Earlier this year, sophomore Charlotte Homer won a silver prize for her animation, an award she received from the Korean UCC Contest of San Francisco.

Ever since she could remember, Homer has had a long adventure with art, drawing since she was little.

“I’ve been doodling and drawing my whole life,” Homer said. “I enjoyed it when I was young, and it sort of stuck.”

Her stemmed partly from the mentorship she received from a fourth grade teacher, Patti Vargas.

“I used to doodle a lot. Ms. Vargas was the first teacher who appreciated it, and she actually asked me to keep drawing as long as I did my work, and she’d color in my drawings,” Homer said. “I remember feeling so appreciated.”

Homer’s Korean-Italian heritage has also influenced her dedication to art. The Korean UCC Contest of San Francisco, which she won the Silver Prize in, had a prompt of Beautiful Hangul, which was based on the Korean alphabet. Her work was an animation titled “Beautiful Hangul: Danbi”.

“[My animation] was inspired by my middle name, because I’m half Korean, and so I wanted to show how that is beautiful to me, and it follows the prompt.”

The contest started off stressful for Homer because she had a late start, but she enjoyed it nonetheless.

“It was inspiring and so exciting to create,” Homer said. “The whole ceremony was also amazing.”

With sports, clubs and additional classes to worry about, Homer sometimes struggles to squeeze in time for her art, but has tried to create a system that works for her.

“I wouldn’t say I balance it the best way,” she said. “Sometimes with sleep [I don’t balance my schedule], but I do [manage] by trying to work hard.”

Homer understands how hard it is to find time for art with so many other priorities in and out of school, but encourages people to motivate themselves to pursue it regardless.

“I have a lot of people I know who say, ‘I can’t draw’ or ‘I suck at this’,” Homer said. “But I really think that you can. You just have to be more confident in yourself.”

Reporting by Abigail Medeiros and Hailey Steed