I came to charcoal the way most people come to the things that save them, not by choice, but by necessity. Growing up between Honduras and Maryland, raised by a widowed mother who carried our family across a different country and language, I discovered that making something with my hands was the only place where the weight of that displacement felt manageable.

“If you are creating, you are already succeeding”

Cultural identity and pride are the root of my works. Many of my drawings are Latino and Black figures. To spend forty, sixty, eighty hours creating and building a piece can only be achieved through genuine passion and care for your work.

There is a discipline I bring to drawing. The level I’m working on can only be built through compound consistency. If I don’t create, I feel lost, a deep feeling in your stomach that can only be compared to freefalling or deep emotional distress. I create because I have to. I am creating things that will outlast me.

The point is the drawing, the hours alone in the studio, the charcoal on my hands, the final piece emerging slowly from a white sheet of paper. Everything else is not a priority.