I interviewed three creatives at Andrews to discuss art and how their identity affected those experiences. Anali Guzman (junior, public health), Nora Martin (junior, English and psychology), and Minji Kang (senior, violin performance) gave me their time to ask about their involvement in art.
Anali Guzman explained that during the beginning of Covid, she started to get bored and wanted to find a good way to put her skills to work.
She mostly paints places of nature where she has traveled with her family. Examples include mountains and national parks. When asked about why she enjoys painting, she explained, “It’s calming and since I didn’t get to travel a lot, it’s always been very special to me because I didn’t have that a lot as a kid. I like drawing to make me feel like I was there again.”
In terms of how her femininity plays into her paintings, she loves using bright colors. Her experiences in nature have always been bright and something she can depend on. “Nature is something that I can trust,” she says, “so I don’t really draw anything besides that.”
For the future, she wishes to be able to paint and draw with others to share their experiences and use painting as an outlet the same way she does.
Nora Martin is an avid writer whose favorite genre to write is fantasy.
Although she did write a little when she was younger, she started to write seriously when coming into college. She writes the plots/stories and runs the game Dungeons and Dragons when playing with her friends. She writes poems and short stories about absurd realism for herself as well. “Writing is an outlet for what I’m feeling at the time. It also makes me feel very accomplished after I finish a project or some edits that I’m happy with. Fantasy is a lot of fun for me because other people can experience it as well.”
Her femininity plays a big part when writing. She describes how she tries to stay away from sexism and patriarchy when writing her stories, as many women must face it in real life. Also, she struggles with being able to talk about her own experiences as a woman, because she feels that people won’t see it as serious writing.
Nora plans on continuing to write so she can share and engage her stories with others.
Minji Kang recently composed her first piece for a school project. Her piece was about how hard it was for her to see God in her daily life and praying to see Him. However, she had always been fascinated and interested in composing.
Minji started playing the violin in fifth grade and wanted to focus on only arranging songs, rather than composing music. However, her interest in composing first sparked watching one of her friends during her junior year.
“Honestly, it was stressful to make this song because I felt like I had no topic that just clicked with me. I didn’t feel confident and was scared to show this song to others. But after putting this out, I remember I was so happy and proud of myself after all the compliments I got from my friends.”
When asked about how her identity/femininity played a role in music, she claimed that she felt more comfortable to put music out as most violin players were female. Minji talked about how she didn’t feel that she had to limit herself with the type of songs she wanted to write for the future. For the future, Minji wants to continue writing both Christian and Non-Christian music. “I want to write songs about topics that just pop into my head.”
However, most of her pieces will be about her faith with God because she wants to share how even though she felt that she wasn’t enough for God, He was always there.
The Student Movement is the official student newspaper of Andrews University. Opinions expressed in the Student Movement are those of the authors and do not necessarily reflect the opinions of the editors, Andrews University or the Seventh-day Adventist church.