I’ve always been interested in art while growing up. I’ve been drawing my whole life but I really started to put effort into it in eighth grade, and that’s when I started to develop my own style and try to get good at it. I’d see a lot of people on Instagram who would do these detailed pieces and I wanted to develop my art so I could get on that level. A lot of times the music I listen to inspires me. I try to do a lot of pieces based off of song lyrics and art musicians, and the movies I watch — I do a lot of movie pieces — and then occasionally it’s just how I’m feeling and the emotions I have at the time. I just started exploring that [creating art in the style of other artists], so I haven’t done a whole lot, but I think it’s interesting to pull from different people and almost honor their style, and it portrays a certain atmosphere and mood that you want to incorporate in it. When replicating artist’s styles, it’s important to not copy their art but to add your own spin on it. It sucks when your piece is just recreated and someone just claims it for their own. Be inspired by them, but don’t copy them because that’s just upsetting. I mostly do realistic [art]; I do a lot of portraits, watercolor, and pencil. I am working on doing less pieces that are just portraits of people and delving deeper into more symbolism and more meaning in how I do the portrait, like symbolic references instead of just, “here’s a person smiling.” I don’t want to do art as a career but I know that I want to incorporate that level of creativity, and solving things for myself, and being individual; I know I want that in my career and being able to make something that is mine.