Art has been a part of my life for as long as I can remember. I started creating when I was around four years old, and as I got older I was involved in Talented Art throughout school. For a long time, I thought art would always be part of my life, but not necessarily my career.

Eventually I stepped away from it and chose a different creative path. I went to cosmetology school and built a career in the beauty industry, mainly doing makeup and eyelash extensions. I still had an outlet for creativity, but painting wasn't really a part of my life anymore.

It wasn't until I got married and had my first son that I found my way back to it. I started painting again from home, and what began as something I simply loved doing slowly became something I could see myself pursuing seriously.

Life changed in a way I never could have prepared for when I lost my husband at 25 years old to cancer, while I was nine months pregnant with our second son. I stepped away from painting for a while. At that point, my focus was simply on my boys and learning how to move forward in a life that suddenly looked completely different than the one I had imagined.

Coming back to art has felt different this time.

Painting has become a place for so many parts of my life to exist. Sometimes what I create comes from grief or a memory. Sometimes it comes from something beautiful that catches my attention and makes me want to paint it. I love realism and the small details that make something feel alive, but I don't want to limit myself to one subject or one kind of work. I paint what I feel connected to.

Now I'm working toward turning something I've loved since I was a little girl into the career I once never imagined it could be. More than anything, I want to build a life that allows me to keep creating while also being home to raise my two boys.

There is something really meaningful to me about them growing up around my art and watching me build this from the ground up. I'm still figuring out where this career will take me, but I know why I'm doing it.

Every painting is another piece of that story.

- Jessie McQueen