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I brought brazillian Pão de quejio “cheese bread” and Fandangos, a brazillian chip brand.

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banana bread w chocolate cream filling and peanut butter topping

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banana bread w chocolate cream filling and peanut butter topping

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These are cinnamon rolls. I definitely baked them on my own.

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Larb is the national dish of Laos. It’s a “minced meat salad”. I made larb gai (chicken) which typically consists of chicken, chicken skin, and a variety of fresh herbs. It’s often eaten with cabbage and sticky rice (and never with utensils..). It’s also usually spicy but I decided to lay off the chilis just in case.

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May be spicy

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Gimbap is a traditional Korean finger food, usually eaten by itself or with spicier main dishes. It consists of seaweed, rice, sesame oil, cucumber, pickled daikon radish, egg, sauteed carrots, imitation crab, and spinach (I didn't have spinach).

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Pumpkin and vanilla cakes and candy

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My brother is Autistic and has an eating disorder called ARFID. These cookies are his favorite food and we always get them for special occasions.

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I tried to bake macarons but burned them so I bought cookies instead

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This piece includes three origami lotus flowers created using watercolor paper and then water color to add color and dimension. Lotus flowers are symbol central to the entirety of India, representing good over bad because they are able to thrive in the dirtiest of waters. Each flower is a different color, demonstrating the diversity, with the middle of yellow, connecting the three pieces. These lotus flowers are placed in the center of the exhibition because the other art pieces revolve around the peace of these flowers.

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I created this piece with watercolor. I drew the contour lines first then painted it in. This piece is meant to symbolize a piece of America I haven't explored before, because a lot of my other pieces had imagery heavily centered around the wild west. With this piece, I knew I wanted to show a landscape because America has very diverse landscapes, but I wanted to do something other than a desert, so I chose the beaches of Hawaii. This piece also has a personal significance because its a place I want to go.

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This piece is an air dry clay sculpture of my dog’s collar. My dog, Fudge has been a significant part of my life for as long as I can remember, but his role in my growth has been even more significant in the past few years. I have spent countless hours since sophomore year training Fudge to become certified as a therapy dog, which is why I included his therapy dog tag. The tag points out the specific significance of Fudge, but it also symbolizes how fulfilling being a therapy dog team with Fudge has been. I chose to make this out of clay not only because it is so recent, but also to represent how significant Fudge’s role in my life is.

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This piece uses a real image with digital art rendered on top. I use lettering of a made up Spanish conversation that is deformed to show the indication of the subject lacking understanding while dissociating looking at the scenery. The main subject of my piece has a human body and a cat head because I really wanted to lean into the key cat I have been using through my pieces to tie it all in. I rendered this piece as realistically as possible to better fit the background and the car window I was using as a frame and separation from the outside.

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My piece is named "Dolce far Niente" or the European saying for "the art of nothing". This piece is a collage made up of the keepsakes I collected during my time in Europe during spring break. The overall idea I am trying to capture is the art of a simple life that I observe while overseas. This connects to my theme as despite being in a family that is beyond passionate about traveling, we do not get the opportunity to go abroad many times due to our commitment to year-round swimming. This piece is meant to symbolize the desire for a simpler life, one without the constant hustle or chase for athletic success, a life that embodies the art of nothing.

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In the Netherlands there are more bikes than people! And sometimes.... well no.. a lot of times. The bikes fall into canals and once or twice a year, the government calls this big magnet or claw to pick up the bikes that have fallen into canals. And I wanted to portray that, I still wanted to make it somewhat personal and thus the red bike represents my bike and that in the mess of life you can still shine in your own way and make the most out of it. When I went to the Netherlands I did not know English and it was really hard to communicate and be myself. Likely, I did not lose myself in all that overwhelming pressure but I grew. 

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I curated a photography collection for this studio project. I went to a temple to send wishes for the future and I snapped some photos. I wanted to keep the atmosphere to be very light and green to maintain a sense of tranquility. Moreover, when taking these photos, I realized the actual control I had in my life. When in nature, oftentimes people sit and understand their gratuity for life and the extent of control they have. On a more personal note, I've felt that the busyness and discord of our daily lives forces us to be detached from simple gratitude.

