I was asked to contribute some art to a collaborative zine on the subject of 'big feelings'. My piece combined creative writing and illustration and was about how I often feel my emotions very strongly.

The creation process was a learning experience, as I used the opportunity to experiment with composition, layout and image manipulation. I also challenged myself to use a limited colour palette. I felt the combination of different elements was effective and everything tied in well together, although I thought that layout wasn't as coherent and readable as I had intended it to be.

The Horror Show! was an exhibition that traced the influence of horror on the past 50 years of British culture through three different lenses; monsters, ghosts and witches. I was interested in seeing it because the subjects of horror/the macabre have deeply influenced my work for years. I was very interested in knowing how different artists have interpreted this subject and was pleasantly surprised by the huge breadth of works featured- from club fashion in the 1980s to psychogeographical instillations about urban decay. I have a particular interest in hauntology, which was a subject that came up frequently in the 'Ghost' portion of the exhibition, and that was particularly intellectually stimulating.

Blue Jean is a British period drama film directed by Georgia Oakley which tells the story of a PE teacher living under the Thatcher government who struggles to juggle her home life as an out lesbian, in work environment that is hostile towards her identity. I saw it at the BFI Southbank cinema after going to The Horror Show, choosing it over the other films showing because I felt the plot resonated with me the most.

This film was definitely a more challenging watch than anticipated, as a lot of the main character's decisions provoke conflict and tension which could really be felt by the viewer. I enjoyed it and thought it was a very well-constructed and intimate portrait of a dangerous time in history for the LGBTQ community.

I decided to make a birthday gift for my friend Fern, which ended up being an illustration of her cat. The piece was a challenge because it involved not only finishing the illustration, but also finding a way to make a print of it in the short timescale I had. I completed it over the course of a week and ended up printing it using the Boots photo services, which created a professional-looking outcome. 

The illustration itself was a learning process because I have little experience with drawing animals. I also decided to once again limit my colour palette to shades of pink and maroon, which was a challenge considering I created a border for the piece which I wanted to have as a pattern, where two hues could not be placed next to one another.

A friend who is already proficient in Logic Pro taught me how to use the software because I was curious about learning to sample sound from videos to create music. She demonstrated how to download a sound file and play it as different notes on the in-built keyboard as well as showing me how the synthesisers work. She then taught me how to add effects such as distortion to the music channels. 

I attended a gig by my friend's band in London. This experience mostly demonstrated to me the ways in which live music can be highly interactive and creative, as they were not taking themselves too seriously.

I attended the joint exhibition of abstract painters Hilma af Klint and Piet Mondrian at the Tate Modern because af Klint is one of my favourite artists and I wanted to see her work in person. The juxtaposition of Mondrian and af Klint's work was striking, both in the similarities between them and their differences. I am particularly drawn to af Klint (although I do enjoy Mondrian's work) as she was also a mystic who claimed to have a spirit guide that commissioned painting from her, which are dense with the spiritual imagery of growth, rebirth and higher planes of existence. I was quite in awe of her geometic compositions, as they are so minimal and precise yet full of symbolism.

I went to see Mike Nelson's series of apocalyptic tableaus at the Hayward gallery. This exhibition was immersive and quite claustrophobic at times, particularly in the second instillation where we had to make our way through a maze of rooms constructed to look like abandoned places. It mostly served to heighten the experience, which prompted me to think about the ways in which art could be used to draw attention to climate change and concerns about the planet's destruction. My friends and I did also comment on how it made us wonder if the fine art gallery experience is elitist and whether or not anyone would actually be inspired into action by such works.