Olivia Danielle Vera

The Sun in Pisces (Sagittarius moon, Gemini rising, if you were wondering) created a life for me full of dreamy tendencies and easily flowing tears. 

I was born as a first-generation citizen to Filipino immigrants and raised in the East Bay, surrounded by my parents who gave me the whole universe, grandparents who nurtured and (over)fed me, cousins who taught me how to navigate this world as a woman, and a sister who understands me better than I do myself. 

I spent most of my life imagining and re-imagining, romanticizing and idealizing my world--all while studying and working hard to achieve the American Dream fed to all 90s kids. As I became an adult, I found myself checking off all of the right boxes but still preferring to spend my time in the daydreams. 

It took loss, burnout, sickness, death, and all of the chaos of a global pandemic to give me the courage to pluck those dreams out of my head and set them on the horizon. Creating art has helped me to reconcile the real world with the river of emotions that color my vision. My goal is to continue creating and improving myself in my drawings and paintings, and someday add tattooing to my repertoire.