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So I needed a lens/digital based project for my exhibition, and I wanted to have fun making something kinda wacky. I used MS Paint for this, because I'm intimidated by other programs like Krita or Fire Alpaca. I also think there's a certain level of dorky-charm that comes from using Paint as a genuine drawing application. The concept of this piece is a heart bursting out of someone against their will, with the person trying desperately to collect them self. The style is inspired by pixel art/cartoon animation, hence the pixelated graphics and cartoony 2-D style. The big feelings here are supposed to be panic, fluster, and excitement. Also, I notice now that the hands are backwards. Whoops. Could definitely improve on the shading and detail, too.

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This piece shows a photograph I took of an abandoned building, overtaken by nature. I wanted to capture how time and the natural world slowly reclaim what humans have left behind. The building, once a symbol of human effort, is now hidden beneath thick vines and overgrowth, showing how quickly nature can take over. I added glowing fireflies to the scene to highlight the presence of life in a place that might seem forgotten. The fireflies represent the small, quiet moments of nature thriving even in abandoned spaces. Through this, I wanted to explore the idea that, even when things are left to decay, nature finds a way to persist.

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For this piece, I wanted to explore my family relationships, especially with my mom. My mom used to make us dumplings every Sunday; and so I wanted to represent that with this piece. I made these dumplings the way that real dumplings would be made, so that I could feel what my mom experienced when she made them for us.

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This piece is a representation of how emotion processing works with ADHD. Oftentimes it feels like the current emotion you’re feeling is the only one you’ve ever felt or will feel. Even if the emotion is big or dull. I wanted to show that by having several versions of myself sitting in a small box cramped together yet barely engaging with the others. They’re together, but engrossed in themselves. I wanted to use pushed perspective and anatomy to convey the intensity or the subtleness of each emotion. And I chose a colorful pallete with a dark accent to mesh with the palletes of my previous pieces.

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Made guacamole from scratch and bought chips and pan dulce

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For this studio project, I wanted create a piece that reflects modern trends regarding food and how the food we eat connects to wellness. This piece complies multiple magazine articles and images that give “tips and tricks” on how people can lose weight, boost wellness, etc.

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This piece is meant to expose and criticize the unethical and cruel sport of fox hunting. Globally, hunters will track, chase, and kill foxes. This sport involves the unnecessary suffering of foxes, mentally and physically, all for human pleasure. This activity is not only taxing on the fox itself, but also the wildlife around them. Bans on hunting have been passed, however, it still remains legal in several countries.

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This is a crochet piece showing the layers of muscle, fat and tissue in an abstract style. It's supposed to look like you took a slice of each structure and layered them on top of each other for observation. I used yarn because I wanted to do a 3D piece that's lightweight and can dangle off/ hang on a wall. My goal is to make it kind of realistic through different crochet techniques and the use of gravity making it seem like everything's dragging down. The bottom picture is what I have so far and the top picture is my plan/ sketch for its finished look, I still need to add a bit more.

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I created this piece with a more abstract idea in mind that played with color. I placed the main focus on the two daisies, using wordplay to hint at my name “Dacey” as a personal memory and also using the meaning of daises in representing innocence, joy, purity, and new beginnings. I also placed bluebonnets around the daisies to include a piece of my childhood location, Texas, as bluebonnets are our state flower. I used the color lavender to frame and flowers to symbolize tranquility and youthfulness, another point at childhood. Overall, I wanted to give off the vibe of running through a meadow of flowers as a child and appreciating the little things in life. This was my first time using paper and I enjoyed the 3-D aspect of the flowers, making them more emphasized and drawing in the viewer.

