm that my creative life matters—and give me the time and freedom to keep making work with courage, depth, and joy.