There’s a constant pull in me to create. If I don’t, I don’t quite know what to do with the weight of all these thoughts.
You decide who will appear in Artforum Magazine, take home $25,000, and display their work at The Art of Elysium's Salon!
My favorite art form to create is black and white illustrations. The smallest moments, tender gestures, quiet pain, fleeting love. They don’t just pass me by. They stay. They turn into something restless inside me, asking to be shaped, to be written, to be drawn. It’s almost instinctive now, this need to translate emotion into something visible.
Where do you find inspiration?I find my inspiration in people, especially when I’m quietly observing them. That’s why I often end up drawing in public spaces- libraries, parks, anywhere life is moving around me. I like watching how people exist in their own worlds. Sometimes, in the smallest actions, I notice an emotion they may not even realize they’re expressing. A gesture, a pause, a way they hold themselves- something in it tells me a story. That’s usually where my ideas begin.
What would you do with $25,000?I think more than money itself, what it represents for me is the privilege of being seen- being recognized as an artist, even when I try to deny wanting that validation. But like many artists, I don’t really know how to sell what I create. I’ve been struggling with that too. Winning this contest feels like it could give me that sense of being seen. I don’t know if I need it, but right now, I want it.
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