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For this studio project, I wanted to explore the excitement and celebration that is commonly felt when summer begins. My layered paper piece of a boy biting into a watermelon captures the essence of summer’s arrival and the happiness that accompanies it. I focused on the boy's expression of relief, reflecting the universal feeling of anticipation that summer brings. The watermelon itself is a symbol of the warmer months, and by enthusiastically biting it, the boy is more than ready to embrace summer. Additionally, I spent a little more time on the details of the watermelon as well as the boy's sunburnt skin in order to draw focus to the biting action. This piece finishes the trilogy of this year's "Conceptual Qualities" side of my exhibition.

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For my first digital piece, I wanted to create something more abstract, and so I stuck to the idea of merging by two Zodiac signs together. I was born in the year of the boar, and since my birthday is in January, I'm an Aquarius. I decided to merge these two together by illustrating flowy, wave-like patterns inside the outline of a boar.

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This artwork is made of different images mixed together along with text from blogs articles and posts. Glued together onto cardboard to give and the layers depth. And use of construction paper. I'm using jaguars to symbolize those more deeply connected with their culture and the house cats and kittens as the second generation that lack that proper connection. The words on the plate symbolize the kids eating their own words. My intent for this art piece was to show the big disconnect within your own community of people while also showing that imposter syndrom that is shared between members.

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This is a graphite piece featuring me and my sister's ID. I wanted to play into my sister and I's relationship, and how we're frequently mistaken for each other. The hand in the foreground is holding up my sister's ID, while I'm in the background. I wanted there to be a sense that the person in the foreground is struggling to tell the difference, and I depicted myself looking to the side to imply a little bit of guilt as it's not actually my ID.

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This is a battery operated clock I painted black and white and finalized using printed drawings of myself, cardboard, and glue. The piece represents time blindness, a common occurrence in adhd, in other words, a diminished ability to accurately assess the amount of perceived time it has been since a certain event, and the amount of time it will be for a future event. The never side represents the feeling of time not moving at all, like when I’m bored or anxious. So the figure of myself is impatiently staring up at the hour hand, waiting for it to move, but it never will since it’s glued down. The now side represents how time feels normally. Like it’s running just a bit too fast. It’s like a blink and a week goes by like nothing. To illustrate that, I put a figure of myself clinging onto the minute hand for dear life as it is dragged around the clock. (It does move btw but it is still a minute hand, so it doesn’t move very fast. If I could do one thing to this project it would be to find a way to make the minute hand run much faster.)

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This piece is a beaded flower bouquet, I modeled it after my senior year homecoming bouquet because it was a very significant and special memory of mine. I also picked the specific flowers to represent different things that relate to my theme. The lily shows continuity to my first studio project where I watercolored lilies because those are a favorite childhood flower of mine, so having the lily here from a time where I was older and more grown up shows how the flower has remained significant. baby's breath tends to symbolize innocence and I included it due to the nature of the event it just felt very simple and innocent to have a fun night with friends and that's one of the main reasons I remember the day so much. Finally, I included carnations because they symbolize love and there's a lot of love that surrounds my significant memories.

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This piece hasn’t been fired/glazed yet, but it represents both Chinese culture and a personal family tradition. In our culture, making and sharing food is a way of showing love and care, and for my family, making dumplings together has always been a special activity. This piece reflects that tradition and how food can carry deeper meaning beyond just a meal.

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This is a digital drawing created using Procreate. I looked up multiple references to determine how to draw and shade the hands. The water in the background is meant to be dirty and opaque, but the water in the hands is clear and clean. This is intended to show how it can be hard to see your whole future, but it becomes clearer when you look at it in smaller steps. My theme uses water to represent the future and how unpredictable it can be.

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This studio project I created a 2D peacock using color pencil and water color. The title, Mayura, means peacock in Sanskrit (traditional Hindu language). The body of the peacock is mostly color pencil and the feathers (the bigger ones) are water color. The intent/symbolism of project is to represent the peacock. Peacocks are an animal that are very representative of the India because they are an integral part of Hinduism and the diversity of colors represent India itself.

