“Feck Perfunction” - James Victore. This saying has been the center of my design thinking for the past 5 years. Being biracial, I never felt like I belonged. I was taught by my father that if you work hard, that merit will pay off. Having a first generation immigrant father, I was held to a high standard to do well in school, get a “good job” and achieve the classic American dream. I tried my best to fit this mold, especially
as an undergraduate graphic design student and my first two years after college.
But at some point, after feeling like I was letting people down, I learned to stop striving for perfection and pivot my focus on becoming more personal and relatable to the people that interact with my work.
My current body of work focuses on identity and what it means to be biracial in the United States and what it will mean to my daughter as she grows up. I’ve always been interested in photomontage and how this medium can create worlds from discarded everyday items. I’ve recently made the connection of how I felt discarded from extended family and society to how these discarded images and cutouts are being assembled to create a composition that makes them fit in. With this feeling of not belonging, I strive to help people and clients figure out who they are and how they fit into their respective fields.