Valentina Harper, Flower Print Cards

What makes you grow and flourish, Valentina?

“I am a resilient flower.
I need creativity and bright spaces.
I grow in vibrant spaces.
I flourish in colorful places.”

Andrés Bustamante, Orquídea, Polypropylene sculptures

“I always think of the journey of the seed.
It’s small, full of potential, yet alone.
The seed is buried deep underground and forgotten. It’s cold. It’s wet. It cannot see the light of day.
It has to die.
Then one day the seed grows and grows and grows and just cannot help but be fruitful.
That seed is me. That seed is you.”

Turnip Green Creative Reuse, Dalia, Acrylic Print

Turnip Green Creative Reuse is a non-profit with a mission of fostering creativity and sustainability through reuse.

Cesar Virto, Flor de Maga, Photograph

“As a child my father would take the whole family to a construction site to help work. We all participated in doing something to help move the job faster. During early years we all did not know much about work, but we had ambition. Most of the time my siblings and I oversaw cleaning of the area.

If my father saw us fighting on the job site, the job description did get more rigorous. After finishing up each job site my mother would ask one of siblings to translate to the owner of the house if she could take a stem of a flower so she could replant it in her garden.

The flowers are still blooming at her house after all these years. I like flowers because they remind me of my mother, and it takes me back to those early memories when we first moved to the USA. ”

A.M. HASSAN, Daybreak Arts, Rose- Acrylic on canvas

Daybreak Arts is a social enterprise nonprofit that creates artistic and economic opportunities for people experiencing homelessness and housing insecurity by providing them access to creative resources needed to achieve personal fulfillment and success.

Elizabeth de la Peña, Flor de Izote, Watercolor and ink

Sarah Bennet, Estableciendo Raíces – Growing Roots, Mixed media installation.