ARTIST STATEMENT

Growing up, I never challenged myself to explore what it means to be creative. As second generation Asian-Americans, a lot of kids around me didn't have that opportunity. It's not that we didn't try. It's just that we never knew. I never knew. 

Creative [kree-ey-tiv] (adj.):  having the power to create from a thought, expression, imagination, daydream, etc. 

The term "imagination" was so distant and because it was out of my reach, I never chased after it. I never thought outside of what was more tangible and more direct. However, I was never content with just whats in front of me and I always knew there had to be more in life than just what is directly in front of me.

When I first heard about what being creative meant as I secretly joined the drama club in the fourth grade, my curiosity of what it can do made me want to strive to pursue such a future that my own mother deemed as "hopeless".

There is something about wanting to go after something even more when someone says you can't. I guess some people call that being stubborn, but I think its more like desiring something you could go beyond with. So, without letting anyone know, I started to fall in love with the possibilities this simple word, creative, could take me. I even joined a Media Team for a Christian Ministry and made videos for the many events and conferences we hold each year. 

And let me tell you, I fell in love. 

Up until last year, I wasn't sure if Media Studies was something I wanted to do for the rest of my life. My main reason being, "I can never be THAT creative to survive this industry". But I knew I had a passion. I knew that nothing made me more ecstatic than films that inspire people to reach further for their dreams and films that bring different perspectives into situations that are relatable to, hopefully, all humans, and especially films that display specific events in our lives that we want to relive everyday, events like proposals, weddings, first-born, first day of school, graduation, etc. 

The fact that I am able to capture a specific moment in time overcomes me with an underly of doubt and doubt because that's how incredible this field is. 
I'm so excited to see how this field will develop over the next years and I genuinely want to be part of that movement. 
A movement beyond my imagination. A movement that shares true emotions and feelings that we can't describe with objects nor express with words. A movement that I will fall in love with over and over again.