I decided to name my exhibition and the titles of my pieces all in Spanish because half of my family is Venezuelan on my mother's side. Although I don't speak Spanish fluently oddly enough I feel more like myself when I do speak it. Many of these pieces have been based on very important moments or emotions I have experienced in my life. Identity is a key factor of this. I am multiethnic and multiracial with a twin sister. My race and ethnicity have made me feel like an alien to the world. A big identifying factor of this has to do with my hair. I have abnormally curly hair for a white passing person, which made it hard for me to make friends growing up. People were either fascinated by it or hated it. Not to mention I have a twin sister with the same head of hair.

My twin sister means everything to me. She can make me the happiest, angriest or saddest person all at the same time. Being a twin has it’s pros and cons. The piece I created represents some of the happier moments of being a twin, but people don’t talk about the downsides. Everyone obsesses over getting names mixed up or you guys saying things at the same time that people forget you are two different people. Even extremely subjective things like looks, bodies and personality would be compared. It is frustrating that my identifying factor is being “her sister” rather than just being me. The question I get asked the most is, “Do you like being a twin.” The answer is, I wouldn’t give up being a twin for the world. That is what the piece “Gemellas” means to me.

Family and friends are extremely important to me. My parents have shown me a strong example of what love is growing up. The love I knew growing up isn’t the same as what I see in my current generation. My perception of what love means to me has affected many of my relationships. I had a friend who would call me hurtful names, yet still said I love you to me at the end of the day. I never felt loved in that relationship, I felt manipulated. I made the piece “solito” to represent how words today have negatively impacted me.

The pandemic has had a tremendous burden on me. School has been extremely difficult to keep up with to the point I felt like I couldn’t have a break. Motivation has always been the struggle, but it got even worse during the pandemic. The last few months of Junior year were going great, but once senior year started everything went downhill. I actually contracted Covid-19 at the end of March. It was my family's worst nightmare to find out my grandmother had Covid. My grandma has Parkinsons, which makes her shoulders shake a lot. Not to mention, she broke her shoulder a year ago and had surgery. I was worried about her just getting the vaccine due to the side effects I have heard about, let alone actually getting Covid. The pieces that I made are representing the symptoms of Covid I experienced, however most of my family had worse symptoms than me. Luckily none of us were hospitalized, but it sucked having to miss spring break.

This collection of work over the past two years taking Visual Arts has been more impactful than I thought. Not only being able to play with my creativity and love for art, but being able to have a very personal with each of the pieces I have made. I put them in a specific order on my gallery walls. The designs and clothing I made one one all and all the more visual artwork on the other wall. I wanted there to be a separation since it is clear that my art form is within fashion. In additon, the memories I have making the artwork and the materials I used to make them have made an impact in my artistic abilities. It is very hard to create a representation of everything encompassing my identity. This can only be a small taste of what I have felt and gone through in my life, not just high school.