the first grid

"The First Grid" is an homage to the earliest moment I can remember engaging with architecture—coloring inside the grid lines my mother drew while renovating our childhood home. Based on a sketchbook I recently rediscovered from that time, this painting traces both a memory and a relationship: between mother and daughter, between discipline and freedom, between past and becoming. The white lines recall her structure and order; the expressive colors evoke my own refusal to stay within them. Many of these hues reference the palette of our home, now layered and reimagined through my own hand. This piece honors how my mother helped shape me—while also acknowledging the quiet act of reshaping, of stepping outside the grid to find myself.