Reflection

My sister and I were looking at a parking lot from the balcony of a restaurant. My sister jokingly spread out her arms and said, “Ladies and gentlemen, I give you choked up Mother Nature!” Though funny at the time, I remember how smothered and suffocated Nature looked through a sea of asphalt, with only a few skinny trees stretching out of the ground for air. That moment stayed with me as I noticed similar paralleles in my own community. It made me want to capture the quiet struggles of nature trying to breathe in a world built to ignore it. I used digital art to express this suffocation not only in my city but around the world. I looked into my community to witness what has been often overlooked—from the rustle of trees to tufts of green pushing through the sidewalk cracks. This year’s theme taught me that connecting with nature often begins by looking inward and realizing our distance from nature. By looking outside, I saw the physical displacement of nature; by looking inside, I saw my own–and society’s–role in that disconnect. The central figure in my piece, a tired woman-tree, represents nature as patient yet strained. The silhouettes on the left are ignorant of her presence, while those on the right reconnect and notice her. This contrast shows that renewal is still possible only if we choose to do it. I want viewers to understand that we are not separate from nature, and if we continue to harm her, we ultimately harm ourselves. This is not just her struggle—it’s ours.