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This is a painting made with both acrylic and oil paints (woah, crazy). It's a new rendition of one of my old favorite paintings that I've done. it's done in a fauvist (fauvism) style which encourages the use of bright, saturated colors. I first layered a base of acrylic paints and then detailed with oils on the top layer. The main focus is the giant, heart-shaped plume in the center. The main theme is 'love' - kinda broadly. Something about wanting to be warmed by love (conveyed by the contrast between the cool hand & bright, warm flames). I'm pretty happy with the composition, but maybe things could be positioned more dynamically or something. I struggled A LOT with the hand, and I'm still not satisfied with the anatomy of it. Oh well, I think it all turned out pretty good though.

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For this piece I used wire to make an orchid bouquet. Orchids are tied with good luck within Chinese culture and are often used as gifts. I added tissue paper flower blossoms to add colour and to symbolise new opportunities.

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This sculpture is meant to represent the unintentional harm human activity can cause on wildlife. A lot of people enjoy collecting seashells at the beach and end up taking habitable shells for hermit crabs, resulting in a shortage. Every year or so, they "trade" shells with other hermit crabs to move into a new shell that fits them based on size. This unique natural occurrence is disrupted by the reoccurring issue of "trash shells". Human pollution, combined with people taking shells as keepsakes, has caused hermit crabs to use trash (ex. cans, plastic bottles/caps, pipes, & other metal/plastic/glass waste) as "shells". Not only is this just bad for the health of hermit crabs, but it's also a real-life example of humans forgetting that they share this earth with the natural world and being careless with their actions.

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For this studio project, I wanted to show how food can communicate literal meanings. These sweetheart candies are traditional Valentine’s Day candies, and they always have a short fun message on them. I used color pencil on this to create a light and bright piece.

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sorry of the so and so quality of the picture. But this piece was created to embody a multitude of memories I have in one specific island. My home island Syros. Syros is the home of Hermes and that is why he is portrayed as the main submject in the piece. The gold border represents the balcony seats in the Apollon Theater in Syros where is was the first time ever I saw an Opera with my Grandparents. The Night sky ombre represents the countless nights I have spent with friends and family watching the stars and searching for shooting stars.  

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This piece was inspired by Cormac McCarthy's novel, "All The Pretty Horses," which deals heavily with themes of national identity and being American, which is very similar to my theme. Horses are an example of a symbol that is seen as American due to their association with the old west, cowboy culture, ranching, and agriculture, as well as personality traits such as minimalism, resourcefulness, ruggedness and the American spirit. This piece was created using clay. First I sculpted it, then I hollowed out the neck and the head separately. Next, I will reattach the head to the neck, finish sculpting smaller details, and fire it. Then it will be glazed, then put in the kiln again to solidify the glaze.

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For this studio project, I wanted to illustrate how my sport influences my life beyond my time in the pool. This project represents the time in my life during COVID when I would meal prep every week in fear of getting out of shape when I returned to practice. I chose to recreate how my cutting board looked during those weeks by creating the foods that I prepped out of clay. Overall this piece presents a very personal time in my life as looking back, I realize what an overarching role my sport played in my life as I let it influence every aspect of my daily routine including my meals. (This piece will be glazed to be colorful)

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My painting captures the lighthouse view in Portland, Maine, based on a photo I took during a summer road trip with my family. Every year, we take these trips, visiting lots of new places and gaining many experiences/memories. This scene reminds me of that day, just a good summer moment enjoying the view with my family. It connects to my theme of personal identity through those road trips, which have been a constant in my life throughout the years.

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For this piece, I wanted to portray a classic childhood “you want but you can’t have” item. The rainbow lollipops are a staple of every kid’s dream and their inclusion represent the nostalgia of being a child. The butterfly symbolizes death and new beginnings, the death of childhood and a new chapter in one’s life. The butterfly rests on the edge of the lollipop, perhaps about to fly away, illustrating the fleeting timeline of childhood and its deep nostalgia.

