I always sought comfort in routine and control. Over time, I learned that it was a way of coping and compensating for things out of my hands.

In my first series after college, I used elements from my childhood like dolls, rabbits, bears, etc., as a subconscious attempt to surround myself with the comfortable and familiar as I navigated the art scene where everything was new to me.

After a while, I started to incorporate statues in my artworks—another familiar element owed to my fine arts education. The more pieces I added to my statues-in-nature series, the more I seemed to find my balance. I admire the man-made and natural combination—the beauty imprisoned in stone and the beauty in the unbound. It became the theme in most of my works. I focused on arranging the elements in a way that was beautiful in my eyes. I believe that humans surround themselves, strive to be a part of, and want to possess those we find beautiful because it is in these things where we see the ideal qualities that we aspire to have. Looking back, I now understand that my admiration of statues in different settings was my own desire to be as safe and unmoving as these marble figures despite the ever-changing environment that surrounds them—to be in control.

Today as the pandemic continues to surge, I learn how there’s so much more that we have no control over. I feel unsafe as I see the increasing number of cases each day and as I hear of another person’s passing—a family member or a stranger. I feel agitated knowing that I have no control over the safety of the people I love. And even my small world that I have created and controlled through art started to suffer. What was supposed to be a haven for me started to become my source of unease as I lost equilibrium. When the pandemic started, I began to include self-portraits in my works. Seeing myself in places different from our reality restored some comfort in me.

The series of studies that I have planned for this project will also include self-portraits. Instead of a means to escape, I aim for my works to depict acceptance. Believing that lack of control was a form of failure made me overlook the strength and wisdom in acceptance. I applied control in as many aspects of my life as possible and lacked the ability to accept. I lose my peace over things I have no control over.