Welcome. My name is Jessica Amgalanbaatar. I am a freshman at the University of Colorado Boulder. I am majoring in Art practices and hope to dive into Graphic Design in my junior/senior year. At the age of five years old, I started to go to art lessons. Every Saturday up until I was in my junior year of high school, I was taught how to draw, paint, and sculpt with various mediums. In my junior and senior years of high school, I was allowed to be an assistant teacher for the same school I was taught in. I helped kids with their artwork and assisted with prepping projects. In my Senior year, I was given the opportunity to create a sweatshirt design for the class of 2023 stagecraft and design major. This was the first time I had delved into digital art. I enjoyed the experience of people wearing my art around school. I was overjoyed when people complimented my design. My inspiration for my artwork has been my Mongolian culture and altruism. I value altruism because for us to grow as a society we need to help everyone and not just think of ourselves. The Mongolian community in Denver is small, compared to California and Chicago. Growing up I felt different because I knew there was a small amount of Mongolians. In elementary school, I would show my classmates the Mongolian anthem and the Mongolian alphabet. From a young age, I loved showing culture because it was who I was. After I got back from Mongolia in the summer of 2022 I became more aware of my religion. When I was in Mongolia, my grandparents and I often visited Buddhist temples and shamist shrines. At the time I took it for granted because after I came back from Mongolia I missed going to the shrines and temples. It made me question, “What does it mean to be Buddhist?” and “What does it mean to practice shamanism?”. So this year I have been diving into reading books on Buddhism and religion. Currently, I am reading “The Tibetan Book of the Living and the Dead” by Sogyal Rinpoche. Reading this book made me realize I want to make the world a better place for incoming generations. That we should try to keep this world as long as we can. In the future, I aspire to have my own cafe business, surrounded by my illustrations drawings, and installations. Customers will have the opportunity to buy my merch such as T-shirts, cases, and artwork. I aim this to be a Mongolian-owned business that employs newly immigrated Mongolians. Making sure they have a stable source of income and taking the burden of financial issues.