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With this piece, I wanted to show how my two cultures impact little things such as what accessories I wear. As a child, I had a lot of photoshoots done where I wore a gold bracelet, a traditional Chinese accessory. In my piece, I instead illustrated myself with a jade pendant and American flag earrings to show the contrast between the two.

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For this piece, I wanted to recreate a memory from the 4th of July of this past summer (from my Nikon L320). I chose to use pen for this project in order to expand my exhibition's medium variety and to resemble an impact frame (a collision frame in 2D animation). I decided to challenge myself by using only hatching to shade and "color" my piece. Overall, I want this piece to symbolize the fleeting nature of summer to connect to my theme of 'summer nostalgia,' resembling the style of an impact frame to display the impermanence of these memories. It feels as though I was just taking these pictures of my friends, and yet, the realization hits me that this photo was taken an entire year ago.

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Created with paper, scotch tape, hot glue, yarn and acrylic paint, as well as tacky glue. This is pulled together to symbolize the pressure to start picking at others within the mexican community in an attempt to fit in yourself.

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My thread/theme is internal feelings/desires; this piece is trying to portray the feeling of "leaving". This piece is something I've wanted to do for a while, though my vision didn't fully manifest/come to beautiful fruition here. It's my first time even trying to use oil paints seriously for a full piece, and I tried to use color in a meaningful way. The outside is meant to be cold and dark, and the inside world behind the window is meant to be warm and enticing. The figures inside are supposed to be monstrous, and their body language (was meant to) portray a kind of mean jeering at the man outside the window. The idea is that the man outside has left the party, as it's more favorable to be out in the cold alone than trapped inside with those beasts. He's huddled up in a corner and having a smoke. showing that although he's uncomfortable, he's trying to hold himself together. I think I definitely want to practice oil paints more and make this piece once again, except next time 100x more technically competent and with better imagery.

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I referenced Japanese magazines for this piece because I liked how busy they looked. I wasn't sure what to add for the empty space in the bottom. Please give recommendations and suggestions!!!! Additionally, I need some more inspiration on what other lucky charms to add!!!!!

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It's a painting of hands pressed against ice. The hands are trying to break through the ice sheet. I used a blue color for all of the shadows and then painted over with a more orange color. Doing this I was able to create really delicate shadows. I’ve used water to symbolize the future. In this piece the water is ice and shows how we can feel stuck, Sometimes you feel like you can't move forward. I wanted to stick with the idea of water representing the future.

Using ice was meant to symbolize the feeling of being stuck or trapped.

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In this piece, I wanted to explore the concept of yearning. I chose to depict a little boy upset with the fact that he could not take a goldfish home (reflecting a personal memory of mine). Using a Van Gogh styled background, I wanted to show how yearning for something can overtake your entire mind, the boy's sole focus being the goldfish. 

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With this piece, I wanted to show how my adhd affects the way I view chore and cleaning. If it’s not something I will get immediate satisfaction in doing/ requires a lot of mental effort, I’ll put off doing it until I can’t anymore. This can sometimes lead to my room being kind of messy. (although not NEARLY as messy as in the photo, this is an exaggeration.) To represent how big these tasks seem sometimes, I drew a tiny version of myself on my bed, surrounded by clutter and trash I need to clean, and laundry I need to put away. But instead of doing any of that, I’m stuck lying on my bed. To exaggerate my tiny size, the farther away things are from me, the larger I made them, and the taller they got, the more distorted they would become. I structured the composition to look like a whirlpool to further illustrate the feeling of being “stuck.”

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This piece is a critique on consumerism and waste in the ocean. I represented this by making a fish out of materials like plastic waste and litter. I specifically based the pattern on the Tomcod because that specific species of fish evolved to become resistant to dangerous chemical pollution. The fish sits on a plate because many people are dependent on them for both food and income but due to our carelessness, their habitats and well-being are being harmed.

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Emma Zhou

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For this piece, I decided to utilize jewelry to represent the cultural blend between my Chinese heritage and American upbringing. I modeled the clay hand off of my own and placed the bracelet in the palm, illustrating that I own my identity, not the other way around. For the bracelet, I painted one half green to represent jade and the other half red and blue, America's colors.

