RoxanneMorrison

Hi! My name is Roxanne Morrison, most of my friends and family call me Roxy. I am finishing up my LAST QUARTER at UCLA and I am giddy with excitement and just overwhelmed with finishing college (it took me 6 years because I took two years off to work). I am a Gender Studies major with a Theater Performance associates degree before I transferred. I consider myself a social activist and finished my senior thesis last spring researching the effects that the Prison Industrial Complex has on masculinity in inner city communities of color. I am deeply passionate about dismantling the Prison Industrial Complex and I, of course, am an avid feminist. Along with my social justice interest I was raised by my mother who was a sculptor, so I have always considered myself a modest artist because of her influence. I like to sketch with charcoal and pen and I am now dabbling with spray paint and oil. Overall, art is a lifelong long and therapeutic escape for me and I am thrilled to be studying Chicana art this quarter!

I grew up in an inner city El Salvadorian neighborhood of Chicago so La Virgen de Guadalupe was always around. My family is not Catholic, but many of my friends' were. I considered her an emblem of femininity, even before I knew what my femininity meant. She was less of a religious figure but more of an artistic element in street art and home decorations that I always remember was vibrant and colorful, as most of the women in my life are. I feel she represents far more than a Catholic story at this point, she is a cultural icon that provides a feminine grace and aesthetic to any environment she touches.