About Maya

Class of 2026, English (Creative Writing)

From the Bay Area, CA. I love reading and writing. Anything non-fiction. I love taking photos (both analog and digital) and cannot live without music.

These are pieces I'm most proud of and that I've grown to love more overtime. They reflect different moments that I've observed or even staged in some cases, a lot of them having to do with relationships and adolescence.

I draw a lot of inspiration from the people around me and my observations of them. Media also influences me a lot—anything from literature, music, movies, art, or something I see on the street I will draw inspiration from.

I love working with photography because there's so much freedom within it. I enjoy taking candid and staged photos because they both work towards overall concepts or ideas I'm trying to represent in their own unique ways. It helps me capture things unsaid, better shown than written. In terms of poetry, I feel like it works similarly to photography as I'm trying to encapsulate not only an idea, but the feeling of that idea from my own perception.

I couldn't live without art! It's such a great way of expressing what goes unsaid in my mind and communicating that visually. A lot of what I make translates how I perceive what's around me, and sometimes that's better expressed through art and writing since I find it more provocative and engaging.

I've always love taking pictures on my dad's camera growing up, and that love has just grown so much more over time. As for writing, I've been doing that since I was really young writing all kinds of stories (usually left unfinished). Ever since coming to college, though, I've grown more interested in poetry. In the future, I hope to create projects involving both my photography and writing, combining visual and literary aspects.