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With this piece I wanted to explore American values and ideals rather than just imagery and scenery, and as such I decided to depict the first amendment rig to protest and the American value of the free speech. This piece is a watercolor piece meant to depict, in an abstract way, the American protesters who have protested for freedom in Palestine and an end to the Israeli occupation, apartheid, and genocide currently taking place using American taxpayer dollars sent to Israel.

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In this painting, I wanted to capture a playful memory of my sister and me when we were little. Using acrylic and colored pencil, I chose a bright pink background and crayon doodles to reflect how creative and carefree we were as kids. The doodles also hint at my love for art, even back then, as drawing and creating were always a part of who I was. The butterfly mask and foam sunglasses add to the silly, lighthearted energy of the piece, but for me, this painting is about more than just a funny moment. It’s also a reminder of the small things that shaped both my childhood and my love for making art.

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This piece is a representation of the clash between visual arts and academics in my childhood. When I first started visual arts, I was in awe of all the creativity around me, symbolized by the blurry glasses being broken. The glasses are also an important piece of my childhood since I have had them since elementary school. The arts has opened my eyes in my childhood and allowed me to express myself. The crayon symbolizes the longevity of my pursuit of the arts and the balance of time between art and school. The words, 2 cool 4 scool display the freedom that art brought for me as a kid. The physical representation of the crayon and the glasses are that they are important parts of my childhood but the contrast between them in color and meaning represent the greater metaphorical representation of balancing responsibility with passion. Overall, I wanted to illustrate art as an aspect of my childhood and how I have grown up with it. This was my first time using cardboard and I encountered various challenges but it turned out better than I expected.

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This piece is a classical Indian dancer in a squatting position, called Murumandi. This form of dance is called Bharatanatyam and is originated from Tamil Nadu (South India).The title of this piece means peace and I think that it represents the expression on her face and the pose. Additionally, I chose to do this in graphite to further extenuate the peace she has achieved in this pose.

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This is a watercolor painting of my first childhood home in Denver, and I wanted to highlight one of my most distinct memories of this house, which is the mural my parents painted in the bedroom, and I painted that n the background.

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I didn’t want to use super realistic colors for this piece . | wanted it to feel kind of magical or dream-like I also wanted the hand to show that I am exploring my opportunities and how I can impact my future. I wanted to use the water to symbolize my future. Water isn't a fixed object and similar to my future it can change. The hand is showing

that while I can't exactly plan my future, l can have some effect on it. I wanted this piece to show that I am optimistic about my future. Nothing is set in stone, but there are still things I can do.

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The centerpiece of this artwork is the realistic watercolor peach. I wanted to portray a kind of "surreal" feeling, kind of like those episodes of SpongeBob where a realistic man in a gorilla costume appears, which is why the peach in the center is the only detailed element in the piece. I wanted to portray the idea of both self-superiority and being "left behind"; the "good" peach is still left behind with the rotten ones.

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For this piece, I wanted to explore my relationship with my sister and the intense similarities we share. Recently I’ve been told a lot that my sister and I look like twins, so I drew inspiration from that. In the mirror, you can’t see our heads, so you really don’t know who is who, unless you know us personally and can tell who we are by our shoes.

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I wanted to replicate my proportions into a replica in order to observe the structure of myself. Rather than exploring unseeable aspects like organs and the skeleton, I wanted to this time make it about the silhouette. I want to explore what keeps every part of me together - the outside layer. Its a plain white because I wanted to show that this is only the top of the iceberg and that more discovery awaits within the body

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I made this acrylic piece because I was inspired by overgrown buildings and other man-made structures. I initially chose to portray a train station because, throughout history, railways have been evidence of industrialization and technological development. From transcontinental railways to the high speed bullet trains of today, train stations are a representation of humanity’s overall improvement. This is why I thought it would be compelling to show a train station overtaken by nature, as a metaphor for humanity reverting back in time to when nature was the overruling power, not humans and their technology.

