 I love art, from all different forms ever since I was a kid. Perhaps this love for art began with a love for storytelling. Storytelling has always been a part of my life, or at least reading and listening to other people's stories. In every meal I shared with my parents or distant relatives, they always shared retellings of their memories, often ones about their childhoods in the Philippines. In elementary school, there was a reserved time after lunch when my classmates and I listened to our teachers read aloud books. As soon as I could read as a kid, I grabbed onto any book that looked remotely interesting, especially ones with colorful covers. Growing up near a library, it was natural for a kid to pick up any picture book. This is where I found my love for comics, manga, and graphic novels. I was attracted by the simple line art and the minimal color themes on the pages. I was hooked to every word and automa and apia that accompanied the pictures. At this time, drawing became my number one art medium. I remember being fascinated with a Mickey Mouse themed coloring book that my mom bought for me. She gave me colored pencils and crayons to fill the characters with their respective color palettes, and she taught me how to smoothly color within the lines. I would draw and paint consistently. I fell in love with translating the images in my head onto paper and creating any type of reality. Spending a year in time because of COVID-19, I had more time to explore and rejuvenate my childhood interest in other art forms. My love for storytelling flourishes again, perhaps to the point where I want to be a storyteller. I enjoyed observing the different color schemes and filming techniques used in many movies, especially A24 films like Minami and Moonlight. I also took comfort in rewatching several city-ghibli movies, being reminded how beautiful the mundane things in life can be. I found inspiration in the hundreds of songs that go through my Spotify playlist, taking note of how the instruments blended into each other and how many artists placed intention and care into the lyrics. I rekindled my interest in novels after analyzing various poems and short stories that touched on social issues such as imperialism and socioeconomic status in my Spanish class and understanding the complexity of Asian American voices and stories in my English class. When it comes to creating the art itself, I admit it takes me a while to get started since I find myself often hesitating as I stare at an intimidating blank page. This is when looking to other art forms helped me get started. Even watching YouTube blogs about people's days, lookbooks, skincare, or makeup inspires me. Seeing daily tasks being captured cinematically makes me want to romanticize my own life and capture it on paper. Just like how my art is based on a variety of references and other art forms, I have a combination of experiences, memories, and other people's influences. Because I have spent my childhood growing up with people of color with first-generation and low-income backgrounds, representation in media has increasingly been important to me, whether it is creating or seeing that representation. While I do acknowledge that representation does not need to be a direct solution to the systemic issues in our society, I hope uplifting and highlighting a diverse range of stories in art can offer a source of healing and optimism for others in times when they don't believe their art is enough. Whoever is listening out there, I hope you know that your art, work, and craft is important, and you are where you need to be. Just like how art has touched me, I hope this video has touched your heart too.