I studied at MiraCosta for five years, from 2015 to 2020. Although I started as an art major, I had a hunch that, sooner or later, my curiosity for the natural sciences might get the better of me. Fast-forward through an academic identity crisis, and in 2019 I decided I wanted to pursue a career in science illustration. In Fall 2020, I transferred to CSU Long Beach as a biology major.
My art training from MCC opened opportunities for me at CSULB that helped me gain valuable experience during lockdown. Since my first semester at university, I’ve held a work study position as an illustrator in the Science Learning Center, a portion of the Science Education department which performs science outreach activities for kids. In my second year, I joined the campus microbiology club as a designer. These experiences kept me involved with my campus community, but also bolstered my resume and portfolio. This in turn helped me when I applied to the Science Illustration graduate program at CSU Monterey Bay, to which I was recently accepted for the Fall 2022 term.
My recent artworks are a collection of personal studies and work commissioned for my student job at the SLC. As someone who usually paints animals in closely cropped settings, I find plein air painting to be borderline frightening, but exciting—group painting especially has lately been my go-to antidote for Zoom fatigue. Meanwhile, my design work for university organizations is a stretch in another direction, since my graphic design training is limited to one class I took in Illustrator. My unsolicited advice to my art peers is that we all should take classes in graphic design and typography, since being asked to use these skills seems more-or-less guaranteed for any artist.
My art training from MCC opened opportunities for me at CSULB that helped me gain valuable experience during lockdown. Since my first semester at university, I’ve held a work study position as an illustrator in the Science Learning Center, a portion of the Science Education department which performs science outreach activities for kids. In my second year, I joined the campus microbiology club as a designer. These experiences kept me involved with my campus community, but also bolstered my resume and portfolio. This in turn helped me when I applied to the Science Illustration graduate program at CSU Monterey Bay, to which I was recently accepted for the Fall 2022 term.
My recent artworks are a collection of personal studies and work commissioned for my student job at the SLC. As someone who usually paints animals in closely cropped settings, I find plein air painting to be borderline frightening, but exciting—group painting especially has lately been my go-to antidote for Zoom fatigue. Meanwhile, my design work for university organizations is a stretch in another direction, since my graphic design training is limited to one class I took in Illustrator. My unsolicited advice to my art peers is that we all should take classes in graphic design and typography, since being asked to use these skills seems more-or-less guaranteed for any artist.