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I chose to portray the simple concept of changing perspectives as one grows up. My piece displays my house in two forms: a grown perspective and a child's perspective. I purposely only did color for the child drawing because children often perceive their world in vibrant colors.

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For my 3rd studio project, I wanted to shine a different light on my sport. In my previous two projects I reflected the mental turmoil that training has brought upon me. In contrast, this project depicts the end of my recruiting process as I got the opportunity to commit to my dream school this year. This process has been something that made me realize how incredibly grateful I am for this sport as it brought me opportunities I had never thought were possible. 

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For this piece, I wanted to paint a self portrait that includes part of my personal identity (which is my theme). The scenery is from the top of a mountain that I hiked in the Glacier National Park in Montana. I wanted this painting to reflect the sense of resilience and accomplishment I feel when overcoming challenges, like reaching the summit of a mountain. This moment symbolizes both a physical and emotional “high point,” showcasing the strength and determination that shape who I am.

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This piece is a digital rendition of my brain whenever someone is having a conversation with me. Even if I’m interested in what they have to day, my brain will always been thinking of other things in the background, I represented those thoughts with early 2000’s pop-ups because the way they’d fill up a screen and block everything behind them is pretty much how the onslaught of thoughts make me feel. I decided to go with a softer pallete because the slew of thoughts is not a bad one, I actually enjoy the random runs my brain has, but I don’t enjoy that they happen when I’m trying to pay attention to what the person I’m talking to has to say.

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This is a ballpoint pen drawing of the Alamo, an iconic American architectural structure that’s recognized across the country, but especially in Texas. As such, it fits with my theme of America and American really well because it represents not only American history, but the architectural and cultural influence of other cultures (in this case, Spanish) on America.

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Last year I created a colour pencil piece of a porcelain clock with blue designs. They told me maybe to make an actual design. Thus, in the spirit of Thanksgiving I drew on a plate a picture of the Thanksgiving dinner I remember. It comes from an actual picture from the table set up. On the border I just put a floral design and doodled symbols that mean something to me and remind me of Thanksgiving. I will try to improve it creating more depth shadows highlights etc. But for now I was not comfortable to do that because I was scared I will ruin it. 

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Dacey Yang - Clay and Acrylic

For this piece, I wanted to illustrate the phenomenon where we see less balloons as we grow up. They seem to be only a birthday party sort of thing. I also wanted to portray the feeling of growing up fast with the dripping letters and numbers on the string. Balloons are such a nostalgic object that I enjoyed as a child so I wanted to use my personal experience in this artwork. The dripping letters also display the experience of birthdays later on in life. Birthdays feel less special and are more of a reminder of age.

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For this piece, I wanted to explore another personal summer memory (I plan to split my exhibition into a concept side and a memory side). I chose to create a 3D paper representation of my sister during her white coat ceremony. Although this memory was filled with much pride and joy, it also brought emotions of sadness and bitterness. My sister has been the most important person in my life; she's the one that raised me and I consider her my second mother. Her white coat ceremony would mark a new chapter in her life as a medical student, but also marked an inevitable departure. Just like the bittersweet feeling of summer ending, I felt the same bittersweetness knowing that I wouldn't be able to see my sister often anymore. However, similar to the hopeful sentiments one experiences waiting for summer to begin, I wait eagerly for the days she visits home.

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Adding onto my last studio project, I wanted to further expand on my culture through clothing. However, this time, I chose a portrait of me when I was a baby to illustrate how my culture has stayed with me throughout my entire life so far. For my exhibition, I plan to place these two works next to one another to further emphasize this detail. This piece was done with graphite, which I thought was too plain, and so I used watercolor for the background.

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This piece is about choosing your own path instead of following other people, represented by fish going in opposite directions. I used my younger self as a model.

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This piece is meant to encapsulate the feeling of being overwhelmed, exhausted, and dissociated. The girl is dragging her face down to exemplify her exhaustion, and her clown makeup signifies how she feels about herself in her predicament. The cubist-style eye is meant to represent the "window to her soul" being glazed over and dissociated. The hand being less detailed and almost "cartoonist" is a way to show that she's desensitized to her surroundings.

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This piece is inspired by one that I took myself in a tulip field in the Netherlands. I was having a hard time figuring out how to connect it to  my theme of "Who am I?" what makes me.. me. But in the thumbnails someones said that the tulip can represent my personality that I embrace it and let other people see. It is a little far fetched but I think it will work.

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I created this piece by using photos of friends and family that I defaced to represent my foggy memory. Poor memory is an aspect of ADHD that I struggle with everyday. I decided to make it in the form of an art show, because my inability to remember things usually comes to light when other people ask if I remember things. I used acrylic for the background and the floorboards.

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My intent with this piece was to recreate one of my most favorite trips, which was visiting Santorini in Greece. I wanted to convey the nostalgia and happiness surrounding my memories of the trip, which is why I used such a warm tone for the sunset, and I also wanted to tie the blues together in the buildings and the ocean. My original intent with this piece was to embroider the white of the buildings as well, but after starting with the blue, I realized that I wanted to highlight just the blue of the buildings because it's such a characteristic part of the place that stands out in my memory. 

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In this piece, I have a sunset in Jaipur, a north Indian city, at the Jaigarh Fort. Through my piece I wanted to ensure that I was including colors to represent the vibrancy of India, which is why I chose to do a colorful sunset for the background. I chose watercolor for this piece because it is a medium I enjoy doing, but I have never applied it to creating a full piece. So, I wanted to learn new techniques and make the buildings look realistic using the watercolor.

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I looked at a couple of different reference pictures to help me become inspired. I used watercolor as a base layer of color. Then I went over it with colored pencils to add more detail. I wanted to show my journey and where I am now. There's still darkness but you can see that light is coming through. I wanted to show that more positive times are ahead.

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I made this piece by drafting multiple patterns and creating a prototype, before finding the right pattern. Then I sewed and stuffed each limb before attaching them to the body. After I drew on the eyes and created the clothes with a mix of reusing old doll clothing and hot glueing different fabrics together to create the right shape for the pants and dress, as well as shirt. Lastly I gathered yarn and sewed it on the head of the doll, then i braided the hair and trimmed it to size. Lastly I created little cat stuffies for my dolls, using cotton, t-shirt scraps and rice for weight.

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This painting is about a foreign exchange student I made friends with earlier in the year. I wanted to depict him as faded out to reflect the temporary nature of our friendship, and how we both knew it wasn’t permanent. I also wanted the background to be colorful and blurry to reflect me memory.

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I made this piece using white colored pencil on a black background in order to make the foreground really stand out. This piece features my interpretation of the large baroque sculpture, "The Abduction of Proserpina," by Gian Lorenzo Bernini. I first saw this marble sculpture two summers ago in Italy, but I hadn't known about the background and mythology surrounding the piece. After researching it further, I discovered that it is a representation of the Latin myth of Proserpina, which is very similar to the Greek myth of Persephone. In the story, Persephone, the goddess of agriculture, is taken by the god of the underworld. In the end, Persephone ends up spending six months of the year on Earth and six months in the underworld. This leads to the formation of the seasons, with vegetation and life during spring and summer, and desolation in the fall and winter. The reason I chose to portray this well-known myth with my art is because it is a perfect example of how man-made art and mythology often revolve around nature. In this case, Bernini was inspired by the Latin mythology, which was inspired by the mysteries of the seasons in nature. This relates to my theme, the interactions of man and nature, because it shows how man often draws creativity from nature.

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I wanted to bring up the concept of a "lucky rabbit's foot." The overall purpose of my art was to emphasise the irony of a human-eating rabbit. Rabbits are often considered to be the ultimate prey, so by eating the human they're seen as weirdly lucky. I used water colour and oil pastels for the leg. Additionally, I layered the paper on top of each other to add a 'pop' to the leg.